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Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781452070339 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | AuthorHouse |
| Publication date: | 09/21/2010 |
| Pages: | 172 |
| Product dimensions: | 6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.40(d) |
Read an Excerpt
The B'Beaker Boys
By Bill Walker
AuthorHouse
Copyright © 2010 Bill WalkerAll right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4520-7033-9
Chapter One
The B'Breakerboys
Pennsylvania was a major source of coal for the last 200 years. Most active mines are gone, but left behind are dangerous, abandoned mines, with open shafts, underground fires and water pollution. The B'Breakeboys is a fact based story about child labor conditions, until 1920 in the coal mines, when new child labor laws restricted such practice. The factual is followed by a fictional story about two teen age boys falling into an abandoned coal mine shaft. They are not alone and have to fight desperation, cave-ins, rats, fire, water, and old dynamite to escape. The format is a movie script embedded with drawn storyboard picture frames.
After large pieces of coal were crushed and dumped, The bare handed boys Breaker boys picked waste slate and rock from the sliding coal under them. The Bossman kept the boys awake with a cane pole, working twelve to fourteen hours a day, six days a week, paid twenty five cents a day.
THE B'BREAKERBOYS
FADE IN: AERIAL OVER AN AIRPORT, SMALLTOWN, PA AND INTO THE MORGAN HOME
1990 GRANDPA B'BILLY MORGAN TELLS STORY TO HIS GRANDCHILDREN
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.) This is a coal mining story. Coal mining has existed in our world a long, long time! Thousands of years! GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.) Just imagine, millions of years ago.... a prehistoric family, huddling around a small fire with burning tree branches. Suddenly, One of the cave-men, while poking a burning stick into the flames, gets excited. GRANDPA B'BILLY(VO) (grunting Cave-man dialect) Ummmm! Black rock in fire burn! Get more black rocks! Coal was discovered and coal mining began! GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.) Pennsylvania was unpolluted, skies were blue, the land was covered thick with high green grasses, with thick forests of tall trees. (pause) until the industrial revolution came in the 1700's. By 1940 skies were most often gray.
Evaporating WHITE PUFFS OF STEAM from operating train engines and steam boilers on the ground.
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.) We humans have used coal more and more, and when the industrial revolution came in the seventeen hundreds, coal became very valuable. GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.) Coal was not just for home use, but for industry, in steel mills, ships of all kinds, on the ocean and steam engines of trains and tugboats on the rivers of the world, carrying passengers and supplies and COAL.
INDUSTRIAL SMOKE
STEEL, ROLLING AND FABRICATING MILLS LINE THE RIVERS. DARK SMOKE RISES FROM THE OPERATIONS.
SUPER: 1900
The steel mills, coke ovens, manufacturing of all kinds crowd both sides of the rivers of Pittsburgh.
The river below us is busy with TUG AND BARGE TRAFFIC.
We see trains on both sides of the river with coal, slag, formed ingots and rolls of steel being pulled by SMOKE spilling steam engines.
ADVANCING AIR SHOT UP RIVER
The air is clogged with SMOKE and pollution. The river below us is active with tug and barge traffic.
SUPER: 1937
We see on both sides of the river, with loaded cars, coal, slag, formed ingots and rolls of steel being pulled by SMOKE puffing steam engines.
ACTIVE COAL MINING OPERATION - DAY
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
Coal became King Coal, and it had to be mined. Coal mining became BIG Business!
The smoke and dust disburse along the river, revealing a large coal mining operation. The BREAKER building is a huge, wedged shaped building standing against the mountain.
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
In the breaker building, the mined coal, was crushed into useable sizes, mixed with waste. One of the jobs was picking slate and rocks out of the coal. The boys that did it were called BREAKERBOYS!
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
Eight to eighteen years old, the boys worked twelve to sixteen hours a day, six days awake for twenty five cents a day.
BOSSMAN
INT. BREAKER - DAY
Twenty year old TIM, the overseer, called BOSSMAN, is in charge of the slate picking BREAKERBOYS. He wields a long CANE POLE.
Tim walks between the raised wooden, laddered rows of boys, seated, who work bare handed. We look closer at the working hands, some are BLOODIED.
Using the cane pole, Tim taps all the boys with the pole, while urging them stay awake and work.
TIM (YELLING)
Stay awake boys, pickin' nat coal! We lost Elmer yesterday! He got squashed in the chute when he fell asleep!
WALT, the forty year old, bearded, with a left eye patch, is the miserable top foreman of all. He brandishes a bull whip, approaches, unseen by Tim, snapping the whip.
WALT (yelling)
Stay awake yourself Tim!
CRACK! CRACK! Over the heads of the boys He CRACKS the whip behind Tim' head. Tim ducks at the sound of the CRACK.
TIM Dammit Walter! Boss! Don't do that! Walt rolls the whip up and tries to give it to Tim. Tim refuses the whip. WALT Use this, Tim! A good sting'll keep 'em awake! TIM I won't use the whip! I didn't like it when I was pickin' slate! And I sure don't like it now! WALT We lost that boy yesterday Tim. You lose another, you're back below in the mine!
