Change in the Coalfields: A Podcast by Coalfield Development
Change in the Coalfields: A Podcast by Coalfield Development
Jacob Hannah
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This week we have a virtual conversation with Coalfield's very own, Jacob Hannah. Jacob is the conservation coordinator for Coalfield Development and is a huge asset to our work in Appalachia.
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This is Change in the Coalfields, a podcast by Coalfield Development, all about change in Appalachia. What change has happened, what change is happening, and what change still needs to happen. I'm your host Brandon Dennison, founder and CEO of Coalfield Development. This week, we have a member of the Coalfield family, our own Conservation Coordinator and Wayne County native Jacob Hannah. Jacob, welcome to the podcast.
Jacob Hannah:Glad to be here. Brandon.
Brandon Dennison:Start off - just tell us a little bit about yourself. We'll get into your work at Coalfield in a little bit, but tell us about about yourself and where you grew up.
Jacob Hannah:Sure, so I grew up way out in Wayne County, with my six siblings. We were all homeschooled on a beautiful mountaintop farm with my parents. My dad, he worked with the coal mines, my mom, she had her hands full with all of us kids run around wild on a mountaintop. So it was pretty great childhood growing up, we were sort of raised in, I will say would be typical Appalachian post-coal era. And so being young, you don't really sort of realize things are wrong, you just sort of get accustomed to it. And so as I grew up, as the rest of us grew up, reality started to kick in and realize that there's not a lot of jobs in the area. We had to sort of move away from the region and head up to the northern part of the state. And so now making a grand exodus back to the to the coalfields, to the home of our family, and then trying to work together with other organizations work with each other and try and help bring about some good opportunities in the area. So super excited to not only be a part of the cultural development family, but also just be amongst the broader family of really this region of the state.
Brandon Dennison:A lot of times when folks talk about Appalachia, there's this phrase"close to the land," that Appalachian people tend to be close to the land. Do you connect with that? And in thinking about your childhood, what was your relationship with the landscape around you in rural Wayne County as a child?
Jacob Hannah:Absolutely. That term I think embodies the love/hate is the wrong way to put it. But it's a connotates this endearing but persevering struggle for life that does exist in Appalachia, where you can't just go on autopilot and expect to just be okay in Appalachia. You really have to just sort of fight for everyday comforts just to be able to put food on the table. So I think folks feel close to the land because the land not only challenges you but rewards you when you, when you know it well, when you respect it. I think for a lot of people in the region, it's that back and forth between the wild wilderness of West Virginia, but also just the comfort that that comes with being amongst that sort of untouched feeling of the land.
Brandon Dennison:You said your father was he was employed in the coal industry.
Jacob Hannah:Yeah, him and his father as well. They sort of do what they had to do to put bread on the table for his kids. He also, when when those mines closed down, he was part of The Lock, Stock, and Barrel restaurant in Williamson, West Virginia. Him and his dad in their own ways, they were trying to try to identify the tools available to them to try and help people around them. It's cool to see some of those ideas and those tools become manifested again, in today's age through Coalfield and other organizations as well.
Brandon Dennison:Tell me a little bit more about The Lock, Stock, and Barrel, what was that place all about?
Jacob Hannah:It was really ahead of its time. Back in the 70s and 80s, the idea was, let's put some of these governmental dollars to use in a way that people in our area can relate with. And one thing that there was lacking of in the area was just good West Virginia Food, West Virginia atmosphere. It was all the fast food industry was taking over and really killing mom and pop stores. And so my dad started taking advantage of these resources that were in the area and help start this restaurant that had these old timey menus and these old old recipes to get off the the old folks and try and recreate them in his restaurant. And it was just sort of like a little community center hub. Him and my mom got married there, actually. So it is a really beautiful place -it's essentially a social enterprise before that that term came along. Yeah, it paid a living wage and was community based, hired folks who normally would have a tough time finding employment elsewhere. So it was sort of a beautiful thing to see that it kind of lives on through this generation as well.
