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E. Ky. Social Club: A Heritage of Connection
This Labor Day weekend, people with strong ties to a small Kentucky town will gather in a far-off city to celebrate their connection to a place and a culture. The annual reunion of the Eastern Kentucky Social Club continues a 44-year-old tradition.
By Amy Hogg

For nearly 45 years, the Eastern Kentucky Social Club has provided a connection among Lynch residents and thousands of African Americans from Eastern Kentucky who have migrated to other places. The story of the social club is a prominent thread in the history and fabric of Lynch.

Lynch was established in 1917 in Harlan County by U.S. Coal and Coke Company, which built schools, churches, hospitals and houses. At its peak in Lynch, U.S. Coal and Coke employed 4,000 people and owned 1,000 structures housing people of 38 ethnic backgrounds. By 1945, Lynch and the nearby coal town of Benham had a combined population of nearly 10,000 people, according to the 2004 book African American Miners and Migrants: The Eastern Kentucky Social Club by Thomas E. Wagner and Phillip J. Obermiller.

Today, Lynch has about 750 people and is still one of the most racially and ethnically diverse communities in eastern Kentucky. The town is listed on the National Register of Historic Places, and many of Lynch’s original structures remain.

After mining’s peak in the 1940s, people began to leave Lynch to find work in cities to the north: Indianapolis, Detroit, Cleveland. But for many, Lynch would always be home....

MORE at http://www.dailyyonder.com/a-heritage-of-connection/2014/08/27/7520