Gifts with Meaning, in Time for the Holidays

If you are searching for gifts with meaning, we suggest you purchase these books, DVDs and CDs released in 2009, all of which were created with major help from OVEC volunteers, board members and staff:

• Appalachias Last Stand essays and photos compiled after an OVEC-hosted writers tour highlighting people and places impacted by mountaintop removal.  www.walkfreepress.com/ALS info.html.

• Coal Country documentary DVD, music CD and companion book, www.coalcountrythemovie.com and www.coalcountrymusic.com. Coal Country won Best Film at the 2009 West Virginia Filmmakers Festival. All proceeds from the music CD will be donated to efforts to end mountaintop removal.

• Plundering Appalachia essays and large format photos, www.plunderingappalachia.org.

• Still Moving Mountains The second fundraising-for-our-cause CD from Aurora Lights. Be sure to check out the educational / interactive companion website, Journey Up Coal River. auroralights.org/journey/.

New coal-related music in 2009 includes our good friends Michael and Carrie Klines Damp as the Dew and Kathy Matteas Coal. www.folktalk.org/damp.html and www.mattea.com/KathyMatteaCoal.html.

In 2009, longtime West Virginia Highland Conservancy member Bob Gates released a DVD of All Shaken Up. All of his mining-related videos can be purchased at www.wvhighlands.org/store/index.html.

Climate Ground Zeros Mike Roselle was out and about in direct-action-land long before starting his efforts on behalf of the movement to end mountaintop removal. Check out his new book Tree Spiker at us.macmillan.com/treespiker.

Returning to productions with which OVEC was involveddo you remember last years big movie releases, Burning the Future, which won top prize for in-depth television reporting at the 2009 Society for Environmental Journalism conference, and Mountain Top Removal? BTF is available on iTunes and Amazon, as well as from the website: www.burningthefuture.org. For MTR, see www.hawriverfilms.com/id11.html.

Remember, too, the assorted works of filmmaker B.J. Gudmundsson, www.patchworkfilms.com.

And for books, theres Ann Pancakes Strange As This Weather Has Been, Dr. Shirley Stewart Burns Bringing Down the Mountains and Michael Shnayersons Coal River. Ask for them at your local, independent bookstore.

You can take your gift giving in a different direction by giving to a project that is not quite complete. On Coal River is a new film that takes viewers on a gripping emotional journey into the Coal River Valley of WV. The film is nearly complete, but short of funding. Visit oncoalriver.com to watch the trailer and to donate to the project.