Thursday, July 12, 2007

March to June 2007

On March 17th, Aurora Lights worked with lots of great folks to organize the Mountain Justice Concert in Charleston, West Virginia. The day before, there was a mass musical sit-in in Governor Manchin’s office in protest of the situation at Marsh Fork Elementary in Sundial, West Virginia. Articles and pictures of the protest can be found at http://www.ohvec.org/galleries/people_in_action/2007/03_16/index.html .
This is a picture of the Capitol Center in Charleston where the concert took place.



Sound Storm: Adam Chase, Jen Osha, Kate Jaworski, Abram Racine, Corey Bonasso, Dan Israel, Cory Chase, Daniel Facemire






In May, we traveled to New York as part of the coal-field delegation to the United Nations conference on sustainable development, during which residents presented their stories about Mountain Top Removal coal mining. This is a picture of the press conference that was held after the MTR summit. Larry Gibson is speaking.






We also worked hard to help organize a concert to benefit the fight against Mountain Top Removal at St. Mary’s Episcopal Church on 126th Street in Harlem. The church was packed with people listening to music. Jean Ritchie graced us with her music, and Robert Kennedy, Jr., came to speak as well.




The Hillkeepers: Abram Racine, Daniel Facemire,
Ross Bishop, and Jen Osha.


Director of Aurora Lights, Jen Osha, summer intern, Sam McCreery, and Coal River Mountain Watch intern, Bobby Mitchell, have started work in the Coal River Valley on a PGIS mapping project. Work on the mapping project includes taking interviews,
pictures, and collecting stories about areas and people affected by mountaintop removal mining. We are also hard at work on the second Moving Mountains CD. Jen Osha is shown in the photograph taking footage of a MTR site behind Marshfork elementary school.







Text by Jen Osha and Sam McCreery
Pictures by Sam McCreery

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