Monarch Mine Issue
SUPERIOR HISTORICAL COMMISSION SUPERIOR HISTORIAN VOLUME 4, ISSUE 2 FALL/WINTER 2006 DECEMBER, 2006 DEATH AND “One of these mornings you’re The roster of the lost men is as follows: DEVASTATION IN THE going to see the Monarch blow,” Tom Stevens, Louisville DEPTHS: THE disaster survivor Nick Del Pizzo Ray Bailey, Broomfield once said to his sister. Oscar Baird, Rickard’s Camp MONARCH MINE Tony Di Santis, Louisville EXPLOSION oil and grease machinery, test for Steve Davis, Louisville gases, and get the mules ready and in Kester Novingger, Broomfield Eight Die, One Never Found place for the day shift. Leland Ward, Monarch Camp in 1936 Disaster The rescue teams were hampered Joe Jaramillo, Monarch Camp in their attempts to rescue the “Some of the men were discovered Constant, short shrieks of a mine stranded miners due to the presence seated on the floor of the mine, their steam whistle broke the silence of a of the “after damp” or “black damp,” a equipment at their side, their faces crisp winter’s morning January 20, deadly mix of carbon dioxide and turned toward their lamps, as if to 1936. It was a sound no one connected nitrogen. Rescuers didn’t want to risk watch the flame burn out with the with coal mining ever wanted to hear making the disaster worse, but eight creeping presence of carbon dioxide, because it signaled an emergency and men remained unaccounted for. the black damp,” is the description by probable disaster in the mine. Officials, family, friends, and fellow author Phyllis Smith. Tragically, the The word spread that there had miners milled about the mine entrance, body of Joe Jaramillo was never found.
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