Change in the Coalfields: A Podcast by Coalfield Development
Change in the Coalfields: A Podcast by Coalfield Development
Gina Milum
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Original intro/outro music:
"'Till I See Stars" by The Parachute Brigade
The sun does not always shine in West Virginia but the people always do and I'm delighted to me.
Brandon Dennison:These are historic times in Appalachia. A lot has changed. A lot is changing now and a lot still needs to change. In our podcasts we talk with change makers right square in the middle of all of this working to ensure the change is for the good. You're listening to Change in the Coalfields podcast by Coalfield Development. I'm your host Brandon Dennison. This is Change the Coalfields. My name is Brandon Dennison, I'm your host. And today I have a fellow Coalfield Development colleague, Gina Milum, who has worn a lot of different hats at Coalfield Development that you'll hear about. She currently leads our arts and outreach efforts at the West Edge Factory, which is the biggest of our many properties, where we do creative placemaking and support new businesses and social enterprises and training. And Gina, thanks for coming on the podcast.
Gina Milum:Well, I'm excited to get started. There's all kinds of things happening down there at the West Edge Factory. And more than so many things happen in southern West Virginia, just really excited to talk about what's going on. Love it.
Brandon Dennison:Yeah. So and this is a chance to let people know what's up at West Edge. I think before we dive into all that. Tell folks what West Edge is today. And then we'll sort of work backwards. And I'd love to hear, you actually have some very personal connections to this building. So tell us what it is today. And then we'll back up and learn about what it used to be.
Gina Milum:Today the West Edge factories have just (been) a dynamo of different enterprises. I mean, it's almost like an anthill. It doesn't look like there's a whole lot going on And some having their prom there, that's amazing. from outside. But as soon as you walk through those doors, you've got three different enterprises that are just just pumping along like pistons in a eight cylinder engine. We've got Mountain Mindful, they're they're printing t-shirts, they're making furniture and all types of things. Wood goods, as you want to call that brand lifestyle brand out of reclaimed wood. We've got a warehouse for Solar Holler down there which was started out as one of Coalfield's enterprises and you know is out on their own they're currently the number one solar installers in the state of West Virginia. It's incredible. We've got venue space, and you know, of course, I mean, my heart is in the Turret Gallery there. And that's where I'm doing most of my work now. The art gallery, the art gallery, yes, we've got workshops going on in there all the time. I'm expecting 60 kids in there tomorrow, from Lincoln and Logan County to do an art workshop. It's just constant we've got a prominence is going to be happening there in April. That would be Chesapeake High School is having their prom, that is so cool. And I mean I've already, had we're already thinking about an adult prom in there. We've got our Artist in Residence is Sassa Wilkes, and they currently have an exhibit at the Huntington Museum of Art 100 Badass Women. And yes, this is a big plug for that. You've got to get out there and see it. It's gotten national attention and it is truly incredible. Sassa is our artist in residence. We have an artist in residence Manti with Barb Lavallee Benton, and we have Pat Valeska, who is a professor here at Marshall. They are another artist in residence. She does a lot of the literary work, you know, helps me with the poetry workshops and writing workshops and, and hopefully, you know, one day a literary festival down there. So that's just an idea of some of the stuff that's going on down there. I mean, there's trainings for the community, there's just it's just continent.
Brandon Dennison:So folks are listening and you can rent out space in this.
Gina Milum:Yes, you can. There are two different spaces.
Brandon Dennison:We've had art shows, music festivals, cornhole tournaments. Alumni reunions.