Brandon Dennison:You recommended this book to me and you led a book club on it called"They'll Cut Off Your Project: A Mingo County Chronicle," this hits on lock stock and barrel and some of the work social enterprise work community development work that your dad was involved with.
Jacob Hannah:Absolutely.
Brandon Dennison:I wonder...have you ever talked with your dad about, I mean, the story sort of ends, there's this burst of hope and creativity and then it pretty much gets squashed, not to give away the end of the book. But you know, yeah, that's what happened.
Jacob Hannah:That's that's just the story of Appalachia.
Brandon Dennison:Close to the land and slightly fatalistic and perhaps negative at times, we are who we are. Have you talked with your dad or ever debriefed that with him.
Jacob Hannah:Yes, dad is sort of the living chapter that isn't written after that book ends. And so what happened tragically, the the land does what the land does sometimes then there was a string of devastating floods that hit the area before the flood walls were built. They were the reasons why the walls were built in Williamson. And so that pretty much was a one-two knockout punch for the restaurant. And so he had to sort of close up shop there and focus elsewhere.
Brandon Dennison:Like, I guess what I'm asking - Is he bitter about how all that ended? Or does he just sort of take it in stride?
Jacob Hannah:It's sort of like you expect it, you know. Any good thing that tries and pops up, which is sort of the story of this book as well, there's going to be forces, whether they're natural or manmade, that are going to try and test its mettle, I would say. And so his mettle was tested, he tried his best. And I think the successes live in the people and his children, as well. And that those endeavors didn't just die with the restaurant they continued on and the mindsets of the people that were touched most closely by it. And you see that now and the renaissance of truly Williamson right now, it had two new businesses opened up in the most challenging year of our state. And you see people reverting back to those, those tactics and the strategies that they've seen in the past that have worked. And so I think to be bitter would just be a waste of time. I think it's what he would say.
Brandon Dennison:So you've got a musical family as well. You're a musician yourself. Can you tell us a little bit about your music and the role that music has played in your family and in your life?
Jacob Hannah:Yeah, so my family has sort of been known as The Singing Hannahs. We would be...when I say "we,", I mean, like, my grandparents generation, my dad's generation...
Brandon Dennison:The whole clan.
Jacob Hannah:The whole clan, really, we would be requested mostly to sing at funerals, just because the family was singing together acapella style without instruments and just in harmony. And we do that every year, as well in our own Decoration Day on our own family cemetery. And so that's sort of that's just passed down as a storytelling device as well, we'd all always sing together whether we were coming back home to our mountain or leaving out elsewhere. And it's something that I think is in our culture in our history, as well, from our Scottish roots to the old walking songs of those cultures to today, where you sort of sing while your work. So yeah, it's nice that this sort of trickled down, I've been able to be a part of that as well. Fiddle around play around, try and make some make some noise that doesn't sound too horrible.
Brandon Dennison:You write your own music, though, right?
Jacob Hannah:I do. Yeah. Yeah. heavily inspired by the region around me.
Brandon Dennison:Actually, I know, from previous conversations, you and your brother actually traveled to Scotland to track down your roots together. And I just love hearing you talk about that. Tell me first of all, why was it so important to you and your brother to go to Scotland, and then tell me about how that trip went?
Jacob Hannah:Sure. So we I mean, we have been super blessed to be able to travel abroad for the university that we were attending, just to spend a semester there. And we knew, okay, this if we're ever going to get any chance to visit our ancestral home, this is it. And so we carved out time, skipedp some classes that we shouldn't have skipped, and just made a dedicated window of time just to saturate ourselves as much as we could in Scotland. Our dad he had, he had stumbled across a books where he found out that, hey, our family is actually you know, they they have this tiny little stone tower, that this is sort of the nexus of where we came from as a people.
Brandon Dennison:Still the Hannahs?
