Whose Side Are You On?

Dave Jenkinson is a professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Manitoba and the author of the “Portraits” section of Emergency Librarian.

The title’s question is the one faced by high-schooler Ron Tarrant of
St. Lawrence, Newfound- land. It is April 1975, and the 2000–person
community is divided by a strike which has seen the fluorspar miners
locked out by the company’s “from away” management. Ron’s
father, Leo, a miner for 26 years, is not supportive of the strike, a
situation that Ron perceives as reflecting on him. When Ron shows
romantic interest in Nicole, a mine manager’s daughter, his community
loyalty is questioned.

Ron’s new teacher, Sister “Perky” Pat, has decided that everyone
will complete a local history project. Ron, partly to annoy his father,
chooses the strike. To research the project, Ron joins classmate Jackie
Haskell in interviewing her dying grandfather, Bennie Lake, an old
miner. Through the interviews, the teen learns how management has
repeatedly ignored safety issues concerning mine dust, and, as a
consequence, increasing numbers of miners, like Bennie, had contracted
silicosis and died. The lung disease takes on a personal face when Ron
overhears his father admitting he has the disease and will not survive
more than two years. The father–son relationship softens, and Ron
discovers his father’s aversion to the strike was based on his fear
that the company would close the community’s only industry, leaving
him, an older man, unable to find another job.

While the social issues are the book’s central focus, there is
sufficient plot to maintain the interest of middle-school readers.
Recommended.