Gina Milum:Yes. We've got 14,000 square feet. And I don't know. I mean, if there are people out there listening that are like me, which that doesn't mean a whole lot when you just start doing square footage of me. It doesn't mean much. But when I tell you it's about the size of four gymnasiums, full size gymnasiums, and that's not counting the Turret Gallery, which can hold up to 50 people for smaller things like say it's a shower or a small business meeting. We do workshops for businesses that want to do team building, we've got all sorts of things that go on down there, compared to when I first heard about Coalfield and I first met Brandon. And it had been a huge vacant, hulking magnet for mischief in the community, which had been empty for, what, 12 years, 12 years. And yeah, it was just constantly, you know, cops were having to circle the place, there were always kids in there, of course, every bit of any kind of copper wiring, plumbing, you know, it had been gone, there have been small fires set in there, you know, people running around on the roof, it had just been just a pain, a thorn in the community side. And so from when I grew up in that neighborhood, I mean, just a half a mile from the old Corbin factory, which was a men's clothing factory.
Brandon Dennison:Just for folks who don't know what it is today, West Edge used to be the Corbin clothing factory.
Gina Milum:Yes. And my mother had worked there. So back in the 80s, my mother had worked there. But I had grown up driving past that place twice a day, every day from my entire life.
Brandon Dennison:One of the biggest employers in town.
Gina Milum:Right, and it predominantly employed women. And these were good, you know, union jobs, where women were able to make a decent living. So I mean, there were as many...when the shift changed, you know, if you were there, if you weren't needed goodbye, that place at seven in the morning or at 4pm. Just be prepared to wait because it was going to be a madhouse. So but to go from seeing that, you know, every day of your life to just being completely vacant, and just wondering what would happen.
Brandon Dennison:What was it like for the from the community perspective? Because it was a slow dwindle, right. I mean, so Corbin in the 70s employed nearly 1,000 people. Yeah, so women, three, eight hour shifts ran 24 hours a day. And then the 80s, you know, they did it, they cut back? The 90s, they halved it? And then by 2002, they closed it entirely in the jobs outsourced to South America. Could you, could the community since that slow dwindle? Or was it still a shock when the doors closed? For good?
Gina Milum:No, because the it was already impacting the community too. Yeah. Because it wasn't just Corbin. Yeah, there is the old black diamond factory, you know, that's just half a block from there that had run three shifts as well. And you heard that constant stamping, you know, in the 60s, in the 70s, in the 80s. Westmoreland had always been, you know, a working class neighborhood, never really middle class. But you know, a good steady working class community, people own their homes, you know, usually had one parent that worked outside the home, you had another parent that was in, you know. There was PTO involvement, lots of involvement in the schools and in sporting activities and the community activities. And then in the 80s, when you started seeing these jobs leaving, you know, there was Owens, there was Whodie, there was, you know, the steel plant started to downsize is all and you know, Maidenform and shoe factory, all these factories that had really made Huntington a dynamo. When they started to close, the community started to close, and people at first, you know, the first wave went with those factories, as Owens closed down and they took those jobs into Virginia, you know, there's the first wave of migration, then CSX starts to cut back and then those jobs go, you know, to Baltimore and Jacksonville, so, it fewer and fewer people living in the community more and more rental property. The community got older ownership, less local ownership, fewer children in schools, you know, a smaller tax base, and you could see that in the community.
Brandon Dennison:And the substance use crisis, I imagine starts to seep its way in.
Gina Milum:Yeah. And you know, of course, had the decline started long before that, you know, it was with the sending the jobs offshore. But then once you basically hauled out a community when when they're most of the good jobs if it hadn't been for Marshall University if it hadn't been you know, for the fact that Huntington is a Regional Medical Center. You're just think how many employers were left here. There weren't that many employers left. So you basically hauled out a community where you've gone, you know, where most people could get a good job in this area to where it's just gone. And when those jobs go, a lot of the hope goes, and then you've got a lot of the really manual labor jobs that are left and then we were just right. We were just ripe for the pickings with the pharmaceutical companies to come in. And, and, I mean, I remember the very first time I had ever heard the word oxy, oxycontin. I was watching an episode of Law and Order. I mean, this was back in the Lindy Brusco days, you know, when, when Law & Order first started, seems like it's been on television for 50 years. And they were talking about deaths in New York. And I know this was back in in early 90s. And they were calling. I heard the term hillbilly heroin. They're bringing this stuff up here from Appalachia. And so that's when it started. And the difference between like I graduated, you know, events in high school, which is right there in the community were West Edge is. And my children did to you know, they graduated from Benson. And then of course, when the school consolidated and they went to Spring Valley. I'm getting ready to have a 45th highschool reunion this year. I can count on probably one hand a no more than two, a number of my schoolmates that have died. And you know, it's from the typical things. I mean, you have maybe a couple of car wrecks, you know, some some cancers, heart attacks, that sort of thing, the general thing. But then when my kids get together, and they started, the oldest one graduated in 1995, all the way down to 2005. They can't even, I mean, it goes on and on. We're talking 20-30 kids out of a class at each one of their classes. Yeah, it's just unbelievable.