Jacob Hannah:There's been some separations - Hannay with a Y, Hana without an H, and Hannahs sort of variations. And the reason because it's just as similar to our traditions and mannerisms. Today, with the Hatfield-McCoy feud, we got into a feud with the family there back in Scotland in the olden times, and we got banished from the country. So I think there was some changing of names to sort of try and fit back in with society. And so it was cool to be able to stay there at the tower with some of the family members that were still there
with the same name said:Hey, welcome home cousin! You know, this is just, you know, us seeing each other after being away for a while, a couple couple centuries, that's all. So that was a really beautiful thing. And just seeing some of the similarities there with the Scottish culture and the Appalachian culture, what was carried over and what was improved or changed. It's really beautiful to see that. I think, especially when you get into the mire and sort of downtroddeness of Appalachia, people tend to forget, just sort of not only where they come from, but the things that are worth celebrating as well. The cultures that have formed and blossomed over time.
Brandon Dennison:I mean, I know it's not like you were there for years, (but) did you get a sense of, was like their spirituality, a similar dynamic? So sometimes I think when we talk about"close to the land" and caring about ancestors from generations ago, you know, that's not always normal in all cultures. But I agree and Appalachia, you know, we really care where we come from, we want to keep those stories alive about where we come from, was that still the case in Scotland?
Jacob Hannah:I can only speak for the family members that I get to meet there. But for them, I'll never forget, the gentleman who gave us a tour of the Stone Tower. He's a Hannah - wonderful, thick Scottish accent, but he was showing us the ruins of the tower. And there was this tiny little flaked chip of a rock that had fallen off of the tower. And he stopped what he was doing mid-sentence of giving us the history of the area, he got down on one knee and picked up that rock. And he was just explaining how his heart was broken about how this testament to his family, our family was sort of crumbling, even down to these tiny little rocks that were coming off every day. And he would come in and put those rocks back in the cracks of the wall to make sure it wouldn't fall down, even just those small little pieces. That meant a lot to him. So I think there is that, that bond there because there's such a history there as well with with the wars and the fighting plans that have happened in that history, that this is something that just wasn't carte blanche just an easy thing to take care of or to live by. It was something you had to fight over and just be cautious about. So I think that that mindset definitely carries through into Appalachia.
Brandon Dennison:So let's talk about your work here at Coalfield Development. You are the conservation coordinator, tell us about what that entails and some of the bigger projects you've been moving forward.
Jacob Hannah:Coalfield Development is a triple bottom line organization. Meaning that in comparison to other more traditional models where you just focus on your bottom line, and what we believe to be not only successful, but responsible in our region to do business, we should incorporate these other two lines, alongside financial bottom lines - a social bottom line and environmental bottom line. Everything we do should at least consider and weigh those variables just as importantly as the financial. And so where my role comes in is to help steward that environmental bottom line. And, in ways that aren't just regulatory or punitive, as some people might sort of connotate with environmentalism, but in creative ways that that give back and benefit the people that have lived in these environments for so long. Some of those things can include recycling efforts in areas that don't have the infrastructure or capabilities to recycle. Repurposing abandoned mine lands that have been left behind from these bankrupt coal companies that aren't able to handle those liabilities. And just coming up with ways to look at creatively these things that have just sort of been forgotten, that are not only damaging the environments, but really damaging the mindsets and the the social fabric of the communities around them. So not only just planet for planet's sake, but planet for the planet's sake of the people who live on that planet. So it's everything is symbiotic and interconnected. So I really love the work that comes along with it. And maybe we can get into some deeper aspects of that. But overall, that's a broad view of sort of how my work fits into coalfield development.
Brandon Dennison:The word"conservation," you know, we could have said environmental, or sustainability, or green, I feel like the word conservation works well, for what we're getting at. Would you agree with that?
