Let me tell you about why I am not surprised why that gunman walked in to New Life Temple and tragically and coldly took 11 lives .
If you spend any time around the Jewish or African American Communities around Pittsburgh You will here the term Pittsburgh Mississippi . No not a town in the state of Mississippi.
They are referring to The City of Pittsburgh and how they feel living here like its a city in the deep south . I know exactly how they feel.
Even Thou I have not one drop of Jewish Blood in my body I do have a last name with a Jewish spelling this came about because when my Grandfather Markowitz came from the Ukraine he could sign his name and was automatically thought to be Jewish not the son of a peasant farmer by immigration officials on Ellis Island . Most peasants could only make there mark on papers and not sign full name.
Having the last name Markowitz I have felt the full effect of Antisemitism in this city even being called a kike on the job and denied employment in the trades or felt or heard on the job..
Something I have never experienced or felt outside of the Pittsburgh region or many states I regularly travel.
It has been so bad at times I had to take the Penn Hills #224 Volunteer Fire Dept before the Pa. Human Relaxations Commission. because of those Anti Semites who where in the dept. who tried to hurt me knowing I had a bad leg and they put a smashed pop can in my fire boots and even small nails.
You just need to ride around Penn hills and Plum Boro and you will find over a dozen homes flying confederate flags .
Travel up US 22 to Blairsville on the weekend to Jonnet Flea market and inside and some times outside you will find vendors selling KKK emblems and stickers and other memorabilia I have even seen Buddy Black and George Foster known KKK leaders walking around the market at times.
Did you know W Pa. has one of the highest concentrations of hate groups and membership in the country ? Look it up.
I was recently at a customers business who has a large ware house on Neville Island and who has several African Americans who work and drive for them I have became friendly with them over time and when I walk in they say high we shake hands ask how things are going etc. and a Driver from an outside vendor walked up to me and asked me why I was being friendly with that N word .
He was told to get in his truck and leave Im over 6ft 200 pounds so he did not give me an argument I wont tolerate it and neither will my customers .
When I got gas this summer at a gas station in Penn Hills a white man walked up to me after seeing a young African American girl cut off another driver and he goes to me did you see that? I said yes he then goes into a explicit speech about her being to dumb to be a slave they would have just killed here down south. I said her being inconsiderate has nothing to do with her race and I did not appreciate his words. He turned and left before I leveled him.
I once did work for a real estate company in Oakland section of Pittsburgh and when I heard antisemitic statements coming out of the owners mouth about Cheap Jews at. Then one day he asked me where I lived I said Penn Hills he said he moved and wondered how I could let my wife shop at the giant Eagles with all those blacks and was I worried about it. I told him no im not a bigot and never took another job off him.
Its a shame all the nasty bigotry I hear and see almost weekly in this are something I never see once I am out of Western P.a.
So was I surprised when New Life Temple was shot up? not at all knowing the amount of White Trash and human POS pieces of shit that live around me. in this area.
What breeds it I do not know because you are not born a racist ,but I do know we also have a high amount of those with mental Health issues in this are which causes the paranoia . Maybe it something in the water and ground after all the years of pollution spoiling it. But its more peoples own failings and wanting to blame somebody for something because they are a failure.
They knew how many Horses and donkeys they lost but not how many Coal Miners. The Tragic Story of the Worst Industrial Accident and loss of life in the US in the little town of Monongah Wv.
I visit the small quiet and unique town of Monongah West Virginia several times a year as I take care of one of the oldest AM Radio broadcasting sites in the state WMMN 920 AM " The Ticket" owned by LHTC Laurel Highlands Total Communications of WV. built in 1927
Riding thru the old coal mining town you would never suspect it was once the scene of extreme carnage and grief or that it played its part in the worst industrial accident in the united states in 1907,
that is till you drive by the town hall and there you find the 3 monuments to the tragedy
The town is quiet today with some boarded up old business in the main section of town and a few old business that still operate along US 19 But this was not the case on
6th of December 1907 in what would be the deadliest year ever for loss of coal miners lives.
