The Friday Finish - Coal Mine Trip - Stop Hunger, Give Hope - The Gift of Healthy Food...Hearing...Cheer
- Tim Crawford
- 1 hour ago
- 4 min read
November 7, 2025
Faith, Family, Perseverance & Pride – The Coalfields Story
Today, my Appalachian Studies class had the privilege of visiting Portal 31 in Harlan County, a historic coal mine that now stands as a museum preserving the story of Kentucky’s coal heritage. This visit brought to life so much of what we’ve been learning in class about the history of coal mining in Appalachia—how it shaped our economy, our communities, and the daily lives of so many families throughout the generations.
Portal 31, once a working mine in Lynch, Kentucky, opened in the early 1900s and became one of the most productive coal mines in the region. It tells the story of the miners—many of them immigrants—who came seeking work and built strong, close-knit communities that defined the Appalachian spirit. Today, the site allows visitors to travel “into the mountain” by rail to experience what life was like for those who worked deep underground.
For my students, seeing this history firsthand was powerful. It’s one thing to read about coal mining in books or videos, but quite another to stand where so many hardworking men once stood—to hear the sounds, see the tools, and imagine the courage it took to do that work day after day.
As we study the history of Appalachia, it’s important for our young people to understand and appreciate where we come from. The story of the coalfields is not just about mining—it’s about faith, family, perseverance, and pride in a region that has contributed so much to our nation’s growth.
November 6th Facebook post by Patty Vance, Alumna of Red Bird Mission School and Current Red Bird Christian School Faculty
Stop Hunger. Give Hope – The Giving Tuesday Challenge
November and December is a time that American hearts turn towards helping others as we celebrate the blessings bestowed at Thanksgiving and share love through giving at Christmas. In reality, faithful Red Bird supporters engage in helping and giving throughout the year so that the lives of more than 11,000 people are a little healthier and more hopeful.
Individuals, small groups and churches have been stepping up since June to ensure that Red Bird Mission continues elderly meal delivery in the face of delayed and inadequate reimbursement for the last six months of the year. Your support makes it possible for Red Bird to buy food, prepare and deliver meals to 60 individuals that essentially wait at the door each day for that meal.
Alumni and friends of Red Bird Christian School have also been stepping up this fall to ensure that our school continues the academic preparation and spiritual formation that prepares our students for careers of leadership and service. Your gifts keep the doors open for eager students that love Red Bird School to enter a classroom each day for instruction and preparation by loving, caring teachers and staff.
We are opening up the Red Bird Giving Tuesday Challenge with a call to “Stop Hunger. Give Hope.” Special donations of food are being delivered this month so that more people than ever will receive food boxes during the two holiday seasons, but we need extraordinary donations to complete the funding of elderly meal deliveries during these last two months of 2025. In the same fashion, generous donations leading up to alumni homecoming covered the tuition gap for our students, but more is needed at year-end to support students complete first semester funding.
Stop Hunger – A generous donor has committed $10,000 of matching funds for elderly meals. Every dollar you give during the Giving Tuesday Challenge up to $10,000 will be doubled for sustaining Red Bird Mission Elderly Meal Delivery through December 31st.
Give Hope – The Homecoming Challenge has raised $67,000 of the needed $100,000 for the first semester of tuition gap funding. Significant gifts are needed to raise the remaining $33,000 of tuition gap funding for these students that find hope for the future through learning and growing at Red Bird Christian School (RBCS).
Giving Tuesday is an international day of online giving that falls on December 2nd this year, but most charitable organizations will give opportunity for supporters to give in the days leading up. You can get Red Bird Mission’s Giving Tuesday started now with an online gift to Elderly Meal Delivery or RBCS Student Tuition, or, if you prefer, mail your check to Red Bird Mission, Inc., 70 Queendale Ctr, Beverly, KY 40913-9607 marked “GT25” and designate a specific program if you are so inclined.
The Gift of Healthy Food
Members of the St. Mark’s United Methodist Church Outreach Team in Murfreesboro, Tennessee made a trip to Knoxville this week to pick up a load of fresh apples and passed by Red Bird Mission Community Outreach to share with our community and two other communities they support. The apples were a nice addition to the grapes, onions and potatoes that Red Bird staff picked up Thursday at God’s Pantry Food Bank in London. God is good to provide partners that can make these connections through their gifts of time and transportation money.
The Gift of Hearing
Another group of 24 volunteer audiologists from the University of Cincinnati were present Thursday and Friday for a free humanitarian hearing health clinic at Red Bird Mission Community Outreach. Over 120 local residents came for first time screenings, repairs, new fits, ear wax management, ear molds, education, distribution of hearing aid sanitizer/dryer kits, battery chargers, blue tooth ear buds, ear plugs and hearing aid batteries.
The Gift of Cheer – Promise Kept
We told you about the Red Bird Mission DeWall Senior Center card project a few weeks ago. Seven of the DeWall Center participants joined Senior Center Coordinator Tammy Adams this week making good on their promise to deliver handmade cards to area nursing homes to encourage residents between holidays. It was a beautiful day to bring cheer inside a nursing home in Middlesboro.