1930: the Great Depression. Twenty-five cent an hour jobs attract thousands of men to West Virginia, two-thirds of them black, to drill Union Carbide's Hawks Nest tunnel through near-solid rock. Within months, men fall ill and die of a mysterious illness tunnelitis company doctors call it. Lacking respiratory protection, at least 800, possibly over 1,500, workers will die of acute silicosis in America's worst industrial disaster. Orville Orr, a company-paid deputy sheriff secures the first autopsy of a tunnel worker and builds evidence of the company's responsibility for the deaths. Armen, the mixed-race daughter of a tunnel worker and union organizer who has died of silicosis, joins him and they fall in love, as Orville risks his life to expose the truth.

Recommended to book clubs by 1 of 1 members.