On Friday, September 18, 2015 at 11:25:34 AM UTC-5, Keyser Söze wrote:

I spent some time in the "confluence" of West Virginia, Ohio, and
Kentucky when I worked for The Associated Press. Once week, I was
covering a conference on Black Lung disease, and I recall several public
officials from Kentucky asserting there was no connection between the
coal dust the miners were ingesting and the disease.

I was there at the invitation of Isadore Buff:

I. E. Buff

Occupational health crusader Isadore E. Buff (August 27, 1908-March 14,
1974) was born in Utica, New York and moved to Charleston with his
parents later that year. He graduated from the University of Louisville
School of Medicine in 1931.

A cardiologist, Buff was the first physician to complain that the death
certificates of coal miners frequently listed the cause of death as a
heart attack when he contended that pneumoconiosis-- black lung disease
--placed such a burden on the heart that it was the precipitating cause.
Long before others spoke out, Buff was thundering that half of the
state's 40,000 coal miners had black lung and were being denied workers'
compensation. Early on, the Charleston Gazette chastised him
editorially. Then he took on the United Mine Workers for failing to
include any coverage of lung disease in their contract.

In the late 1960s, Buff was joined by Drs. Donald L. Rasmussen and Hawey
A. Wells Jr. in organizing a series of coalfield rallies. Buff, an
accomplished showman, was the star performer. He was one of the key
forces behind liberalizing the state workers' compensation law to cover
pneumoconiosis and the Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969,
which put a ceiling on the amount of coal dust allowed in the mines and
provided compensation for black lung victims. Buff died in Charleston.

This Article was written by Ken Hechler


Ken Hechler was a congressman I knew who, while I was in West Virginia,
ran a successful re-election campaign against a Republican who called
himself the Wayne County Whippoorwill. Ken also wrote a book about WWII
that was turned into a pretty good war movie.

Those were fun times in The AP.

Cool story, bro! i.e. who gives a ****?