History
In a five-year period from 1906-1911, 13,228 miners were killed in U.S. coal mines. As a result, the Bureau of Mines was established by Congress on July 1, 1910, "to make diligent investigation of the methods of mining, especially in relation to the safety of miners and the appliances best adapted to prevent accidents."
In succeeding years, Congress passed other legislation designed to promote health and safety in the mines, including the 1966 Federal Metal and Nonmetallic Mine Safety Act (P.L. 89-577) and the Federal Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969 (P.L. 91-173). The most recent regulatory legislation combined the coal and metal and nonmetal industries under one law--the Federal Mine Safety and Health Act of 1977. This act directed that "The National Mine Health and Safety Academy shall be...responsible for the training of mine safety and health inspectors, mining personnel, or other persons as the Secretaries of Labor and Interior shall designate. In performing this function, the Academy shall have the authority to enter into cooperative educational and training agreements with educational institutions, State governments, labor organizations, and mine operators and related industries." It is through the training provisions of this legislation that the National Mine Health and Safety Academy functions.
In response to the mandates of the Coal Mine Health and Safety Act of 1969, on September 7, 1971, the Academy began inspector training in temporary facilities in Beckley, West Virginia. On August 17, 1976, the permanent facility, situated on 80 acres (320,000 m2) of land donated by the Raleigh County Airport Authority, opened its doors with an official dedication. Michael George Zabetakis was the first superintendent of the Academy.
On July 25, 1979, Public Law 96-38 transferred the activities and functions of the National Mine Health and Safety Academy from the Department of the Interior to the Department of Labor.
Read more about this topic: United States National Mine Health And Safety Academy
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“Jesus Christ belonged to the true race of the prophets. He saw with an open eye the mystery of the soul. Drawn by its severe harmony, ravished with its beauty, he lived in it, and had his being there. Alone in all history he estimated the greatness of man.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“False history gets made all day, any day,
the truth of the new is never on the news
False history gets written every day
...
the lesbian archaeologist watches herself
sifting her own life out from the shards she’s piecing,
asking the clay all questions but her own.”
—Adrienne Rich (b. 1929)
“America is the only nation in history which, miraculously, has gone directly from barbarism to degeneration without the usual interval of civilization.”
—Attributed to Georges Clemenceau (1841–1929)