Fire and Brimstone - The North Butte Mining Disaster of 1917 (Paperback)

The worst hard-rock mining disaster in American history began a half hour before midnight on June 8, 1917, when fire broke out in the North Butte Mining Company??'s ???Granite Mountain??? shaft.& nbsp; During an effort to improve safety in the mine, a fire sparked more than 2,000 feet below ground, the fire spewed flames, smoke, and poisonous gas up the length of the wood-timbered shaft.& nbsp; Tragically, Granite Mountain connected to five other mines through a labyrinth of manways.& nbsp; Within an hour, more than four hundred men would be locked in a battle to survive.& nbsp; Within three days, one hundred and sixty-four of them would be dead.& nbsp; Fire and Brimstone is also the broader story of Butte, Montana at the outbreak of WWI.& nbsp; The fire would catalyze a two month spasm of disaster, strikes, murder, and ultimately occupation by federal troops.& nbsp; & nbsp; & nbsp; The Anaconda Copper Mining Company had long been a corrupt institution and is still considered today as one of the most abusive corporations in the history of the American West.& nbsp; In response to this oppressive corporation, the IWW, a radical labor movement vowed the destruction of this capitalist system.& nbsp; And from this political maelstrom and mining disaster rose a Montana lawyer who would shape local and national history.