Jacob Hannah:I would agree with that. 100%. And not only is it...we never want to do anything just because it's politically safe, or just cause it's, you know, sensitive to certain guidelines. But it really, it's two birds with one stone with this kind of language with conservation, just because West Virginia itself has had a rich history with that word of conservation with the Conservation Corps that has created the majority of the parks that we enjoy, the state parks that we enjoy today as a region, was the child of the Conservation Corps that came out of the wake of the Great Depression. But then also even further back to that term. Again, I think Appalachia has been doing it before it was modernized, before it was streamlined. If something was broken, you know, the old timers would fix it or transform it into something new that could be useful. Nothing was ever thrown out. Nothing was taken for granted that oh, yeah, I can just go get another one because you live in an area where either you couldn't get another one or your financial situation just couldn't allow it. And so, one thing I'd like to talk about as well, my mom when she was growing up, she had this older lady who was her neighbor, and she had this peeling knife which they call it a paring knife. Usually a paring knife looks sort of like a spear shape, you know, an arrowhead shape with a long oval but she had used it so much and sharpened it so much, that pear shape was now indented in where she used it worn it down (and) sharpened it. She never had to buy another knife in her entire life. And that was something that stuck with my mom as well that you know, this is, these are values in our region that I think we're losing over time due to population loss and just economic shifts and political pressures. We need to find ways to plug back into that, that grit and that that stick-to-itiveness and that ingenuity really that comes from conservation.
Brandon Dennison:I love that. And I think sometimes Appalachian conservation gets judged. Some people look at a
yard full of cars and say:Well, how lazy is that? When really, we're saying, well, those folks very well might be taking some parts out of some of those different cars to put it together into something that's workable.
Jacob Hannah:Exactly. Hillbilly ingenuity doesn't always look like what we want it to look like. But by golly, it gets the job done.
Brandon Dennison:And I think our mainstream society judge it, judges it and looks down on it, but to the to the detriment of us all.
Jacob Hannah:Agreed 100% of that,
Brandon Dennison:You know, I wonder if in your work, and I do want to get into some of the particular projects, but having said everything we said about, you know how there's nothing more Appalachian than reuse and recycling and conservation. Nevertheless, this stuff gets politicized. And so have you run into resistance or criticism, or accidentally got swept up in political conversations you didn't want to get swept up in by doing the work that you do?
Jacob Hannah:I think every day, I run into the possibility of it. But fortunately, I think a lot of the ingredients exist for there to be steady navigation through what today seems like choppy waters for conversations around environmentalism and politics and culture. So I'm very much so blessed in the position that I meant to be born in West Virginia, the son of coal mining families, to know the region, to sound like someone from the region to understand the region - to where I'm not something that feels like I'm trying to change you or change the area or just make you do better. And I think there's a there's a knee jerk reaction to not just people in Appalachia, but anyone anywhere really in a culture, where if it feels like someone's just trying to come in and make you do something against your will, there's going to be more pushback and acceptance.
Brandon Dennison:Nobody likes to be preached at.
Jacob Hannah:No, not at all. Not at all. And I think the beauty of what Coalfield(Development) does is it acknowledges the reality of the situations that people are existing in and the challenges that are present, and doesn't browbeat people for it, but instead, sort of sits down with folks and says, here's, here's the reality of the situation, here's some opportunities that can help transform that reality. How can we how can we work together? And I think it really sidesteps those those political boundaries, those political
lines and says, you know:What do we all care about? We care about jobs, we care about providing for our families, we care about well-meaning holistic lifestyles. And how we get to that may look different, but that doesn't make it mutually exclusive to these other ideas of environmentalism, recycling, renewable energies, especially solar. I think, a couple years ago, the dialogue around that was a lot more hyper politicized and fiery. And today, I think we're seeing more of those walls break down, not just through, you know, brute force and just, you know, badgering people on and on. But I think folks are starting to see that it's not a one-to-one relationship where every solar panel installed is a coal miner's job lost. The solar panels are a way to help rescue those coal miners that are already been laid off from a crumbling mono-economy, that is the coal industry. Whether that is facing out through other variables that we disagree on or not, we can agree that the jobs are going away. So how can we help catch those being left behind and solar is a good option for that. And it is our rightful legacy, really, as energy producers in West Virginia and Appalachia, to continue that birthright of being energy producers, I think.
Brandon Dennison:I heard an interesting point the other day that the root of the word conservation is conservative. And that, you know, to be wasteful with materials is would be overly liberal with the resources available. And so we should be conservative and take care of what we have and reuse it as many times as possible.
Jacob Hannah:What a time to have such words mean such things. I love that.
