After Powell Harmon wrote a farewell letter before suffocating in the Fraterville Mine in 1902 telling his boys never to work in the coal mines, his eldest son, Briceville student Condy Harmon, knew that honoring such a request would subject his family to hardship. Putting family first, Condy quit school to mine coal and support his mother, brothers, and sisters. He never married and died at age 24 in the 1911 Cross Mountain Mine explosion. Harmon descendants, as well as Briceville students, continue to honor his sacrifice by graduating from high school and college.