Brandon Dennison:It's a decimation. I know, the documentary "Heroine" struck a chord for you almost, you know, almost too close to home in some ways.
Gina Milum:Well, I had actually moved. I I have a son that lives in Maui. And I thought, well, you know, I'm gonna have this great, try that. Try this, you know, my house was paid for, and I didn't have anything to do, you know, as I'm just gonna go out and try living in Maui. So while I'm out there, of course, you know, it was beautiful all the time. And but, you know, once you get this, once you've been raised a hillbilly, I mean, I used to watch that Barn Raiser show that's based on in Lewisburg, I think it is, just so I could hear people talk like me. And I was just really getting homesick. And then the documentary, it's a, it's a Academy Award nominated documentary "Heroine", and it was all about Huntington. And you've got all these places, you know, and people that I knew, you know, like Jan Rader, and you know, all these other people. And I would invite the people that, you know, my friends and colleagues that I worked with in Maui said, Oh, you've got to watch this documentary. It's about the place where I'm from. And so then, I mean, I'm proud of the women, you know, that are being highlighted in this and knowing, you know, the hearts of the people, and how hard we work, and how dedicated we can be in our love and our outreach. And so then I'm starting to get feedback from these people, you know, that definitely don't know anything about West Virginia probably couldn't find it on a map. And they're telling me I mean, I'll never forget one of them said, Aren't you glad you don't live there anymore? My heart just broke. I mean, it was almost like an almost physically feel something snap in me. And now keep in mind, I had had three close friends lose children to this epidemic while I was there, this was just after I'd been in Maui a year and a half. And it's like, I can do something. I can do something. I mean, whether it's just to go back and give some encouragement to somebody, I can do something. So everybody in Hawaii thought I was absolutely insane. But I just packed up everything and basically sent everything the same way back that I'd sent it over which was through the US Post Office, give them a big plug. They did a great job. And I came home yeah. And I have never looked back. I got a I got the job with with Coalfield. You know, soon after because I had I had met Brandon and became aware of Coalfield before I left like the here before I moved to Maui.
Brandon Dennison:I've always wanted to ask you that when so we met in 2014. We bought the old Corbin building had a vision to turn it into West Edge. And we met at a community meeting. And so that was so there was an intermission there, where we met and then you were in Maui for a little bit. Right? Came back.
Gina Milum:Came back. Yeah, and I started work. I moved in 2016. And move, no 2015. I moved in 2015 and drove cross country, put my car on a on a ship, and then flew to Maui. And then came back in December of 2017. So and then I started work with Coalfield in 2018.
Brandon Dennison:Gotcha. So tell folks about that community meeting from your perspective. And the community's perspective.
