In the Sweet By and By: Surviving in the coal fields of the Appalachian Mountains of Harlan County,

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In the Sweet By and By is a story about Emily, a mountain woman from the most poverty stricken area of Bloody Harlan County, KY in the Appalachian Mountains. Harlan is coal country, often called Black Diamonds. The coal industry also brought many hardships to those having to work in the mines. Many died from Black Lung due to not having protection from the coal dust. Emily was from a family of sixteen children and it is a poignant story of three generations of three pioneer women and how they survived the hardships of Harlan during the prohibition days. Emily was my mother and this story is about her, and how she crawled out the back window to elope with her true love. Her father served as Magistrate of Harlan County for twenty-nine years. Her mother was part Indian and had beautiful olive skin with shiny long black hair. Emily was only 2 ½ lbs when she was born, but she grew into a very strong, 4’ 11” and stood up to the toughest. Her life was filled with much love, and also much sorrow. None of her siblings died a natural death, and they were all buried among the trees high in the mountains in Kitts Cemetery in Harlan County. Her favorite brother, Woodrow, was killed by a black man that he had befriended many times. Her first sister, Sudie, was burned to death at the age of three when she caught her outing gown on fire from the fireplace. Her heart was broken when her youngest daughter, Carol, was murdered at the hands of a foster child. Mother’s doctor said she just put things in the back of her mind, stopped doing things and went into a form of dementia caused from great stress but which kept her from going insane. In the Sweet By and By was always sung at every funeral and there were many in the Howard family. This tender story is from the heart of my dear sweet mother’s own words she had recorded in an old spiral notebook. She birthed three girls, Shirley, Joyce and Carol. Emily’s husband was a coal miner and died at the age of 56 from Black Lung and mother remarried. She was married to of these men for twenty-eight years each and they both treated her like a China doll. From this old notebook I tell her tender, loving story. www.booksbyjoyceosbornwilson.com

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