“Monongah – Carbon Arc Lights” by D.D. Meighen is licensed under CC BY-SA 2.0
Wichita Snake is a planned novella (or novel, I really don’t know yet) about Glen Marshall, a former miner from Monongah, West Virginia who, in 1907, arrives in Wichita, Kansas shortly after his wife, Abigail Maris, is murdered at the hands of a cold-blooded crime syndicate. The syndicate manages a significant amount of business that occurs in temperance-era Kansas under the presumptive sponsorship of the Wichita Chamber of Commerce. The Wichita Snake himself, Old Smokey Jones, has established himself as a leading member of the chamber’s membership committee.
Glen Marshall, who will later become William Maddox, Arizona Ranger and great-grandfather to Billy Maddox, has fled the mining life in Monongah just after an unspeakable mine explosion that killed hundreds of men and boys.
[Read more…] about Coal Mining Disaster in Monongah, West Virginia: The Day 362 Men Died