WVVA TV Bluefield Beckley WV News, Weather and SportsA film about mountain top mining, Rise Up West Virginia, is shown locally to educate
Member Center:
Momentum is growing across West Virginia to stop mountain top removal mining.
Filmmaker B.J. Gundmundsson says she's lived in West Virginia her entire life.
However, the day she first saw a mountaintop removal site, she was shaken to the core.
She made it her personal mission to take the public on a journey with her, through the mountains to expose the ugliness she describes as mountaintop removal.
"What had flabergasted me was that not all of West Virginia was not rising up in revolt against this." Gundmundsson says. "I realized that people weren't rising up because they can't see it. You can't get to it. You can't just drive up to these places."
Gudmundsson takes you on that journey in her film, Rise Up West Virginia.
She is now sharing her message and her film with other West Virginians and people around the country.
79 year old Gloria Chewning says she's seen the destruction before her very eyes.
"Each time it was just like my heart was breaking. Look what man has done to the mountains that had taken a billion years to form and they destroyed them, just for greed, in a matter of days." Chewning says.
She also saw the extent of the devastation.
"It didn't just destroy the mountains. It destroyed people. Their lives were destroyed by what happened." Chewning adds.
Now, the Keepers of the Mountain are speaking up and spreading their message.
"It's high time that state government and the Coal Association start looking at defining us by who we are instead of looking at us as lumps of coal that put money on their bottom line." Gundmundsson concludes.
Gundmundsson released Rise Up West Virginia in January of 2008.
The film received the Award of Excellence at the West Virginia Filmmakers Festival.
It has all original music with performers from West Virginia.