Officially 361 miners lost their lives that day in shaft 4 and 6 of the monongah mine but the toll was much higher as many as 461 graves where dug for the miners many children and relatives who went into the mines that day to help the person hired by the mine so there was no record of them being there
4 miner escaped the mine but later died of injury's.
It was aprox. 10:20 am on a cold winter morning when the explosion in the Fairmont Coal company's Monongah 6&8 Shafts erupted shaking the entire town and lifting it nearly a foot windows where broken as far as Fairmont 10 miles away almost the entire upper part of the town was destroyed from all the shaking. There was total chaos all the local mining officials where missing or killed luckily it was the feast of St. Nicholas and many of the miners being of Italian Heritage had taken the day off and went running to the mine some tried to rescue the trapped miners and quickly fell dead to the deadly gases. The streets where soon filled with coffins as help quickly arrived by train , trolley and wagon from nearby mining towns . Fairmont Mining would not pay for head stones for the miners and where less than cooperative in helping the surviving families.
Riding thru the old coal mining town you would never suspect it was once the scene of extreme carnage and grief or that it played its part in the worst industrial accident in the united states in 1907,
that is till you drive by the town hall and there you find the 3 monuments to the tragedy
6th of December 1907 in what would be the deadliest year ever for loss of coal miners lives.
4 miner escaped the mine but later died of injury's.
This was just one of many horrific story's to come out of this tragedy you will read when you do a google search of the disaster including the fact when they went back in to once again mine they would find body parts and just rebury them in the mine. The mining Company did not give one dam about the immigrants.
However it did lead to better enforced safety rules in mines and this lead to fewer deaths each year.
Mining today is by far safer than it ever has been and tragedy's like Farmington still happen when rules are ignored and not enforced.
:As a side note. Did you know that Pepperoni Rolls where invented by the coal miners of WV as a way to carry a nutritious lunch which held up in the mines instead of taking in a loaf of bread and sausage.
The Duquesne Limited - A Horrific Train Tragedy you never heard of in Fayette County Pa.
Maybe because it happened so long ago and in such an isolated area of Fayette County most people would be hard pressed to have even known such a train route existed or such a tragedy which killed nearly 70 ever happened but it did.
It was 7:45 PM December 23 ,1903 and the pride of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad the Duquesne Limited only 3 years into its routes service ,was on its exclusive run from Pittsburgh to New York with an important stop in Connelsville which it never made it would meet its fate in the Laurel Run area curve about 2 miles from Dawson when a train going the opposite direction or directly in front of it lost its load of lumber and was blocking the tracks . The engineers running the train full bore at 60 mph into the sharp curve never had a chance to stop it the entire crew was killed instantly and engine and cars scattered all over the tracks in a mass of busted wood and the fire which resulted from the engine crashing. It was a horrific scene for the survivors and those who attempted to rescue those hurt.
This was one of just many horrific Train, Trolley and Coal Mine accidents to happen that year as America was expanding and the Industrial Revolution was in full swing and people paid for it in sweat and blood and some times even their lives.
It was 7:45 PM December 23 ,1903 and the pride of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad the Duquesne Limited only 3 years into its routes service ,was on its exclusive run from Pittsburgh to New York with an important stop in Connelsville which it never made it would meet its fate in the Laurel Run area curve about 2 miles from Dawson when a train going the opposite direction or directly in front of it lost its load of lumber and was blocking the tracks . The engineers running the train full bore at 60 mph into the sharp curve never had a chance to stop it the entire crew was killed instantly and engine and cars scattered all over the tracks in a mass of busted wood and the fire which resulted from the engine crashing. It was a horrific scene for the survivors and those who attempted to rescue those hurt.
This was one of just many horrific Train, Trolley and Coal Mine accidents to happen that year as America was expanding and the Industrial Revolution was in full swing and people paid for it in sweat and blood and some times even their lives.
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| Grave of Priest Killed while Traveling on the train |
I do not know if you can visit the site,the tracks are still active in that remote area but you can view it from across the Yough River on the Great Allegheny Rails Trail I could find no info on a memorial of any kind about the wreck I can find. .Such a horrific act you would think it would have been better remembered like the nearby Darr Mine explosion.
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