The message from the Rally for the Mountains couldn’t be clearer: West Virginians will not tolerate mountaintop removal and together will stop this massacre of our heritage and future. Over 20 speakers, delivered this message to a crowd estimated at over 500 people.

This rally, organized by the Ohio Valley Environmental Coalition (OVEC), was held Jan 30th in Charleston on the Capitol grounds. People came from every corner of the state to attend. They came to share their feelings of rage and frustration over mountaintop massacre and to learn what they can do to help end the destruction of West Virginia’s coal-bearing mountains, life-giving streams and coalfield communities.

One of the wonders of the rally was the large display of "tombstones" fashioned from pasteboard, the work of Carol Jackson. (And I do mean work!) Each tombstone represents a mountain, a named stream or a town destroyed by mountaintop removal and valley fill.

OVEC’s Janet Fout opened the rally with the theme: United we can stop mountaintop removal! As she spoke, about 60 members of the Methodist Federation for Social Action (MFSA), carrying their banner, marched in.

Secretary of State Ken Hechler teamed up with George Dougherty (the Earl of Elkview) to sing "Almost Level, West Virginia" and other songs that movingly portray the destruction the coal industry euphemistically calls mountaintop mining. John Taylor, a member of the MFSA, wondered about the hearts of the governor (who, amazingly, claims membership in the Methodist Church) and coal companies. He said, "Their hearts are in their checkbooks, and they’re gaining by the destruction of sacred places." John reminded us that "United we stand, divided we fall. We will win. We will surely win." Norm Steenstra noted recent polls show that two-thirds of West Virginians want mountaintop removal stopped or severely curtailed.

Native daughter, novelist Denise Giardina drew cheers that rang across the Kanawha when she said, "They came in here and stole our land, killed a hundred thousand miners, polluted our streams, ground our roads into dust with their coal trucks, and then they have the nerve to tell us that they should be able to destroy our mountains because they have created jobs. Well, the Mafia creates jobs, the Columbian (sic) drug cartel creates jobs, and pimps create jobs," Giardina said. "And they all create jobs the same way -- by exploiting the people they employ. King Coal has reigned in West Virginia for 100 years. King Coal is dead. Long live the people of West Virginia!"

Children in costumes of mountains, trees, critters, and big, bad coal barons gathered to act out a skit about the death of the beautiful hills of West Virginia. Carol Jackson narrated the story of the peaceful mountains and all their blessed creatures blasted to oblivion by mountaintop removal. She said we will tell our legislators: "You won’t get our approval, til you stop mountaintop removal!"

Blair resident Carlos Gore called the mountaintop removal sites near his home "postcards from hell."

West Virgina Highlands Conservancy activist Cindy Rank said the laws we have now are loosely applied and poorly -- if at all -- enforced. Only we can stop the devastation she said, so "Bring a carload of people to the next rally. Write letters, and tell your friends and your neighbors."

Larry Gibson asked everyone to come for another rally on April 24. "It’s got to be bigger than anything you have ever seen," he said. "That way the message may begin to sink in to our elected officials. These people can be replaced come voting time." Blair resident Jimmie Weekly agreed, "We are the voters. We can vote them out of office."

Speakers from the WV Environmental Council, Kentuckians for the Commonwealth, WV Rivers Coalition, Concerned Citizens’ Coalition, Coal River Mountain Watch, the Kentucky Chapter of the Sierra Club and a student from Marshall University shared that message with the crowd.

Frank Young, President of the West Virginia Highlands Conservancy, put the situation in perspective as regards the state’s present leadership. He thundered out for the assembled throng to hear,

"We will have traded our wealth for hollow promises. This bitter lesson is already well established in West Virginia history. That our governor would tolerate, even promote, this sham and destruction is nothing short of official malfeasance.

Governor Underwood is the one who should be impeached!"

The event’s media coverage helped send our message across the state, and to Kentucky as well. It made front page news in a Lexington Herald Leader article, which reported that "nearly everyone involved in mining issues in Kentucky, from environmentalists to state regulators to coal operators, has watched as the MTR controversy grew to huge proportions in West Virginia, then slipped west across the border."

No one should have to face the senseless death of a childhood mountain. See you, and a carload of your friends, in April. In the meantime, keep the energy of the rally close at hand as your write those letters and demand a halt to mountaintop massacre.