He’s Not Going to Work Gerald Burke of River Ryan insists that the “buddy system” led to this informal training and sharing among the men underground. “You had to rely on your buddy, and your buddy was your God in the flesh, not in spirit. He looked after you and you looked after him. With the buddy system in the coal mines, nobody had to go see a psychiatrist. They would talk with me as a buddy. I would talk to them as a buddy. That was as far as it would go, right?” This talking among coal miners saved lives on the surface as well as in the mine. Burke, who retired in 1994 because of injuries and silicosis, remembers trusting relationships with his fellow miners. “I went out this morning to work, right, and I went into the change area and dropped my (clothes) hook. This guy was sitting down on the bench, his head between his two hands. So I said ‘do you care to talk about it?’ He said ‘no.’ “I said ‘if you want to talk about it, I'll be here.’ So I went back out and put on my work cloths, then went to my locker for a finger of chewing tobacco. He came and said ‘yeah, I'd like to talk about it.’ “So I said ‘okay, I'll go in and tell management that we’re not going to work today.’ He said ‘you can do that?’ I said ‘we’re going to do it anyway.’ He said ‘how am I going to get paid?’ I said ‘well if the company don’t pay you, the union will pay you. Don't worry about it.’ “So I go into the manager, right. I took a committee man with me, Timmy MacNeil, God love him, and I said to the manager, ‘I got a problem about one of our workers. He's not in the right frame of mind to go underground today. He's not only going to put himself in danger; he's going to put everybody else in danger.’ I said ‘he's not going to work.’ “Okay,’ he said, ‘that's no problem. Just put his number in and forget about it.’ I went out and told the guy. Then we sat and talked. He told me his wife was going to leave him. She said she didn't love him anymore. So I said, ‘what were you thinking about anyway?’ He said ‘I'm thinking about killing myself.’ “I said ‘you got two daughters. How would you like your two daughters to grow up, go to school and everything, and other ones saying to them that your father did away with himself?’ I said ‘I don't think that's the answer.’ I said ‘wait until I get my clothes off. I'm going for a shower and we'll go have a coffee.’ “I took my car, drove, had a coffee and we talked and talked. I mean we started about 6:30 in the morning. At 12 o'clock we were still talking and driving around. I said, ‘what are you going to do when you go home? You have to see somebody. Do you want somebody to talk to other than myself?’ He said ‘what about the committee man?’ I said ‘no problem.’ I told the committee man Timmy what took place, what happened. He stayed with Timmy that night. The two of them were young, right, and pretty close. I said ‘if you have any problem, give me a call.’ “So I lay in bed that night and never got a call. I kept saying, ‘well dear God, it's looking pretty good.’ Next morning, I go out and Timmy's there and so is the other guy. He's ready for work. He comes over and says ‘can I hug you?’ I said ‘sure you can.’ He said ‘I have a whole different outlook on it.’ I said ‘you'll find out the truth about your wife, and when you do, if you want to tell me about it, tell me about it.’ “So about three months pass and he came to me one day. He said ‘you were right. There was another guy.’ So that was it. The guy worked steady. His two daughters are after graduating and have good jobs. He has a good job and everything else. At Christmas, I always get a card from the guy saying thank you.”
143