When Harlan County USA premiered in 1976, it shone a light on an eastern Kentucky coal mining community’s grueling thirteen-month strike in the fight for a union contract. Accompanied by a rich soundtrack featuring greats like Hazel Dickens and Merle Travis, the Academy Award winning documentary has been heralded as one of the great nonfiction films.
Join local public media station WKMS and the regional Appalachia+Mid-South Newsroom in a screening of Harlan County USA, followed by a conversation with WKMS news director Derek Operle, who recently interviewed director Barbara Kopple and surviving subjects of the documentary to create a radio special on the lasting impact of this seminal film, 50 years after its release. This is a fundraiser for WKMS.