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In Graphic Novel Sequel, West Virginia Writer Tackles Coal, Climate & Race

A few years back, West Virginia writer and filmmaker Danny Boyd stepped into the world of graphic novels, releasing books under his cult-classic Chillers franchise, as well as other stories. One of which was Carbon, a mythological world set in an alternative West Virginia and dealing with an ancient race of people and their effect on the coal industry thousands of years later. The follow-up, Salt, was released in late-2016 and picks up where Carbon left off. We spoke with Boyd about his latest graphic novel, some of the social and environmental issues addressed in the story and why he’s just now getting around to promoting it the way he would have liked.

The last time we talked, we were talking about Carbon — which was the first installment in this mythological world, so to speak. Now comes Salt and take us to the world. Let’s start with Carbon. Describe that world for us what happened and then get us into where we’re going with Salt.

Carbon was a story that I had nearly 30 years after living in Williamson and seeing the destruction of strip mining and those kinds of things. But in the movie world, as a filmmaker, I was never going to be able to have the kind of budget to do something that big and then when I got into comics it’s like, ‘Oh, man, with this I finally can.’ So, it’s Gods, monsters and evil coal barons.

So, I started thinking about it as an entertainer: Coal, coal, coal, coal.

Coal is organic material. It’s plants, animals, people. What would happen if it came back to life and was ignited by an evil industrial power? So that launches Carbon which leads through to Salt with the lead character, Heat Hatfield. And you’re right, it is a mythological approach with it the tragic hero turned to epic hero.

There are some heavy things going on here. For one, there’s sort of an apocalyptic vibe. In Salt, there are some issues of climate change and global warming. What is it like trying to use a platform such as a graphic novel for a subject matter that is so socially ubiquitous at this point?

It is so hard to digest. Who wants to turn on TV anymore? You know, after the last election, it’s the last thing you want to bring joy in your life. So, it’s difficult for a career. I don’t know if that was successful, but [you have to ask yourself] ‘OK, how do you make these topics entertaining?’ That’s number one. If it’s not entertaining, you’re not going to bring people to it. Hopefully, at least, through the backdoor. But, if you’re a climate denier, this is a nonstarter for us. But, if you turn on TV right now and watch the Weather Channel with this new hurricane system coming through — even in a very stable society like ours, we’re only a few clicks from melting down politically, environmentally, all of those kinds of things.

There’s one scene I do want to address in Salt and that is a moment that particularly addresses issues of race. It’s one of those things that, whenever you talk to people about issues of race in West Virginia, you oftentimes hear one of two things. One of the things you hear is — normally from an outsider’s perspective, I would say — that West Virginia is very overtly racist, that we’re a bunch of hillbillies that are ignorant and have no progressive ideas as far as dealing with race. And then, on the other hand, you hear something to the effect of: ‘There’s such a low more minority population that race isn’t an issue here. It seems like you’re trying to respond to some of that in some fashion or another.

I am and thanks for picking up on that. It’s a sticky wicket and it was when I was writing this that I realized, ‘Man, I have my entire teaching career — 32 years with a historically black college and university — I’ve lived in Tanzania, I live in a black community by choice.’ When you’re around the community, you start hearing those things: ‘Oh, we’re all black in the coal mines. You know, we all come out that way. So, we’re not racist’ — that kind of thing. And then you start to hear, ‘No, not really. That’s only if you’re white.’

And I realize the white privilege that I carried — that I didn’t really acknowledge and I really wanted to see and I don’t know if I was successful. But, I wanted that scene with Willie Mays Vincent, who who’s like one of the main heroes of this whole epic thing, with Heat Hatfield where he says, ‘Well, you’re my best friend.’ Well, that’s a stereotype. People always say, ‘I’m not prejudiced. Look at my best friend.’ Well, no, you need to look at these things and live a little bit deeper.

Right before we started speaking, you handed me a sheet of paper. It’s essentially just a one-sheet, more or less a press release, that deals with the Trump Administration and how that’s playing a role and in making dystopian literature interesting and marketable. What can you say — at least in your experience as a creator, as a graphic novelist, as a filmmaker, as a person that’s delved into that particular kind of art — how is the relationship with the administration affecting the marketability or the conversations surrounding what it is that you’re doing?

Well commercially, I probably shouldn’t tell you, but I’ll stand by this: I didn’t think these things would happen. If you read the interview with me at the end of Salt, I’m saying, ‘Hey, look, West Virginia’s got the short end the stick, America.’ I said, ‘Hillary, how about helping us out. You know, giving us a stimulus package after we built the country.’ So, that’s how little that I thought that this would happen.

But this interview took place and was published before the election?

You talk about bad luck timing; my book came out the day after the election. You talk about sucking the oxygen out of the room. So, these weren’t like the most farfetched things.

One of the things I look at in Salt is that it’s a story that seems like it’s still not finished. Is that is that right? Is there more coming from this storyline?

