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your granddaddy’s barn, the old home place, the meadow, forest and historyas they tumble down a spoil bank towards what for ten thousand years was agreen valley.

It can't be helped that under every one of those "valley fills" will be astreambed. I'd suggest you start soon taking pictures of Dodd Creek, Payne

Creek and Laurel Fork; Greasy Creek, Beaver Creek and Boothe Creek; IndianCreek and Mira Fork. The way I figure it, in the interest of the national good,we'll lose some 36 miles of clear, flowing water. But it's just water; think howmany bottles of it Slaughters will sell when our wells no longer are fed byground water that used to come from where there isn't any ground anymore.

But in spite of all these good things about the stripping away of ourmountaintops, it does have its downside for those folks who were beginningto think that scenery and tourism could become a significant source of jobsand revenue in the county.

Regrettably in this trade-off for the good of the nation (or at least a few in the

nation who own the mineral rights) the views from the new "high places" willbe of massive treeless scars where mountains are no longer. And our lazycrooked roads won’t be quaint and serene after the mining begins, what withthe day-and-night blasting and the convoys of bulonium-laden dump trucksthat rumble and belch along our back roads like a thing alive and angry.

& & &

Is this what-if imagined future far-fetched? Ask the folks in Kentucky and WestVirginia if their lives—their forest, streams, roads, air, wells, and culture—have changed for the better since Mountain Top Removal has come to takeaway mountains to get at their local balonium called coal.

Read this little piece again. Imagine it as really happening in the communityyou treasure, and listen to what your gut tells you.

Mine says this is the wrong way to treat human and natural communities. Mygut says that MTR is an unacceptable insult to the planet. And if they weremy mountains, if it were Goose Creek being threatened with valley fill, I’d bevery vocal. I’d tell those who make these decisions to abuse land and waterthat they must now find another way to mine coal while there are still highplaces and flowing streams and living communities yet to save.

FACT: Mountaintop removal has destroyed over 450 mountains andburied over 1,000 miles of streams throughout Appalachia, most inEastern Kentucky and West Virginia—places that unless we speak out will become national sacrifice areas.

We all live downstream. This IS our problem, too, every time we flip the lightswitch without counting the costs.

 No More High Places / Fred First 2 2/9/2008

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Recommended reading: kilowattours.org, ilovemountains.org andmountainjusticesummer.org

 No More High Places / Fred First 3 2/9/2008