Brandon Dennison:And I say that to sort of build to a point as well that you talked about focusing on what's important to us, our jobs, our families, and also our values. I mean, I think in Appalachia, we have a set of values, oftentimes spiritual and religious in nature that are very important to us and that we don't want to see go away and that I think that's a strength for the region. Sometimes we can agree or disagree on the particulars of the theology and whatnot. But overall, I really liked the spirituality of Appalachia. And I feel like in conservation, there's got to be a spiritual element here as well as to be stewards of what we've been given. Does that connect with you?
Jacob Hannah:So my dad, alongside of the many things that he was, he was also a preacher for a short time as well. The stepping up and filling the need in his community for a time. And one thing that he, he really helped me to understand was that before we had everything that we see in sort of religious practice, or religious contexts, or sort of what we see today in the religious institution, there was the beginning in a garden. And man and woman were instructed, this is your first job, your first occupation, just take care of the things around, you take care of this garden. Name, that things, steward the things, protect the things, harvest things. Those two are so tightly intertwined, that it's it's hard not to feel some sort of spiritual restoration in the environmental restoration around you as well. Whether it's picking up tires out of a creek, or you know, trying to help clean up your region, it's something that resonates not only in our souls, but our souls translate that to our body as well. You feel good, you feel euphoric, and seeing that the atmosphere around you is being improved and therefore your mindset has been improved, as well. I think a lot of a lot of folks that I grew up around and myself included, I think we grew up in a poverty mindset because of the atmosphere surrounding us, and so directly hit by the transitions that have been happening. And so the more that we can improve that atmosphere around us, the more the more healing happens.
Brandon Dennison:That's very, very well said. Well, let's, let's talk about your work some more. What are some of the big projects you've been moving forward as Coalfied Development'ss conservation coordinator?
Jacob Hannah:So one of the biggest challenges, really since 2018, but has really expanded in 2020 has been really the rug being pulled out from the recycling economy worldwide. Tthere was an act passed called the National Sword where all the world's recyclables stopped going to China to be processed. And now everyone's sort of trying to look around figuring out well, where do we take all these recyclables to? And in prevention of creating more just illegal dumps in a river or some sort of back holler, how do we localize that demand here in Appalachia? And really plug into that Appalachian ingenuity that we've been talking about that has birthed this reuse corridor that we're developing right now, where we're identifying several organizations throughout the region in Ohio, West Virginia, Kentucky, and eventually in Virginia, and Pennsylvania, that are actively looking for these materials, plastics, wooden pallets, scrap metal, old electronics, textiles, etc. Things that normally would be landfill destined that cost money to ship costs, labor hours to move, costly environmental impacts, there's just a huge drain on the economy, how can we transform that and plug it into these fractured supply chains that are wanting to process these materials to create CDL jobs, create makerspace opportunities, and upcycling opportunities. And really, not only just do the environmental justice that we need to have done, but in a way that benefits the communities and the economy around us. And so that's one of the larger regional scale projects that we're working on right now.
Brandon Dennison:That's huge. And just because folks might be interested, what changed with China, like why isn't recycling stuff able to go to China anymore?
Jacob Hannah:One of the largest challenges with recycling is contamination. And so China is sort of in between a first world and third world country where it has a lot of the amenities, and struggles of both dynamics, a lot of the practices that were in place, were just thinking, let's just ship it there and not worry about the conditions that we're shipping it in. And so they were receiving a lot of contamination, there was a huge cost to sort it, and clean it, and wash it. And so they just finally said, listen enough, it's enough, we're putting our foot down. And so that's really, it's started the conversation that's needed to happen, about the responsibility that we all have in in really facing the aftermath of this consumption and consumption, consumption economy that we have.
Brandon Dennison:And we should have been doing more here anyways. It's still incredibly cheap, like you can dump a whole truck of stuff in a landfill for like 100 bucks. And we still have some cities. I mean, Huntington, West Virginia still does not have curbside recycling. I mean, we are like way behind the curve in this country, and in this region, are we not?