Well, it has an ending that’s a big, big, big ending. So, I hope that encourages people out there to get the books and we won’t give it away. But it opens up another door. We always think things are black and white — it’s this or it’s that. We’re very arrogant to think that we could destroy the earth. We can’t destroy the Earth — we can destroy human kind as we know it.

So, it’s not just about when will we destroy humankind or will we not. It’s like, well, is there something in the middle? And we’re hinting a little at evolution here. Again, this is all mythological and that’s probably as much as I want to talk about the ending.

22-Year-Old Talks About West Virginia, Race, and Hope for Social Justice

22-year-old Takeiya Smith is a student at West Virginia State University, a historically black institution of higher education. Takeiya says over the past few years, as racial tensions have become more visible across the country, she’s become more vocal about the importance of racial justice, but she didn’t always like to speak up.

While she was in middle and high school in Putnam county, Takeiya says she did experience racism, but she mostly kept quiet because she didn’t want to cause any trouble. In this interview, she talks about some of her experiences.
Do You Identify as Appalachian?

Well I will say I’ve never used the term “Appalachian.” And I know that people do, and they identify that way, and it’s like that pride and being West Virginian.

I have such a weird relationship with West Virginia. It’s kind of like that toxic relationship you have with this boyfriend, but you love him like crazy, and you want to fix him. It’s like, do you leave because he’s not always the best, or do I stay and try to work on it? I look at it like being in a relationship.

Sometimes I love West Virginia. And sometimes it’s just not ok. Because there’s racism everywhere, there’s racial disparities all over the country. But I think you see some of the most dramatic racial disparities in West Virginia. I’ve lived in North Carolina and I’ve lived in Maryland, so I’ve had little moments of experiencing other states.

And it seem there is something worse going on racially here than other places that I’ve experienced.

I think if I was a leave because it’s broken kind of person, I wouldn’t be an organizer. One thing they say is when black people become successful they leave West Virginia. And it’s like they’re leaving cause they’re broken. Well if that keeps happening, it’s never going to get better.

The Struggle To Stay

I was dead set on leaving West Virginia until I started organizing here a year ago. My aunt, who lives out of state, she tells me to leave all the time. She says black people don’t do well in West Virginia.

Because when she grew up here, most black people weren’t doing well. Now she’s around other black people who are doing well.

I get moments where I am like, “I am not leaving.” Then I go somewhere else and I realize it’s not so bad. So to answer that simple question about the relationship: It’s complicated.

Is it Difficult to Get Your Hair Done?

Yeah it’s hard. In Charleston, there’s only one place. I’ll be out sometimes and I’ll see a black woman staring at me. And she’ll go, “Who did your hair?”

And with hair products, sometimes we pay more for them. Then sometimes we get thrifty, we shop online. We say, we’re not paying $30 for this hairspray we need.

Black Girl Magic

Black girl magic is… taking it upon ourselves to say we are awesome too. We have started a trend in loving and accepting ourselves in our blackness. And it doesn’t have to be in a whitewashed image.

Do You Feel Hope?

I just want to be clear, there’s a movement going on in West Virginia with racial equality and with young people. Young people are often seen as apathetic. We are not apathetic. We care. And oftentimes we are silenced.

Hope was a really big part of my initial experience with organizing. I met all of these people who were working on things and they were really motivating me, and I thought, change is possible. Then when I met with resistance, that’s when hope started dying down. I noticed how people would push back.

I have not been organizing long enough to where I am no longer shocked to people’s resistance to do the right thing. I went through a low point when it came to hope. Hope is meeting other people who care. Hope doesn’t equal perfection, and it doesn’t even guarantee a win. You can fail. But you need hope to be able to attempt it. For me, it’s other young people who say, “F–k that, we are not ok with it. And we’re gonna do something about it.”

Wheeling Reacts to Racist Political Graffiti

With Election Day just a few weeks away, you’ve likely seen a political sign or two on a street corner in your town, or maybe in your neighbor’s front…

With Election Day just a few weeks away, you’ve likely seen a political sign or two on a street corner in your town, or maybe in your neighbor’s front yard. Up in Wheeling, one community is responding to the defacing of a candidate’s sign after spray paint blackened out her face and racially disparaging phrases covered her name.

Loma Nevels is running for City Council in Wheeling. She sat on the front porch of her home on Wheeling Island and told me a role in government is a goal she set at a young age.

“I was in the fourth grade. The teacher said, ‘What do you want to be or do when you grow up?’ I said I want to go to Caracas, Venezuela, and I want to run for a political office. I’m in Kingsville, Texas, where I was born and raised, and everyone in the class laughed. It hurt my feelings that they laughed. It hurt my feelings that they laughed. She asked, ‘Why those two things?’ I like the way Caracas, Venezuela sounds; and I want to run for political office because you can help people.”

She made it to Caracas, by the way, travelling the world in her spare time while working for the city of Wheeling. Nevels worked in the city’s finance department, then in the water department as assistant manager. After 31 years with the city, she retired a year ago. She then set to work on the goal of running for office. Nevels says dilapidated housing, law enforcement challenges and the drug epidemic ravaging Wheeling are among the top issues her city faces.

