Posted on 09/01/2013 9:33:57 AM PDT by SoFloFreeper
DIRGIN, Texas (AP) — Ida Finley smiles wistfully, recalling how she used to cook for an entire East Texas community — nearly all descendants of slaves...
Now, just weeks from her 102nd birthday, Finley faces the prospect of losing the land worked by her husband and his parents, slaves who toiled for a master.
For three years, Luminant Mining Co. has tried to purchase this 9.1-acre plot, which is currently owned by a bevy of relatives spread across the country. The company owns more than 75 percent of the parcel but can't mine it because of a complex inheritance arrangement and the refusal of some family members to let go or accept Luminant's offer.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.yahoo.com ...
Look, if Ida and her family don't want to sell the land, then that is their right, and Luminant and the rest have NO claim to it....
My question is this: where was the media when the people of NEW LONDON CONNECTICUT had their private property rights abrogated by the U.S. Supreme Court? Their land seized by the government...and that land was given BACK TO PRIVATE PROPERTY OWNERS....
Not a word. Of course, I don't think the New London residents were descendants of slaves.
Everything else, according to them is racists, why not coal companies be?
Coal is black, and white people burn it. That’s just like lynching. Therefore coal is racist.
I turned on the water at the tap this morning. It was clear. You know, if you think about it, clear is closer to white than black. It’s brighter in the spectrum than black, so I think it’s much easier to compare it to white.
Everywhere you turn, white is insidiously incorporated into our lives.
There’s simply no justice.
She was born in 1911, and she was the daughter and wife of former slaves? Her parents would have to be in their 40s when she was born. Possible. And her husband would have to have been in his 60s - if she married at age 20 or so. While it is possible on both counts, I somehow doubt it is true. I believe the journalist just got carried away...
lemme try this one: because coal is black and coal companies are white, ergo they’re the mastas’..
All this over a 9 acre plot?
Something doesn’t sound right.
Cue the ‘aww jeez’ guy
“Lord, I am so tired...how long can this go on?”
Master? Democrat, the historically accurate term is Democrat.
Reading the article... Her husband’s parents were slaves. She was born 1911. Say her husband was 20 years older, that would put him born in 1891 Her husband’s parents would have to have been 26 years older than her husband for it to work. Possible.
Say you had a man who was old enough to remember being a slave, would have had to have been born in 1845. Say they lived to be a hundred, that would be 1945. Someone old enough to remember them as an adult would have been born about 1925, and be nearly 90 now.
This lady must be one of the last people around who knew someone who was a slave. If there’s 40 years between her and her husband, her husband would have been born in 1871, and her husband’s father would have been about 26 years older than his son. Or 33 and 33 would work as well.
What “complex inheritance arrangement”? They hardly ever follow the law regarding title and transfer. East Texas Holderpeople rarely record land transfers in inheritances.
Anytime trying to purchase land connected to such undivided heirships is a title nightmare and invariably there is one in the bunch that refuses to go along thinking they should get 10 times the value.
The 9 acres is probably one of 15 heirs and likely 1/2 mile long and 50 feet wide an not useful for doodley except extorting the power company.
my great grand father was a confederate soldier i knew him he lived til i was 19.
If the mine is to be realized with out touching the 9 acres of substantially harm its value (law suit avoidance) the 9 acre plow would have to leave a substantial amount of land untouched. Also the company could not cut off access to the 9 acres so an access road to the property would have to be left untouched. Then you would have to worry about lawsuits concerning noise and dust. Power lines and other utilities would have to be maintained to the property.
If you think about the amount of land that would be given up to keep the 9 acres intact and accessible it makes the project very much more expensive.
Pretty good. Let me add a few things. The coal, bein' black, is ripped up from the ground where it has been for a long, long, time, transported far, far away without its consent, segregated in coal bins (all the same color stuff in those coal bins!), and then it is used up to provide indirect labor for a mostly white American society. The ashes are discarded like they were never anything.
Sounds pretty racis' to me!
For those unfamiliar with above ground mining (strip mining is no longer used to mine coal), the land mined is almost always uninhabitable die to harsh slopes. However, mining companies are required by law to reclaim the land mined and as a result the land is landscaped so that it is prime real estate for housing developments, parks, and golf courses.
I’ll bet there are a lot more than 15 heirs. I used to work for a company that was always having to try to clear up these small pieces of land. It’s usually black folks but I was involved with one that had 14 heirs, all white. Since the land is usually only worth a few hundred bucks per “share”, if we got it where there were only a few we couldn’t find, we’d bond around it.
One of the biggest hurdles to get over is when there are a bunch of kids who are heirs. You have to get a judge to approve it and he or she usually wants some money put in a trust fund. Most of the times it’s better to just walk away.
Back in 1946 a man platted out a “subdivision” south of Houston and sold lots. It’s hundreds of acres. Nothing was ever done. The streets were laid out but none were ever built. No utilities, nothing. Now every lot is wooded. Oil companies have been trying for years to buy the lots but they can’t locate owners who are still alive or all their heirs. My cousin owns one lot and they offered her $300. She laughed.
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