Greasy Creek/Greasy Pit

A history of this camp may be found in my book, Hearts in Zion: Steel, Coal, and an Appalachian Family (2009). The camp was begun at the same time as the Wolfpit camp, but Wolfpit was completed first since it had a railroad already serving other camps in the Marrowbone area. Greasy Creek had a railroad, in fact, one of the first railroads in Pike County, but it went only from the head of the creek to the mouth on the Big Sandy and was built in the 1880's by the Yellow Poplar Lumber Company. It was narrow-gauge and had to be rebuilt before construction could begin on the mine. It was completed just before WWI broke out and building materials were impossible to get during the war, resulting in mine production but no camp houses for the miners until the war was over and construction materials were made available. The Greasy Creek mine shut down officially March 1, 1928, because the last of the male owners died, leaving only the widows, one of whom demanded the camp be closed in order to save money that was set aside for expansion. 

     -submitted by Bruce Hoskins on 4/12/2014 bhopkins@setel.com, author of Hearts in Zion