Gina Milum:Well, you know, everybody's nosy. I'm gonna admit it. I mean, I'm one of the nosiest people I know when, and when you live in a community. And so many times people aren't informed about what's going on, it's like, you're going to get what we give you, and you're going to like it, and the community doesn't have any input. So there had been all sorts of rumors. I mean, we were there was gonna be everything from salvage yards to low income housing to, you know, just all different kinds of things. So the community really wanted to know. So it was almost like me and the person I went with Luke Huffman, who is also works, you know, at Coalfield. We were almost the community delegation that was sent to just scope this out, and then come back and let everybody yeah, see what's going on. So we get there and meet Brandon. And he's this young guy, and yeah, these all these other guys are up there. And they, from an architectural firm, and then I get a Deacon Stone, he worked with you, he reserved a big part of the beginning of the work there at West Edge. Founding property manager. Yeah. And so the communities there, Brandon introduces himself, he tells us a little bit about Coalfield, and then they take and they put up on the wall, the footprint of the building. And he's got the architectural firm there, and then they take paper and put over it, you know, kind of like tracing paper, you can see the floor, the floor plan of the building, you know, the original footprint. And he just Brandon just turns around and looks at the community and says, What do you want in here? And I know, I mean, I looked at Luke and he looked at me, and it's just like, you mean, we've got some say, we've got we're gonna be able to have some input as to what we want to go in here. And then it was just like popcorn people are popping up - it's like, okay, yeah.
Brandon Dennison:In the architecture world, this is called a charette.
Gina Milum:Yes. And that's back in the days when I thought a charette was the car I drove to prom. So I've learned so many words since then. But I mean, it was just incredible. I mean, it's just like, yeah, we want jobs. And we want training. And we want art, art, art, you know, everything from stand studios to artists, studios to theaters. And so Brandon is just letting them write it up there. It's like, well, how much room do you need? And where do you think it would be? And I'll never forget this to my dying day. I mean, because it sits right near the railroad tracks. And the debate that went on about the trains were can we have this and if I just stood up, and I mean, I said, I volunteered to get call CSX and get the train schedule. So we can move this discussion along. And I think that might have given Brandon an idea about what my personality was like all those years ago. So he can't say he wasn't warned.
Brandon Dennison:No.
Gina Milum:That was just amazing. And so then Luke, and I left that meeting. And I said, Luke said, his mother just lived like two houses down at that time he goes, every time those doors are open every time you see anybody over there, I said, you need to go over there and see what they're doing. Because we're going to see if this guy's really doing what he says he's going to do. And so here I am. How many years later is that eight, nine years later, sitting here with you and I can tell you as we work on the black box theater, as we speak, the last promise that Brandon and Coalfield made, my community is being realized. It's awesome. Yeah. It is awesome. And thank you and thank Coalfield.
Brandon Dennison:I'll of course follow through. But thank you to the community for keeping us honest and really for buying in. Yeah, building really belongs to the community. Which is special.
Gina Milum:Yeah. Well, and it's not just we're doing the same thing. And I'm actually getting to do what, I'm getting to hold my own charettes. So as we acquired the way...Brandon has got a mouse in his pocket, but you know, as Coalfield acquired the Black Diamond property, we've done the same thing, open it up to the community, what do you want to see, what what do you want changed? You know, we want to let the community know what's going on. And the community has really responded. I know, we've got advisory boards, you know, both at Black Diamond, and when and then I've got an advisory board and Arts Advisory Board, there West Edge, and we hold meetings to make sure that the community knows what's going on, that the community has input, and a say so and just just keeping everybody in the loop.
Brandon Dennison:So let's go back to the beginning now, so it's beautiful entry to hear, I mean, your Gina, the work you do is so fantastic. And this building has just come back alive. It's been revitalized. And now it's in our mission statement. We talk about perceived liabilities, becoming community assets in West Edge is the epitome of that and you're at the point of the spear so thank you. What was it like growing up in Westmoreland back when it used to have all these factories humming and what was your family situation? What were you into as a kid?