Walt stalks away. Tim returns to his task.
Tim walks among the boys. To one side, a boy, O'Brien, is nodding off and falls asleep, and falls into the flow of coal and slate in the chute below.
THE Boys
O'Brien fell! O'B Fell!
Fire bell RINGS - high-pitched alarm SOUNDS - all work stops the flow of remaining coal and slate continues down the chutes.
All the boys stand and look toward the scream and see O'Brien, SCREAMING, traveling down in the chute, waving his arms, trying to stop, grabbing the sides of the chute. Two boys try to help, but they're not strong enough to help O'Brien.
Tim throws his cane pole, runs and leaps, knocking boys aside as he desperately tries to get to trapped boy.
Tim manages to spring ahead of the sliding O'Brien. He straddles across the chute and reaches below catching Boy under his arms and pulling him out safely.
TIM
I gotcha O.B.! I gotcha!
The boy is all right, bent over, hands on knees, standing on a bench, he is balanced and held gently by Tim! Tim gently pats the boy's back.
TIM (yelling)Back to work Boys!
He's ok! O.B.'S O.B.'S OK!
ALL THE BOYS CHEERING (ad libs)
FIRE BELL RINGS - BOYS SITTING - WORK RESUMES
PAN AWAY TO BREAKER BUILDING.
THE BREAKER BUILDING
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
The breaker building was the heart of the coal mining operation above ground. It stands like a prehistoric monster, preying on the land around.
The BREAKER BUILDING a huge, wedged shaped building, sits on the side of a mountain. It is black as coal with dust. It rises eighty feet, and is two hundred feet square at the bottom.
Coal dust rises out of the many missing windows. The remaining windows are dirty and unclear.
On the slanted mountain side of the Breaker Building, a double-tracked incline runs from a coal mine tunnel OPENING to the top of the Breaker.
MORPH TO LIVE ACTION
AERIAL: OUTSIDE BREAKER BUILDING
We see the coal mining operation. Many structures, including large shafts extending skyward, dark smoke and steam are exhausted from a building away from the mine opening.
AERIAL AWAY FROM THE COAL MINING OPERATION
THE "PATCH" COAL COMPANY HOUSING
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
The Coal Company provided housing for the Miners and their families. It was called the Patch, called so because most of the families had small patches of gardens Period dressed family members move about the patch
The Company housing community called the PATCH, over one hundred dirty, wooden, two story, small houses. They are close, side by side, with un-fenced common back yards. An outhouse lies half way between the back of the houses in the joined yards servicing the opposing houses.
Individual water pumps stand close behind each home, with wash tubs beneath. Some of the homes have HANGING WASH, FLOWING, drying on clotheslines.
In front of the houses is a coal dust road. At one end of the road, stands a small wooden schoolhouse. At the other end of the road, widely separate from the houses, is the Company Store, and well beyond the store, stands the coal mine owner's home, a large three story. Victorian.
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
The Company also provided a Company Store, where the miner's families could buy their needs with company issued script money.
CLOSE ON: COMPANY STORE
CLOSE ON: MIFFLIN COAL COMPANY STORE (SIGN)
It is five times the size of a Patch houses. It is fronted with dirty glass windows on either side of the front door.
There are posters of produce products for sale in the windows. A wide, raised wooden plank sidewalk with steps on both ends extends the front of the store. A hand railing stretches the length of the sidewalk. Some women with children and miners use the sidewalk and the steps and the front door of the store.
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
But the heart of the coal mining operation was the Breaker Building.
AERIAL TO COAL OPERATION
BREAKER BUILDING
Stands like a vigilant monster.
REAR OF BREAKER BUILDING INCLINE
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
At the rear of the Breaker Building, a double-incline connects the mine
SOUNDS of activity of workers shouting out orders, coal cars clanking and squeaking, rolling on steel rails and the CRUSHING of coal.
CABLE DRAWN CARS
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
All kinds of activity takes place around and in the Breaker. Coal and slate loaded carts come from the Mine. Their loads are dumped into the crusher at the top of the incline.
Overloaded coal cars travel up one set of tracks up the incline. Empty cars return down into the mine on the other set of tracks and enter the mouth of the coal mine.
OVERLOADED CARS DUMPING
SOUNDS of the activity. The cars reach the top, they dump their loads into the CRUSHER.
The empty cars travel down on a track on the other side of the incline, beside the 'up track' down into the Mine.
Coal dust BILLOWS from the incline where it joins the Breaker at the top and SPEWS from broken windows.
CUT TO:
EXT. OTHER SIDE OF BREAKER BUILDING
STEAM ENGINE TRAIN #1
On the opposite side of the Breaker (from the mine incline) at ground level is a PUFFING, CHUGGING steam engine train pulling a long line of railroad cars loaded with crushed coal away in an endless procession.
STEAM ENGINE TRAIN #2
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
The coal, now sorted, is carried away by train. The waste, culm, is hauled away and piled, making mountains of waste material.