Jacob Hannah:We are, it can be very frustrating at times. But one of the models that I like to live by is there is the greatest amount of opportunity where there is none. So the fact that we don't have a lot of curbside recycling or institutionalized recycling is a challenge. But it's also a massive market opportunity as well, because the market is not oversaturated, there's not a lot of competition striving for those materials that are innately valuable. And so this economy is wide open now for these entrepreneurs and innovators that we're seeing pop up. Pure Cycle Recycling, first of its kind worldwide to take plastics and reduce it back down to its virgin form. It's right across the river from us in Ohio, right across from Huntington. And so we're seeing the ingenuity and and that market prowess that - hey, this is something that doesn't have to be a burden on the economy and society and the environment. This is something that is wide open for creating new jobs, new opportunities. And let's dive right in.
Brandon Dennison:How about on composting? Is the reuse corridor - are you seeing anything interesting with composting?
Jacob Hannah:Absolutely. So we just had some super exciting news. The other day one of our partners with the reuse corridor, Marshall University, they finally got the last large component that they needed to start their on campus composting. And so they have a very large student body that produces a lot of food waste. And normally, that waste would just get chucked over to a landfill like what you're mentioning before. But instead, they're able to aggregate that food waste on their campus, on the site that they have dedicated for this material and use this earthworm bin composting process to create high grade quality compost that they will then utilize back on their campus for the composting needs, sell it to other partners, as well. So what initially was a cost and a damage to the environment is now a revenue source. And something that is keeping the environment clean. And so that's a beautiful model that just started up this year with the partner in the reuse cooridor. And we're seeing that more and more with different campuses, West Virginia University is applying to transform an abandoned mine land into a composting facility as well with the help of Coalfield Development. And I think folks are really just starting to zoom out and see that these liabilities can become assets if we approach it in the right way.
Brandon Dennison:I know you told me another one of our partners in Athens actually has curbside composting.
Jacob Hannah:Absolutely.
Brandon Dennison:So you can put your composting out just like you're trashing your recycling, which I think is brilliant.
Jacob Hannah:And they're just a small Appalachian community, you usually hear about that and larger urban areas, but they're, they're pioneering the way.
Brandon Dennison:In this conversation, I think about grad school in Bloomington, Indiana, where they sort of switched the incentive when it comes to trash and recycling. Curbside recycling is free, and then you pay for your trash and it's by the trash can. So that's an incentive for the less cans of trash you put out, the less you have to pay. And the recycling is free. So the more recycling you do, it's free and you're lowering your trash cost. Surely we can do better as a society and take out all the politics again, just from a spiritual element. It's like, are we really comfortable wasting as much as we waste as human beings on this planet?
Jacob Hannah:Yeah, absolutely. And how do we institutionalize those best practices like you're describing in a way that makes it easy for the residents, make sense economically for the communities, and just makes good on our promise to the environment around us.
Brandon Dennison:You mentioned the mine land project a little bit. I know, tell us more about your work on the mine lands issue.
Jacob Hannah:West Virginia and central Appalachia, in general are pockmarked with these abandoned mine land sites that have been left behind by the coal industries that have either gone bankrupt or have just had to close close shop because they haven't been able to last out the changing wider economic fluctuations of the coal market. And so a lot of communities are left holding the bag and left with those sort of gaping holes of the liabilities that exists on these mine lands. And there are programs though, that are set up to help remediate those sites into something that can be not only environmentally sustainable, but economically beneficial to the communities that have been left behind. And that gets into this broader concept of a just transition. And shorthand term really means that the first fruits of a new economy should go towards helping out the people left behind this that were the real cogs and gears of the previous economy. So that fits to a T the people in Appalachian coal regions and coal communities. And so these projects are now looking like the aquaponics facility that's in Kermit, West Virginia. It's tough to get fresh seafood in a landlocked state and now we're harvesting it ourselves right here in the, in the hollers. Other ones look like, like I mentioned before the composting facility up at Marshall University. And part of the reuse coordior as well, we're looking to do more just processing of materials, shredding textiles, shredding pallets, and upcycling those materials to create new products as well. So it's really mine lands are now being viewed as blank canvases that that people can be creative on and come up with new solutions and ideas to help reinvigorate the economies around them.