Gina Milum:Well, both my parents worked. So we've, we did pretty I mean, I was looking back on it. I was a spoiled kid. You know, we we, you know that money was never an issue. I Mine was Matchbox 20, a lot lamer. mean, this is back when everybody would get up on a Saturday. C0atch the bus, go downtown. Downtown Huntington was thriving departments, department stores. I mean, Anderson-Newcombs and bakeries, theaters, restaurants, movie theaters, they were like five different movie theaters. I mean, all over you know, all over town, not just all of them in one place, like Bowman which Bowman's great. But everybody No, I like Matchbox 20. I love it. just all the kids rode the bus and went downtown. And that was that was just what you did there. You went to Davidson record store and you bought your, you know, your 45s. I remember the very first album that I ever bought was Yellow It was a CD, by the way. Brick Road. Was Elton John's Yellow Brick Road. Yes. First one. We used to have great concerts. In the 70s, Huntington had nearly 80,000 in 1970s. Oh, yeah. That we used to have amazing concerts that came here. I remember at the Memorial Fieldhouse, which is where the Soccer Complex is now. That's where the first concert that I ever saw, you know, was able to go by myself anyway, was to a KISS concert in 1975. Yes, I saw Aerosmith and Queen. I mean, we had that mean, I guess but because of you know, the proximity, you know, to venues like Cincinnati and Columbus. And I mean, if you were going to go from Cincinnati, or Columbus, and go anywhere, like Roanoke, you gotta go 64. So it's just like, hey, why don't we stop in this? The population was more I mean, wasn't it? And that's just in the metropolitan.
Brandon Dennison:Fast forward to 2020 is 49,000. So nearly cut in half. Yeah, they know that city limits that's not counting greater area. It's the story. It is the illustration of the industrial decline of middle America in lot of ways, and hopefully the industrial renewal of middle America too.
Gina Milum:Exactly I mean, to know, I mean, just like walking into West Edge right now. I mean, and knowing that over top of our heads, they're almost 300 solar panels. And to know that that is already in this old building that's over 100 years old. There's parts of it that are over 100 years old, that we're on the cutting edge of the new green technology. I mean, I really take a point of pride with that, especially as I take people on tours through the building. I will stop them there. And I'll just, you know, point both fingers up and go right over top of our heads are 300 solar panels, offsetting our energy needs at West Edge. So it to know that we're helping revive an entire region. I had been in sales and marketing for 35 years. Yeah, I'm sure some of the things I sold were worthwhile. But how a lot of them weren't. But now as as I know, as I sunset my career, I mean, I'm probably going to be like 95. And you're going to have to say to somebody, come get her, she's escaped, and she's coming. But to know that I, my kids even talk about it, you know, just how I talk about the work that I do, and how happy I am to know that I'm finally been able to give back to a region and a community that that I love so much.
Brandon Dennison:Were you always so outgoing?
Gina Milum:Always, always.
Brandon Dennison:Were you in theater in high school?
Gina Milum:I did. Well, it was kind of we didn't really have theater. We had like speech classes. I wrote a play that we performed in front of the whole school, it was called the Connie Johnson Show, guess who was Connie Johnson?
Brandon Dennison:Not at all surprised.
Gina Milum:And then, of course, there was Edna McMahon and you know, we had all different kinds. I mean, yeah, of the celebrities back then, you know, just kind of takes on everything from Charo to Burt Reynolds. And I don't even remember some of the names that I'd given him. But of course, I got to write the whole thing. But then that speech class comes up and we go to the theater and City Hall, and we do A Christmas Carol. So the teacher you know, the speech teacher says Gina, you talk all the time. And in all the classes, you are going to be the Ghost of Christmas Future. All I did was staying there in a sheet that had been dyed black and pointed. It killed me to be on that stage. Yes, it killed me to be on that stage and not get to talk.
Brandon Dennison:That's hilarious. Have you always loved to read? I know you're a big reader. You've set up a whole library at West Edge for Coalfield staff and crew and trainees to have access to.
Gina Milum:Oh, yeah, always love to read. I mean, my earliest memories are my mother reading to me. Yeah. And reading the classics. So it would be you know, we will be reading you know, Little Women, Black Beauty, Robinson Crusoe. I mean, when I'm like four or five years old. By the time I was in third grade, they don't know they used to have these little biographies and I'll never I mean, they were bound in had an orange binding. And so I could spot them you know. And each classroom had their own library, but I had been given permission by the time I was in fourth grade to go into any classroom and pick any book that I wanted to because I just loved them.
Brandon Dennison:You like biographies still, right?
