Appalachian History

Technically, on the Catholic Christmas season calendar, December 13 is The Feast of St Lucia. Over in Fairmont, WV on that day this year the local Italian community instead celebrated the Feast of the Seven Fishes.

This southern Italian feast is traditionally celebrated on Christmas Eve. It stems from the observance of the Cena della Vigilia, the wait for the miraculous birth of Christ in which early Christians fasted on Christmas Eve until after receiving communion at Midnight Mass. At one time, Rome was the farthest point north where ‘La Vigilia’ was celebrated, but today Italians throughout the world celebrate it.

Fairmont local son Robert Tinnell is a screenwriter, director and author whose book, "Feast of the Seven Fishes," inspired Fairmont’s city fathers to launch the local celebration, now in its fourth year.

"When I was kid, eating fish on Christmas Eve was just something you did," says Tinnell. "We never called it by name. I never even bothered to question why we did it, especially as I had not been raised Catholic. All I knew was that December 24th meant a delicious meal of exotic foods, cooked up by my ancient great-grandmother, Isabella Oliverio, on her wood-fired stove in the basement of her modest home in Rivesville, WV."

At least 11 percent of the population of Harrison, Marion, and Monongalia counties has Italian ancestry. The larger communities are in the vicinity of Clarksburg, Fairmont, and Morgantown respectively. Many Italians originally immigrated to West Virginia in the early twentieth century to work in the coal mines throughout the state.

Specialty glass factories in this region were largely an Italian immigrant industry with factories in Fairmont, Mannington, and Clarksburg. Italian stonemasons were also common in the early communities. So 'La Vigilia' clearly has an established place among West Virginia Christmas traditions.

Why seven types of fish for this Christmas feast? Some believe that seven fishes are served because it took God seven days to create the world, while others mention the Seven Hills of Rome. There is also the possibility that the seven fishes symbolize the seven sacraments in the Catholic Church, along with the seven sins, or the seven days it took Mary and Joseph to reach Bethlehem, or the seven of the twelve Apostles who were fishermen. Some say it is because it took God seven days to create the universe.

Some regions of Italy require three courses (the Trinity or three Wise Men), nine courses (the Trinity times three), twelve courses (the Apostles), thirteen courses (the Apostles, plus Jesus), or even 25 courses(for the days in the Christmas season).

The origins vary, depending on who you ask, but quite clearly, you did not eat meat on Christmas Eve since it was the birth of Jesus, and just as you would not eat meat on Good Friday, you would not eat meat on Christmas Eve. As midnight brings Christmas day, that is when you would start cooking the sausage for Christmas Dinner, and often the eating would go on until the late/early morning hours.

The people from Naples are famous for their elaborate spreads of cold shellfish cocktails and hot fish dishes, as well as the roasted peppers and antipasti. In most of the southern coastal regions in Italy and Sicily, seafood was abundant and so offered the perfect opportunity to work fish into the menu for this festive day.

Two fish most traditionally found on Christmas Eve menus across Italy are baccalà (salted cod) and anguilla (eel). Other popular fishes that are eaten on this special holiday are prepared versions of calamari, kale patties, oysters, scallops, whiting, clams, and shrimp. At the Feast of the Seven Fishes, the meal usually begins with antipasto, the Italian equivalent of hors d'oeuvres. This can include a variety of cold foods such as cheeses and raw or marinated vegetables.

The meal ends with any number of delectable desserts. One that is almost always present is panettone, the famous sweet cake-like Christmas bread that is eaten during the Christmas holidays.


Sources: www.sicilianculture.com/food/xmasfish.htm
http://bleedingespresso.com/category/uniquely-italian
http://statejournal.com/story.cfm?func=viewstory&storyid=47866
www.gomestic.com/Cooking/Traditional-Italian-Feast-of-the-Seven-Fishes.58592
www.incanto.biz/letters_-_xmas.html

At 10:20 a.m., December 6, 1907, explosions occurred at the No. 6 and No. 8 mines at Monongah, West Virginia. The explosions ripped through the mines at 10:28 a.m., causing the earth to shake as far as eight miles away, shattering buildings and pavement, hurling people and horses violently to the ground, and knocking streetcars off their rails. Three-hundred and sixty-two men and boys died. It remains the worst mine disaster in the history of the United States.