We see a coal laden train moving in one direction, and a waste loaded train moving slowly in the opposite direction, PUFFING AND CHUGGING to the mountainous, multicolored CULM (waste) piles.
The train moves across the culm trestle, dumping the waste, the waste cascades down the side of the pile, enlarging the culm mountain.
CULM PILES
The piled high slate and rock waste surround the of the mining operation.
SPREADING CULM
The waste is spread by workers, leading mules, pulling chained spreading boards back and forth. Reaching the edges of the piles, waste cascades down the sides of the culm mountain.
CULM WASTE
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
The miner's families, wives and children, picked small pieces of coal from the waste piles for their personal use at home. Miner's wives and children, bent over, move up and down the sides of the culm piles, scavenging small pieces of coal out of the , putting it in baskets, buckets, wash tubs, and aprons for home use.
ELEVATOR AND VENTILATION SHAFTS
At the mine's entrance, were elevator and ventilation shafts.
Closer we see the TWO BLACKENED, FIFTY-FEET-HIGH, SQUARE TOWERS, the elevator and ventilation shafts, surrounded by moving WORKERS AND EQUIPMENT, shoveling, carrying tools. Coal miners enter and leave the towers at their bases.
DARK SMOKE
SMOKE PLUMES skyward from the ventilation shaft, the smoke comes from the coal fired furnace pumps deep below at the bottom of the shaft, inside the mine, sucking fresh into the mine.
VENTILATION SHAFT TOWER
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
The flags showed the air flow from the mine, in or out.
TWO DIRTY FLAGS flow upwards from the top of the ventilation tower, indicating the air from below is flowing out of the mine.
ELEVATOR SHAFT
GRANDPA B'BILLY (V.O.)
And on the elevator shaft flags indicated the air fresh air flowing down into the mine.
We see the elevator, the entrance to lower levels of the mine, On either side of the opening to the shaft stand two, small, dirty flags flow downward into the elevator shaft, indicating fresh air is being drawn into the mine.
METAL CAGE
We see worn faces of young and old miners standing in the cage. Their caps are affixed with carbide lamps, and they carry lunch pails. The faces reflect from hard work and exposure to bad conditions below.
The cage descends. The miners are lowered in a metal cage suspended by cables. The cables roll on a exposed large turning wheel above.
The cage and the men in it disappear down into the shaft. The miners make the best of it by SINGING.
ELEVATOR MINERS
Down in 'na coal mine, deeper'n the sea, I seen the devil, and he seen me.......
(SINGING FADES as the cage is lowered out of sight.)
CUT TO: EXT. BACK OF BREAKER - INCLINE
Pulled by the incline's cable, a train of coal cars, over loaded, piled high with large chunks of coal and slate mix, move, RUMBLES upward and out of the mine on the rails of the incline. Empty cars descend on a the second pair of rails. Each dirty car has the same sign.
CLOSE ON: MINE OPENING BLACK TUNNEL
Activity NOISE, cars moving, steam WHISTLES in back ground is loud.
We are on board of a descending empty car.
NOISE OF Traveling, BUMPING, WOBBLING down the incline, we enter the dark yawning mouth, the opening of the coal mine tunnel.
INT. MINE TUNNEL - DIM
In the mine, overloaded cars are drawn the opposite way up the incline to the Breaker. Wheels of the cars RUMBLE and SQUEAK on the steel rails.
MINE (menacing) MOANS, groans, cracking, water dripping
TUNNEL - MOVING DEEPER into the mine, the walls and ceiling of the tunnel in flickering light are a blend of BLACK SHINY COAL, slate, rock, and dirt.
Loaded with coal, linked cars pass in the opposite direction, back up the incline, dragged by cables.
Dirty, smeared, ELECTRIC LIGHTS bulbs light the ceiling of the descending tunnel. Deeper, DARKER ...
MINE Moooooan, creeeeeak, hoowwwl!
RAILS COME TO MINE HEAD
We come to the working area of the Mine. Deep in the Mine, WATER RUNS down the black shiny walls.
We pass loaded cars and laboring mules going in opposite direction. The mule is led by a driver, a boy.
WATER FLOWS beside the tracks with the downgrade of the tunnel.
MINE TUNNEL - DIM
We move deeper into the mine darkness.
MINER'S LAMP LIGHTS
Miner's burning cap lamp's appear, dancing in the dark like FIREFLIES.
CLOSE MINER'S FACES
The lamp lights grow as we close on LIGHTING the workmen's dirty faces and tunnel's walls.
The row of loosely wired electric lights FLICKER.
On the other side of the tunnel, loaded cars are being hooked up to the moving cable. As they are connected, the cars lurch away to the Breaker.
Farther along, mules, being led by teen-age Boys, are pulling loaded cars to the hook up connection.
Continuing along are the mules, returning down into the mine being led to a side tunnel and out of sight.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from The B'Beaker Boys by Bill Walker Copyright © 2010 by Bill Walker. Excerpted by permission of AuthorHouse. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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