Humbled By Hospitality In WV Mine Country

I have
been thinking a lot about the recent tragic accident here in my county,
Raleigh. It has touched everyone, every where I go. Signs are on every
business "Pray for our Miners and their families". Collections are
started, bands are doing benefits, churches are cooking benefit dinners
and people are being very generous. Sometimes when you live in this
kind of atmosphere, you can get too used to it and it doesn't touch you
like it should. The blog piece I've linked  http://worldofwonder-dave.blogspot.com/2010/04/humbled-by-hospitality-in-wv-mine_14.html  how it affects those not used
to us West Virginians! Be proud and never forget your heritage, your
Mountaineer Pride. We have something in this State that people are
searching everywhere for!

Saturday, April 10, 2010 at 4:45pm

A Massey Energy coal silo towers over Marsh Fork Elementary on April 6, 2010, near the Upper Big Branch Coal Mine in Naoma, W.Va. (AP Photo/Jeff Gentner) © 2010 AP

It would be embarrassing if it were not so humbling.

Hours after the West Virginia mine explosion Monday, scores of journalists from all over the country started arriving — in a very rural area with no communications or places to sleep closer than an hour's drive away.

When the governor began giving press briefings at Marsh Fork Elementary School (this week happens to be spring break, so the children are out), journalists began getting comfortable at the site a few miles from the mine entrance, and we never left. By Tuesday, a couple dozen satellite trucks filled the parking lot, and classrooms with tiny chairs and paintings on the walls were turned into newsrooms and bedrooms.

And all of a sudden there was food — a lot of food. Pepperoni Pizza. Pulled pork and beans. Fried chicken, potatoes and green beans. Cookies. Crackers. Doughnuts of all stripes.

Prengaman

Usually I lose a few pounds while covering stories like this. The deadlines are too tight, the access to food often limited. This time, I'll be going home a little rounder, and with a touched heart.

The food was cooked by residents and donated by businesses in this community. Some of it came by way of a local Red Cross, a Wal-Mart and a United Way, but even more was the home cooking of kind West Virginians who just wanted to take care of us.

Imagine, here we are, an aggressive and hard-charging bunch of journalists in the middle of this devastated community, and it's THEY who are taking care of US!

The kindness hasn't been lost on any of us. By Thursday, two plastic jars — "school collection" and "community collection" — were put out, and by Friday both had a few hundred dollars. I feel like we owe this school and these people so much more.

When I asked interim principal Shelly Prince how folks could be so giving at a time like this, she said that many felt it was soothing to help others. This situation made them feel helpless, and helping others was doing something. She also said it gave people a chance to show the world what West Virginians are "really like."

"Often on TV, we are not portrayed in such a good manner. We often are portrayed as ignorant and backward," she said. "But we are just ordinary people who live ordinary lives."

I have to disagree. These people are extraordinary.

Peter Prengaman, multimedia editor at the AP's South Desk in Atlanta, is in West Virginia to help cover the coal mine disaster.