Face Boss: The Memoir of a Western Kentucky Coal Miner by Michael D. Guillerman

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Synopsis

Face Boss tells a story that few people have heard: what it is really like to labor inside the dark and dangerous world of a vast underground coal mine. With unflinching honesty, as well as considerable humor and insight, Michael Guillerman recalls his nearly eighteen years of working as both a union miner and a salaried section foreman--or "face boss"--at the Peabody Coal Company's Camp No. 2 mine in Union County, Kentucky. Guillerman undertook this memoir because of the many misconceptions about coal mining that were evidenced most recently in the media coverage of the 2006 Sago Mine disaster. Shedding some much-needed light on this little-understood topic, Face Boss is riveting, authentic, and often raw. Guillerman describes in stark detail the risks, dangers, and uncertainties of coal mining: the wildcat and contract strikes, layoffs, shutdowns, mine fires, methane ignitions, squeezes, and injuries. But he also discusses the good times that emerged despite perilous working conditions: the camaraderie and immense sense of accomplishment that came with mining hundreds of tons of coal every day. Along the way, Guillerman spices his narrative with numerous anecdotes from his many years on the job and discusses race relations within mining culture and the expanding role of women in the industry. While the book contributes significantly to the general knowledge of contemporary mining, Face Boss is also a tribute to those men and women who toil anonymously beneath the rolling hills of western Kentucky and the other coal-rich regions of the United States. More than just the story of one man's life and career, it is a stirring testament to the ingenuity, courage, and perseverance oftheAmerican coal miner.

K. Pennavaria<br> - Park City Daily News

Mike Guillerman did a job for 18 years that most of us wouldn't want to do for even one day. He was a coal miner. And he loved it.
In his recently published book, Face Boss--The Memoirs of a Western Kentucky Coal Miner, Guillerman tells the gritty details of a workplace hundreds of feet underground, in caverns hollowed out by machinery. He and his almost exclusively male co-workers labored every day, round the clock, to mine a coal seam in western Kentucky's Union County for the Peabody Mine Company.
Despite the dangerous conditions, constant stress, and likelihood of serious respiratory problems later, at age 28 Guillerman gave up an adequate, if unexciting, job with Whirlpool to become a coal miner. His life's circumstances did not force him into the job; he chose it for the high wages and because it was challenging. Throughout his years as a miner, Guillerman rose from the lowest level to salaried crew supervisor, or "face boss." The job of face boss was stressful and demanding (Guillerman describes it as "walking a tightrope with a millstone around my neck"), but any higher position would have taken him out of the mines, and, as the author makes clear throughout the book, he never wanted that.
The book is dense with details about the personnel, equipment, and technology involved in "running" coal, i.e. cutting it from the face of a seam and transporting it to the surface. Only a few miners have ever recorded their experiences the way Guillerman has, so this account of his day-to-day activities has high value for future historians as well as for people today who want to know the details of coal mining. Especially interesting are the numerous pictures included in the book,all taken underground. Rarely has the book-reading public been granted such up-close access to the dirty and dangerous world of coal miners.
Guillerman tells some unsettling stories about hazing rituals among the miners, in which rookies are roughed up, sometimes to the point of serious injury, and about the almost-constant battles for dominance and superiority among the men. An already harrowing job became even more so when the macho posturing and puerile pranks of some miners put others in danger. The miners' hazing practices are far worse than anything a fraternity could come up with, but they seem to have served a purpose. Mining demands above-average physical, mental, and emotional toughness, and any man who could not take the hazing probably could not take the normal routine of mining either. By Guillerman's account, the miners he worked with were often careless with their health: most of them smoked, even down in the mines, where it was specifically forbidden by company policy (anyone who reported the infraction could expect to receive a beating from his co-workers).
The author was every bit a company man, and has nothing negative to say about the Peabody Coal Company, the miner's union (the United Mine Workers of America), or the mining industry as a whole. A self-confessed workaholic, he often worked ten to twelve hours a day, six days a week in the mine. He felt proud of his role in the mining operation, and writes in the book with unaffected poeticism, "I put my heart and soul into running coal."
But the grueling work took its toll: Guillerman suffered serious injuries to his wrist, shoulder, and back which eventually forced him to retire at age 46. A few years later, he was diagnosed with heart and artery problems as well as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). Today, almost two decades after his retirement from mining, he suffers from near-constant back pain and continuing respiratory problems. He is also a prostate-cancer survivor.
The author spends almost no time discussing the practices of mining company administration or speculating about the future of the industry; in fact, he seems indifferent to the fate of the coal once it has left the mine. Nor is the book an attempt to reveal awful truths about mine conditions. It is simply one man's recounting of his work activities and realities for 18 years. If someday human society has found an energy source which makes mining coal obsolete, then this book will become even more valuable for its firsthand, underground account of the life of one miner in one coal-producing state.

Biography

Michael D. Guillerman worked for the Peabody Coal Company from 1974 to 1991. Over his long career, his jobs included belt shoveler, timberman, shooter, drill and shuttle car operator, rock duster, and finally section foreman. Now retired, he lives with his wife, Marie, in Union County, Kentucky.