Brandon Dennison:That's sort of a transformation right before your very eyes to take a liability that large and see it become an asset that big within a period of a couple of years. And any other pieces of your work that you would like to highlight for the listeners as conservation coordinator? You're doing a lot.
Jacob Hannah:There's a lot but I think some of the things that maybe are worth hitting more time on would be a lot of what Appalachia is doing here. The world is watching, which didn't always used to be the case. I think anytime West Virginia would make news, it would be about how bad we were doing.
Brandon Dennison:Some environmental catastrophe or a mine safety incident.
Jacob Hannah:Yeah, or some sort of lists where we were 50th in whatever metric.
Brandon Dennison:Overweight, drug overdose, we are also exhausted by it.
Jacob Hannah:Yeah. And now we're seeing what now we're seeing that flipped. We're seeing that people are paying attention to our area now, because we are coming up with those innovative solutions. And those creative approaches that people sort of wrote off - that'll never work it. Within that larger transition conversation is that the world is transitioning brown economies right now, it's not just Appalachia, the world is struggling with this.
Brandon Dennison:When you say brown economies, you mean fossil fuels.
Jacob Hannah:Fossil fuels, yep. Coal, even gas in some ways. Peat is another one that's used in Scotland in the UK. How does the world tackle this transition that's happening? And a lot of the cases, 99% of the time probably, it's from a very top down approach from the government level. And it does well in result for environmentalism, but it really sort of pushes out the people who are on the ground level, who are left behind from those economies. And so what the, what the world is now - and when I say the world, I mean, players like the World Bank, the European Union, Just Transition platforms - they're looking at coalfield development in Appalachia and saying, well, this ground-up approach actually makes a lot of sense. Now we're seeing that they're reskilling coal miners to actually do the remediation of the coal mines, reskilling them to deconstruct old buildings and make new furniture products out of the wood. It doesn't have to be mutually exclusive, it can be very holistic. And it's really beautiful to see that not only part of my work, but the larger, broader picture as well is having that dialogue back and forth with these larger players internationally.
Brandon Dennison:That's cool. And what an empowering message here back home for folks to be a part of flipping that dynamic and actually becoming leaders and known for resilience and problem solving, whether as opposed to ranking first in everything you don't want to rank first in and last in everything you don't want to rank last. And that's that's incredible. And I hope for you I wonder if you could just speak on sort of a personal heart level, like not just to be a part of that, but you're really a leader of that flipping, and how does that feel for you day in and day out?
Jacob Hannah:Very surreal, just because I think I'm speaking for myself, but I'm sure there are others that feel this way, I feel oftentimes undeserving of being in the position that I'm in just because I'm from a coal family background, because I'm from West Virginia, I'm from Appalachia, I should have been many other things that are within those negative statistics that we see every day. And so to be able to self-actualize, and to and to be able to put to use some of these things that I would consider invaluable, like my culture and the history of coal and the history of Appalachia and use that now in a way that is incredibly valuable through data, research transitions to these other organizations and to Appalachia itself. Now, it's bizarre, the things that I would have considered so boring as a kid, and so shameful to be a part of now are things that are the secret ingredients to help figuring out the formula to solve this chaos, to solve this mess. That outward transformation in the regions and the people, it's impossible not to feel an inward transformation as well to where I'm remediating my own self, in my own mind as well along with it. So it's a truly beautiful thing to be a part of, and it's a it's a wonderful time to really be in Appalachia as well to see that transformation period began to happen.
Brandon Dennison:Well, you're doing amazing work. And I just want to commend you for that. And thank you for your commitment.
Jacob Hannah:My pleasure.
Brandon Dennison:The last question that I like to ask all of our guests two questions at once, which is in your lifetime, what has changed in Appalachia? What have you seen change significantly, and what still needs to change or should change?
