Thousands of anthracite coal miners labored under inhuman, underpaid, overworked, filthy, exhausting, and life-threatening conditions, and their work played a central role in the nation’s development. Historians cite the beginning of the American Industrial Revolution during the 1840s in the Scranton, Pennsylvania, area, where anthracite coal was found to be superior for heating factories and running machinery. Small factories producing various products spread throughout the coal region, and coal and iron were used to manufacture iron rails that helped launch the booming railroad industry. Coal fueled the American Industrial Revolution, contributed greatly to victory in the Civil War and two World Wars, and supported the rise of the United States as the most powerful nation on earth. That prosperity and growth came at a terrible price: for over 100 years miners toiled under horrific conditions, more than 50,000 were killed, and hundreds of thousands suffered from black lung disease and other serious ailments.