Customer Reviews

In the Kingdom of Coal: An American Family and the Rock That Changed the World

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I am a bit of a nut about history and energy. So I had high expectations about this book...and, frankly, they were met and exceeded.

There is no real political slant to this - just history. Like it or not, coal has been one of the major factors in our technological and lifestyle progress. The history of the rock in Pennsylvania (hard and soft coat) as well as some of the big finds in VA. are detailed here.

I read a lot of boring history books to gleam information. This was not one of those boring books. Exciting and informative was how I would describe it.

When I checked this book out of the library since it appeared to be the *only* book that would discuss the history of the coal mining industry in terms of how it revolutionized standard of living. The United States of America is considered the Saudia Arabia of coal. I wanted to read about how anthracite coal went from a pile of useless black rocks to a cheap, efficient, abundant and relatively clean energy source. Unfortunately, this book greatly fell short of my expectations in this regard.

The chapters on Josiah White's discovery of the utility of anthracite coal and the entrepreneurship of John Leisenring are very exciting to read. However, this book contains too much emphasis on the impact of labor unions in the coal industry. While I am not questioning the veracity or the importance of this information, I perceive that it just does not make inspiring reading material. I decided to not finish the book.

Tragically, this still might be the best book on the productive geniuses behind the coal industry to date.