Gina Milum:Yes.
Brandon Dennison:Favorite one or two or three, you had to pick.
Gina Milum:Isak Dinesen. The woman who out of Africa the movie out of Africa is written about if you know a lot of people might have seen the movie that starred Meryl Streep and Robert Redford. But the biography well, it was actually hurt. She told it herself, Isak Dinesen. It was absolutely incredible. And another one, which is basically I mean, ironically, it's in the same air. I mean, they're in the in eastern Africa, Beryl Markham. Everybody talks about she was an early aviator, and she flew in, did a lot of her flying in eastern Africa in Kenya. Her parents had moved her there, but everyone knows that Lindbergh was the first aviator to fly across across the Atlantic, and he did it west to east which is easier. Beryl Markham was the first person to fly east to west. And she was, she was a woman, and you don't hear anything. I mean, she was mad as a hatter about a whole lot of other ways. And she had actually been a contemporary of Isak Dinesen. Okay. And, but both of those probably are going to pop out to me because they're just, I think it's the adventure and it's the exotic locations because I'm a big traveler and and they were women.
Brandon Dennison:So did you go straight into sales and marketing right out of high school?
Gina Milum:Right out of high school. No, I became a wife and a mother. And so I - Where did I go to work? I went to work at a law firm. I got divorced, went back to school, I was a returning student. So you know, I went back to school after I had my kids. And then I went to work at a local law firm, I was the law librarian, and the dead file clerk. So that's where I met Margaret Mary, she and I worked together at at the law firm. And so I got to put all the supplements in all the law, all the law books, so I got to be around books all the time. And I was actually studying for a paralegal degree here at Marshall at the same time. So that's what I did first. And then I went, I took a job as I was the office administrator for an insurance company that sold Medicare supplements and life insurance. So I was licensed. And you know, I had an insurance license and that and then I went to work. I moved from that into sales. I went to work at the Herald Dispatch, in sales there.
Brandon Dennison:what's it like? So you're a single mother for a time what's what's that? Like?
Gina Milum:It's busy. Yeah, you were busy. I mean, there was, I had gone from being, you know, this, this spoiled kid who had her own charge accounts at the smart shop and the princess shop, you know, from the time she was 12, on to man if I found a 50 cents in the dryer, I was hooping and hollering, so. But trying to work, and go to school and raise three kids, and make sure that, you know, they were involved and weren't doing what they had not to do and tried to get. I mean, I think they conspired to, you know, drive me insane, or kill me a few times. But I survived. And they all did, too. They've all you know, went to school here at Marshall. Graduated, I've got two of them have master's degrees. They're all doing well. So I mean, it wasn't easy. And there are times I mean, I don't remember a whole lot, but we got through it.
Brandon Dennison:You did good, mom.
Gina Milum:I, they almost killed me, but we got it done.
Brandon Dennison:One of the things we were on a tour together at West Edge, I can't remember who it was. But you made the comment. You know, sometimes you I think you said sometimes peoplen need a big ol' hug from grandma. Yeah, or something like that.
Gina Milum:A memaw hug.
Brandon Dennison:The value of of encouragement and support.
Gina Milum:Yeah, and I know how much it's meant to me at certain times in my life. And we work with a population, you know, with people that have, not only are they at risk, but they have been at risk a lot of times their entire lives. And maybe they haven't had anyone to encourage him or give him a pat on the back, or give him a hug or, you know, and that that can go a long way. It does matter. And if you know, I mean, just take the time as you get to know their name, and ask them about what they're you know how they're doing or joke with them, or it really means something to them. And it brightens my day too, of course.
Brandon Dennison:So what's, what do you feel most excited about for 2023? And for West Edge?