Jacob Hannah:For the longest time, Appalachia has been in an identity crisis, because of this transition that we're in. It's hard to know what to pivot to, like where we were really good at one thing, and we don't know what to do next. Well, now I think we're we're starting to understand what that next could look like. We're not so much sort of scrambling and trying to figure out how to preserve the things of the past, but how do we use them as tools to drive towards new things of the future, and combine the two. So I think we're really seeing a beautiful renaissance in Appalachia where we are finding our identity by not leaving who we were, but really putting that at the forefront say this is what we've been and this is what we can continue to be and expand on that. We're really going to make a patchwork quilt as a region as well. So that's sort of like the visual metaphor I like to see is that center that quilt is our our initial history of our area. And we just keep adding squares and squares and squares. We're not turning away from who we were, we're expanding it and still retaining that beautiful history, so I'm really happy to see that. And then the areas that I think we can improve on is how to just continue to guide the conversations towards that expansion towards that renaissance and make sure that we're being good stewards of not just relying on mono-economies again, we're doing really good and tourism, we just got a brand new National Park. So how do we continue to expand on those opportunities and not, not let it be exploitative, or extractive, like the previous economies have been? Because even tourism itself can sort of have an extractive impact on community. So how do we make sure that we're doing a good job and ensuring that these new economies are benefiting everyone that's involved in Appalachia. We need more changemakers; there's not enough of us. There's a scripture, I'm not going to paraphrase it exactly, but it talks about how a lot of wheat, there's a lot of corn, the harvest is ready - but there's not enough people to harvest it. The opportunity is here, the opportunity is ready. But we need more people to help train to understand how to harvest it, how to take advantage of the resources because there are great programs out there right now through the government, through nonprofit organizations, foundations that are just ready waiting for those change agents to come along and actualize those opportunities. But I think it all starts with with one person like I started with you, Brandon. It also starts with an idea and an ambition. I love that Coalfield(Development) is positioned itself to help train those folks to become change agents and to capture those ideas and that ingenuity and help guide it along not to, not to steal the ideas, not to hoard all the talent of ourselves but to reach out and help support the leaders in different regions. So we need more of that in our area, I think and to to prepare for the huge amount of opportunities that's going to come our way soon.
Brandon Dennison:Very, very well said. And if we don't, we're gonna repeat the 20th century where we had full fields of assets and wealth that others from outside the region came and took and left. If we don't step up and do it ourselves, somebody else is going to do it. Jacob, I have really enjoyed this conversation and just really respect you and your heart and your mind and your soul and appreciate your time today.
Jacob Hannah:Thanks so much for having me on here, Brandon. I
Jacob Hannah, singing:"I'm the orphan Appalachian, teething on appreciate you. the rust, playing hopscotch on the ashes, of kingdoms long past. I was born in their shadows and atmospheres. My inheritance is the echoes of yester-year."
Brandon Dennison:You been listening to Change in the Coalfields. I'm your host Brandon Dennison. Today we've been joined by Jacob Hannah, Coalfield Development's own conservation coordinator. Jacob is also a musician and we'd like for you as we close out to enjoy his original song titled "Lost Generation."
Jacob Hannah, singing:"At the end of my rope, when you can't find a hope. There's a shift in the wind. There's a change blowing in. I believe it, I receive it. I can sense it all over. The mountains are safe, but something has changed. Well, I used to feel lonely now's extolling. I believe it, I receive it, I need it. So hold me, mountain true, and now return it back to you."
Brandon Dennison:Change in the Coalfields is a podcast created by Coalfield Development at the West Edge factory in Huntington, West Virginia. This episode was hosted by Brandon Dennison, and produced and edited by JJN multimedia. Become a part of our mission to rebuild the Appalachian economy by going to our websites Coalfield-Development.org to make a donation. You can email us anytime at info@Coalfield-Development.org and subscribe to our newsletter for up-to-date information on the podcast. You can follow us on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn by searching for Coalfield Development. Check back soon for more episodes.
Jacob Hannah, singing:"Without a vision, my people will die a lost generation. Hear us cry. So scream loud, Montani Semper liberi. Know now the mountaineer is always free. Be proud of all we can and cannot be. See how you made yourself begin to believe again."