Coal: A Human History

This book is both interesting and heartbreaking. It's also a high-flying overview, covering thousands of years in about three hundred pages. I think that's just right for me- I don't know that I could have taken too much more about the Victorians dying from "fog" or the little kids with rickets or... well, any of it. Including the modern coal industry spin doctors who are the same soulless bastards they've always been. Coal dust is GOOD for children to breathe, they said back then. Greenhouse gases are GOOD for farmers, they say now. *shudder*

Well worth reading.

From soup to nuts, this is the history of coal at breakneck speed (with some global warming/climate change lectures thrown in for good measure).
I will be one hundred percent honest. Before Freese's book I had never really given thought to coal. It is an interesting topic. Every Christmas there is the joke about coal in the stocking and once in a while a coal mine collapse will make the news. I did know that it has always been a dirty fuel responsible for massive pollution in cities across the world like London and Pittsburgh.
After reading Coal readers will know there are different types of coal and their uses will vary. Historically, coal was used for making jewelry and as currency, in addition to being a heat and energy source. Once show more the dangers of mining coal were fully realized, companies put animals, children, and immigrant laborers to work in the mines. The illnesses and deaths resulting from working with coal were difficult to read. Despite being less than 300 pages, Freese reserves a good section of Coal for explaining the environmental repercussions of using coal. The statistics are staggering and eye opening. show less

This is an interesting overview of the complex relationship between coal and humankind, how the natural resource propelled people into the industrial age and many technological advancements even as it kills with both intimate and widespread forms of poison. The focus is on the zones: Britain, western Pennsylvania, and China. Freese's approach is even-handed, blunt in her descriptions of coal as a blessing and a curse.

Interesting history of human's interaction with coal and the long-term effects on the planet. A little depressing to realize how old this book is and how little has changed.

Written with enough detail to tie into the reasons for coals importance in the old and new epochs but with sufficient lightness that a general reader will find it highly entertaining. And even for a seasoned reader of technology and the world, like myself, enjoyed this wonderful book.

Some of the insights I could kick myself for not considering such as cheap fuel and sunlight on offer compared to slums, dinginess, and expensive fuel would make the US highly attractive in the pre-1900 world.

From the title, I was expecting a commodity history, like some of Mark Kurlansky's excellent works about cod and about salt. This book has a little of that at the beginning, but most of it is about environmental damage and climate change. Even the role coal miners played in the union movement was barely mentioned. That said, I give the author credit for her clear, engaging writing style.

A well-edited presentation of the relationship between humankind and coal. While forthright about her specific interest in coal's environmental ramifications, the author maintains an enlightening treatment of coal's important (and perhaps forgotten) position in the development of human social and institutional civilization. You come away with a respect for coal and the people who work it. Coal alone didn't usher in the world as we understand it; but without coal, little of what we take for granted would be recognizable.

I appreciate the optimistic tone with which Ms. Freese addresses global climate change - an opportunity for humankind to surmount yet another challenge, with our ingenuity and understanding of our interconnectedness. In show more the future, perhaps folks will look with interest at our lengthy affair with coal and wonder. show less