Gina Milum:Well, I mean, I have never, I'm getting to build an art program from the ground up. I mean, something that to actually put something in place where nothing was there before. So that to me is so exciting. It's a little bit scary. But it's also so exciting just to create, just to create. And I was so touched, we recently, you know, everyone at Coalfield went on a retreat right before Christmas. Where everybody I think you would ask everybody to give three things about this past year, you know, that they had really enjoyed or that had really impacted them. And almost every single person mentioned something about the arts. And that just really, I mean, gave me wings. It's like so what I'm doing is having an impact people are really being positively affected by this. And so it's just like, hey, you know, I also challenged myself to it's like Gina, you really got to up your game. This has got to be good this year.
Brandon Dennison:Well, and it's interesting. I mean, we're we're not a traditional arts organization in a traditional sense, you know, we're not an art museum or our academy. But, you know, we do community economic development. And I think what we've discovered is Arts is an incredible tool to achieve economic community development. It's like if I say, hey community, come to a meeting, versus: hey, community, come to a art festival workshop, or music festival workshop, what would you be more inclined to do? You know, what's more fun and interesting, but the outcomes are the same. We build relationships, we learn what's on people's hearts and minds and what people want out of life and in their community. And, and then the creativity, you know, the modern economy, it's, it's not about how many widgets can you produce? And how quickly it really is about how can you create innovative solutions to complex problems, and it's a creative process. It's not a linear, mechanical process, or at least it's not that alone. And so it's been really cool to leverage the arts as a, as a tool. It's almost become a thread throughout so much of our work that makes it unique and compelling.
Gina Milum:Well if you think about, I mean, just the traditional Appalachian economies, even, they've always been supplemented by the things that we make a great point. And Appalachians will always say they might not call themselves an artist, but they consider themselves a maker of things. And we all have you know, that uncle or that someone we know that widdles or carves or the grandmother...
Brandon Dennison:or tinkers.
Gina Milum:I know, I mean, that's, that's all creative endeavors, yes, all those things. And what it does, I mean, it's, it stimulates parts of your brain that make you more resilient, that make you see the problems that you encounter in different ways. It's just like, I can't go with this straight ahead. But you know, if I just take two steps over an angle at this way, and come back around, just like if you were, if you were building a piece of furniture, or if you were it just an if you look at how they've always supplemented our economies, and they still do that is that's another element in our economy. I mean, it's the makers, it's the singers, it's the engine has an amazing music scene. People making money doing that. People sell we had an amazing Christmas market this year. And I know I had wrestled with how am I going to work this around Black Friday and, you know, Small Business Saturday, and then it dawned on me it's like, Why do I have to give these big box stores the first shot at people's, you know, Christmas money? Now, we're going to do this on Black Friday, but we're going to call it Black Fri-Yay. And people can we had 50 vendors and those people made money it's great. So just you got to look at it that way. I mean, I know we're going to be able to do sell the artists work that you know when they come in an exhibit they will have their work there on consignment. We've recently I mean, Brad Smith, right here I mean, he came in, he brought a tour through with you I forget who would come through and we'd take him into the gallery and there were two pieces of art there by Sassa - our artist in residence and he fell in love with them. He came to the market the next day, it was the you know, he came to our Christmas market with with him and his wife and his two daughters and bought two of those pieces. And those were his Christmas presents to his daughter.
Brandon Dennison:Gina, thanks for everything you do. Thanks for just being a great citizen in the community. A wonderful mentor and encourage her to our crew members are trainees and a steward of the West Edge Factory which really has become important to that not just Westmoreland, not just Huntington, not just Wayne County, but really the whole region. It's become a cornerstone for the new Appalachian economy. And you've been right in the mix of it and I'm grateful.
Gina Milum:Well thank you, and thank Coalfield for getting me off the streets. Thank you Brandon.
Brandon Dennison:Change in the Coalfields is a podcast created by coal field development in the hills and hollers of West Virginia. This episode was hosted by Brandon Dennison, and produced and edited by JJN Multimedia, become a part of our mission to rebuild the Appalachian economy by going to our website Coalfield-Development.org to make a donation, you can email us anytime at info at Coalfield-Development.org and subscribe to our newsletter for more information on the podcast. You can follow us on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn by searching Coalfield Development. Check back soon for more episodes.