COAL COUNTRY: _RO50370.NEF

Coal miner Phelan Napier and wife in their one-room cabin, Harlan, KY, 1978. Phelan is putting up his dukes, perhaps an early sign of his increasing hostility during my visit, leading up to his holding us all hostage at gunpoint for two hours while threatening to shoot his wife. He lived off disability checks, payment for injuries suffered in the mines. The emblem on his hat reads, “I dig Harlan Co (County) coal.” Jon Chase photo