You Load 16 Tons, What Do You Get?
You Load 16 Tons, What Do You Get? was Originally Posted on July 26, 2014 by lavarock
Tennessee Earnie Ford made famous a song called “16 Tons” Video with the lyrics talking about loading 16 tons of coal and owing their soul to the company store. I remembered that song as I began loading 850 pounds of coffee cherry on the truck to have it processed.
When I was a DJ in the coal mining district of Kentucky, we moved our offices into town from the top of the mountain. That building was originally owned by the Consolidated Coal Company.
The town used to be “owned” by the coal company and that was fairly common throughout the area.
On my second stint at the radio station, I lived in that building in an apartment that took up 25% of that third floor. The radio station was on the second floor and shared that floor with an office that processed miners claims for black lung disease.
In our radio station offices, next to the DJ area was a large walk-in safe, reminiscent of a bank vault that was used to store coal company money and important papers. We used it to store our records and items because it was fireproof. One fun thing we did was lock ourselves in and break out. These vaults are easy to get out of, just not into.
When the recent movie “Coal Miners Daughter” was being filmed, there was a suggestion to use the radio studio in this building as one in the film, however the studio was too new to depict the one Loretta Lynn would have been in back in the day. It was decided to use a different station and I believe they used WNKY over in Neon for those shots.
One of those fellow DJ’s went on to work for the Post Office in Daytona Florida. Another moved nearby, became a teacher and coach and does sports commentary for local radio stations. Another went on to become a writes (among other things). Gayle and I spent some time driving around and I saw my first real coal mine thanks to him. He later did some writing and here is one of his remembrances. I like to think he remembered my Camaro when he mentions a Z28 but I never threw cans out to litter the countryside.
What got me thinking of Jenkins Kentucky today was loading 700 pounds of coffee cherry in the back of the truck and driving it up the mountain to be processed. “Up the mountain” was a common expression when I was in Kentucky because you either went UP or DOWN the mountain, there appeared to be no in between. I used to see horses standing on the hillsides and joked that two of its legs had to be shorter than the others.
I still remember many times back there. It seems so long ago and so far away.