Up from the Underworld

A regional mining community that won a national reputation, Wonthaggi came to be admired by many, and disliked by others. For sixty years the town’s highly unionised miners successfully worked the thin, broken seams of a state coal mine that would have been regarded as insufficiently profitable by most Australian mine owners. At times, through the national Miner’s Federation, they exerted a powerful influence within the Australian coal industry and beyond. For the residents of Wonthaggi, their mine and their union helped them understand and define who they were, these things playing a role in their everyday lives, understandings and imaginations that thoroughly transcended the workplace. In an age of private accumulation and social fragmentation, Up from the Underworld brings to light this important history.