Five Hundred miners went to Heaven, December 6, 1907 Well, Monongah was the coal town's name From the native tongue is where it came For it was the indian word for blood which would prove quite fitting soon enough Well, the miners knew the ground was haunted With the name Monongah the natives taunted Who knows what evil those boys found While digging deep down in the ground The rescuers they couldn't breathe After fifteen minutes they had to leave 'Cause you just can't breathe in the afterdamp Carbon Monoxide have a sample Shaft number 6 and Shaft number 8 are connected by ducts that ventilate but which also act as a path of breath for a coal-dust-methane-hellish-fiery death! As I toil through the firedamp Well I can't afford a Davy Lamp I smell the gas I see the spark Then scorched I choke in the drowning dark The earthen tomb is mighty cold For a dozen boys of twelve years old How could a nightmare like this happen? I guess I should've stuck to trapping. No, it wasn't a Native American curse, the real situation was certainly worse Complicit in the mine's creation was Fairmont Coal, and Consolidation and rest assured that the company mine would be reopened in one month's time By boys like me scraping tooth and nail While Two-Hundred-Fifty widows moan and wail! And Monongah was the coal town's name From the native tongue is where it came For it was the Indian word for blood Which would prove quite fitting soon enough. Five Hundred miners went to heaven... December 6, 1907