Video Gallery
From 1974 to 1984, researchers conducted visual ethnography documenting coal mining history in the Rocky Mountain West. They conducted interviews on audio and video, collected approximately 12,000 historic photographs, and archived materials at the University of Colorado Archive.
Toil and Rage in the New Land
The first edited video ethnography, presenting coal mining history through participant accounts. The production incorporated historical photographs and film. A “Public Editing” section involved showing works-in-progress to coal town meetings for accuracy verification. The team included co-director Ronald McMahan, videographers Oliver Henry and Bill Loeffler, and editor Randall Vik, with funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities.
Out of the Depths
This program extends the narrative to the brutal 1913–14 strike culminating in the Ludlow Massacre. The team interviewed strike survivors, with most interviews completed in 1977 when subjects were in their eighties. Notable participants included Mike Livoda, a union organizer from 1913.
Out of the Depths — The Miner’s Story
Produced by Bill Moyers for PBS’s “A Walk Through the 20th Century,” this version condenses the researchers’ material to 58 minutes for broadcast distribution. It represents an important early instance of independent ethnographic work achieving national television exposure.
Hard Times Soft Coal
A work print examining post-Ludlow labor history, focusing on how the United Mine Workers of America was excluded from western mines. Coverage includes company unions, the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW), the 1927 Colorado strike, and the National Miners’ Union. Militia violence killed six picketers during this period.
Raw Steel Mill
Additional documentary footage from the coal mining and industrial labor research project, capturing the steel production process and the workers who operated the mills that processed raw materials from the western coalfields.
All materials are archived at the University of Colorado Archive.