A coal camp and its classroom: a historical study of a Virginia coalfield community and its school 1888-1987

Abstract

The coal camp school located in the community of Bishop, Virginia was a unique institution that was molded for an equally unique time and place in the history of Tazewell County, Virginia. However, as a prelude to understanding the Bishop school and its community, one must briefly examine the history of the Pocahontas Coalfields. The school that was established in the community of Bishop was a direct result, not only of the agricultural community that preceded it, but also of the influence exacted upon the school by the coal company which created the Bishop camp in the 1930s.

The strategy used to investigate the school and community of Bishop included principal use of the historical research methodology and a variety of primary and secondary accounts. Extensive and detailed literature review first established a foundation of existing knowledge. This assessment preceded considerable additional research into both primary and secondary historical records.

Oral history strategies became an integral part of the work in examining the history of the Bishop School. Numerous interviews with former students, teachers, principals, other employees, and parents of the Bishop and Crocketts Cove Schools were conducted.

Triangulation verification techniques permitted substantiation of much of the research gathered during this study. Oral history interviews were compared to Bishop School records and Tazewell County School Board records, to both local and regional historical sources, both scholarly and amateur, and to evidence available using photographic archives.

The primary importance of this study is the preservation and examination of a unique phenomenon in the history of schooling in the United States, the coal camp school. Within this framework, the evolution of the Bishop School and the role played in its development by the coal company, the union, the local school board, and state guidelines and regulations are scrutinized. As a result, the study has lasting value to the scholarly community which embraces both educators and historians on the state, regional, and national levels.