There’s a heart shaped, painted wooden sign, stuck in the ground somewhere in the town of Centralia PA. Somewhere in town is the best way to put that, I think, since most of the town’s landmarks have been gone for a long time. The sign reads, to Centralia, with love from Kingston New York.
Fifty years ago, the Centralia fire department set fire to a town dump to help clean up the town for a Memorial Day Celebration, and the fire burns to this day. The town sits above a great many abandoned coal mines, and not long after igniting the blaze the mines caught fire as well. Sulphuric steam rises from breaks in the asphalt that was once Route 61.
A fight ensued between residents who wanted to evacuate, and those who didn’t. The evacuees won out, and by the 1980s over a thousand people had moved away, their homes reduced to rubble by bulldozers.
But some residents refused to leave. It seems not all of the homes and lives were in danger. But for whatever reason, the state decided a few years ago to revisit the issue and ordered those remaining to leave. For those souls who have lived in Centralia without incident for the past 50 years, this is nothing more than a land grab for the coal beneath their feet.
At best this is a well intentioned effort to help landowners. Then again, how often has eminent domain been used for the benefit of property owners?
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