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From 1910 to 1955, the mines at Reliance produced coal for the Union Pacific Railroad. To staff these mines, people from a variety of countries were hired. During World War II there were not enough mine workers to extract the coal. People were brought in from Oklahoma and Arkansas and housed in railroad cars. Yet there were still not enough workers, and women entered the work force in the coal industry. Women had long been considered bad luck underground, and this superstition died slowly. One of the first places women found work was in the Reliance tipple. Working alongside men in the black dust, women sorted coal throughout the war years. Here, at the “picking tables” inside the Reliance tipple, dust-covered women sorted coal amidst the deafening noise of the now silent shaking screens. |
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