The Monongah Mines Nos. 6 and 8 were located on the West Fork of the Monongahela River, about six miles south of the town of Fairmont, West Virginia. The mines were connected underground and were considered model mines, the most up-to-date in the mining industry. Electricity was used for coal cutting machinery, locomotives were used to haul coal, and the largest areas of each mine were ventilated by mechanical fans.

For a time pandemonium reigned. Every local mine official was missing. It was impossible to fathom the nature and extent of the catastrophe, or to tell whether either mine was on fire or full of gas.

Soon after the explosion, four miners emerged through an outcrop opening, dazed and bleeding but otherwise unharmed. The stunned survivors could tell nothing of the fate of the others still underground.

With the hundreds of shrieking, half-crazed women and crying children came every man left in the town. Volunteers were willing and anxious to help with the rescue work.

Frantically, they cleared away the wreckage at the entrance and tried to force their way into the mine. They soon began to succumb to the toxic mine air and had to be rescued themselves.

The explosion filled the mine with "black damp", an atmosphere in which no human being could live. It blocked the main heading with wrecked cars and timbers, and demolished one of the fans, which greatly restricted ventilation.

Choking coal dust, rubble, and wrecked equipment impeded the progress of volunteer rescue teams. The No. 8 mine's huge ventilation fan had been destroyed, and a smaller fan was used to ventilate both mines. Brick stoppings, the partitions used to direct air through the mines, had been blown out. As rescue parties slowly advanced, they used canvas curtains to restore ventilation, dilute gas, and disperse dust.

At the bottom of No. 6 slope, debris from a wrecked trip was found scattered for 250 feet along the headings. Cars were smashed and piled on top of each other nearly blocking the entry. The trip had been pulled up the slope and stopped at the knuckle a short time before the explosion causing the coupling pin on the first car to break. The entire trip consisting of eighteen loaded two-ton cars went down the incline. The explosion occurred before the cars had gone into the pit mouth and before the trip had reached the bottom of the slope.

At 4:00 p.m., moaning was heard near a crop hole, and a rescuer was lowered through the hole on a rope. About 100 feet below, he found miner Peter Urban sitting on the shattered body of his brother, Stanislaus, staring glassy-eyed into space as he sobbed uncontrollably. He was the last survivor of the Monongah disaster.

Exhausted volunteers found conditions in the mines almost unbearable, heat was intense, and afterdamp caused headaches and nausea. In some headings, ventilation materials and bodies had to be hauled 3,000 feet over massive roof falls and wrecked machinery, mine cars, timbers, and electrical wiring. The stench of death was barely tolerable, and became overpowering as the search dragged on.

Searchers never lost sight of the fact that there might possibly be some men in the mine alive. They continued to explore all parts of the workings with all possible speed, leaving unnecessary work for another time.

Embalmers worked around the clock in shifts. Caskets lined both sides of the main street. The bank served as a morgue. Churches conducted funeral services several times a day as dozens of men dug long rows of graves on nearby hillsides. Disputes flared over identification of victims, and more than once, a body was claimed by two families.

By December 10, the number of people killed was over 175. It was obvious to most rescue workers, but not to relatives of missing men, that Peter Urban would be the last man to be brought out alive. By Thursday, December 12, all workings had been ventilated and searched and 337 bodies recovered. Twenty-five more victims were found during cleanup operations.

A special graveyard, soon filled, was laid out on a bleak hillside. Company houses flanked the burial ground. Rows of open graves were dug in the sodden, half-frozen, rain-drenched and snow-flecked West Virginia soil.

The 362 casualties of Monongah's coal mine disaster left more than 1,000 widows and children.

The Marion County Coroner's Jury, after hearing from numerous witnesses, concluded the victims of the disaster died from an explosion caused by either a blown-out shot or by ignition and explosion of blasting powder in Mine No. 8.


"Mining Disasters - An Exhibition," Mine Safety and Health Administration; online at www.msha.gov/DISASTER/MONONGAH/MONON3B.asp