Coal Mining in Britain | The story of mining from the coal face to the strike
Forty Minutes | Miners
A weekend in the lives of four Yorkshire miners.
CHANNEL | BBC 2
FIRST BROADCAST | 25 November 1982
DURATION | 39 minutes 45 seconds
FIRSTBROADCAST
1982
Synopsis
Four Barnsley miners escape from the harsh, subterranean world of the pit to enjoy a weekend of dancing, drinking, dog racing and caravanning. Set against the backdrop of the 1982 Falklands War and two years before the catastrophic 1984-5 miners' strike, this poignant documentary evokes the vanished world of life in a Yorkshire mining community.
Did you know?
Until the 1990s, mining was Barnsley's main source of employment and the closure of the pits led to huge job losses. In 1857, a mining disaster caused an enormous loss of life when an explosion at Lundhill Colliery occurred. The mine was flooded to put out the fire and 189 men and boys, some as young as ten, lost their lives in the accident.
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