Ever wonder how a disabled person got by before Social Security, disability and all those other programs? Well, if they were coal miners, they found a way to work. Here are some of the coal miners from Maryland and West Virginia who worked because they needed to do. They come from the unpublished memoirs of a miner named Kenny Bray. John Schooly had been crippled by polio and was only able to walk with the aid of crutches. Schooly actually had two sets of crutches; one was normal length and the second pair was only three feet long. He used the short crutches to drag himself through the mine headings to the face of the mine. When he got there, he braced his hands on the rails and pushed the coal cars into place with his shoulder. Then he would Read more…