She’s says campaigning has been a peaceful process until last week.

“I was in a meeting Friday – the Women’s Club of Wheeling – and the phone kept dinging and I said it may be my husband so I answered it and the person said, ‘I’m so sorry. Somebody painted your face black and KKK next to it.’”

Loma Nevels is running for Wheeling’s city council after working for the city for three decades.

Loma Nevels says she’s experienced racism her entire life, that it’s as prevalent as ever, but the vandalization was a surprise. She went to see the sign herself.

“I said, ‘Well, I’m gonna pray for the person, and I’m moving on. I’m not going to let this be a distraction to me in running for city council. And I suggest everybody else forget about it.”

But people didn’t forget. Political candidates made statements on social media condemning the act, and a $1,000 reward was offered for information identifying the offender. Comments of all kinds poured out in reaction- some positive, some negative, one that brought her to tears.

“That night, Friday night, when I read all of the comments on FaceBook, when I came to the one that said, ‘She probably did it,’ I never thought nobody would think something like that.”

Deputy Chief Martin Kimball of the Wheeling Police Department says there’s not a lot of graffiti in Wheeling, and that the department gets very few complaints. He says occasionally there’s one or two people who will tag buildings and walls.

“Our latest particular artist is a guy who goes by ‘Said.’ He’s been tagging for the last two or three months on rare occasions.”

One of those rare occasions was last Friday night, in the same vicinity of Loma Nevel’s political sign, with very similar black spray paint. Of course, it’s not conclusive evidence and Kimball says while he suspects the connection, police still don’t know who this tagger called ‘Said’ is.

But Amanda Carney is the artist who took the matter into her own hands. She’s a young entrepreneur and grew up in the area. She isn’t well acquainted with Nevels, but the sign was planted on a piece of property that her father owns.

“I try to respect everyone’s opinion but when your opinion fundamentally disrespects someone else, then I don’t think it’s valid anymore. So I wanted to turn that message into something positive because this is my city, too.”

Carney says she’s a fan of street art and graffiti as a way to give voice to communities, and so she used art to work out the anger that the pedantic and hateful graffiti inspired within herself. She painted a new sign with a floral design that read “Vote Loma Nevels, Ward 2.”

“Hey Loma Nevels, I fixed your sign,” Carney wrote on Facebook under this photo she posted:

“Hey Loma Nevels, I fixed your sign,” Amanda Carney wrote on Facebook under this photo she posted.

Nevels approves of the new sign. She says she’s moving on. Though she does wish she could meet the perpetrator.

“If I could, I would invite them in this house and bake them some chocolate chip cookies. And then tell them to get up, get out of my house, and go do good. Hatred is going to be here in my opinion, until Christ comes back. So in the meantime, just get over it,” said Nevels.

“You can’t make people love one another. It’s a choice. Some people choose hate. I choose love. Simple as that.”

Kanawha Community Dicusses Racial Issues

Members of the Kanawha County Community gathered at West Virginia State University earlier this week to discuss race and the ongoing battle for equality.

Community members, officials and students took part in a discussion at West Virginia State looking at different racial issues effecting West Virginia and Kanawha County. The discussion was organized by students and the American Friends Service Committee.

“Taking Action for Racial Equality” was a discussion focused on finding ways to reduce racial disparities in the state. It was part of a series of events that began last November at the Summit on Race Matters in West Virginia that drew nearly 200 people. Takeiya Smith is a West Virginia State student from Charleston who said it was important for students to lead the discussion.

“It means a lot to me because I’m from here and we’re not talking about changing things in the entire world, we’re talking about changing things right here in West Virginia, Smith said. “It makes me feel really good, I’m 21 years old and I know I’m doing something that’s extremely significant that matters and it’s really fulfilling.”

The forum focused on ideas generated at a June meeting at the East End Family Resource Center. That meeting generated possible community solutions to racial inequality in voter engagement, criminal justice reforms and investments in affordable housing on Charleston’s West Side. Eight issue teams presented solutions and then participants had the opportunity to pick team they wanted to join in order to take action.

Smith said each discussion of race in the region is a step in the right direction.

“Having a victory on one racial justice initiative is not going to eliminate racism all over the country or all over the world,” Smith said. “But that’s ok because we’ve taken one more step toward where we need to be and that’s equality.”

Among those issues was reinvestment in Charleston’s West Side where Reverend Matthew Watts said they just need others in the region to believe in the community.

“The West Side is arguably West Virginia’s most challenged community. If we were a separate municipality we would be the 9^th largest city in West Virginia with over 18,000 people,” Smith said. “We have the highest concentration of African America people of anywhere in West Virginia. There are over 4,000 children in one neighborhood. So we’re trying to bring attention to the West Side and how it can be a model community and how it can be transformed from the inside out.”

Other issues discussed including the Second Chance Employment Act which would allow for the expungement of one non-violent felony five years after time served in order to allow the person to have a clean record. And issues like LGBTQ safety and equality on West Virginia State’s Campus. West Virginia State will host another meeting in January to track the progress of the various actions teams assembled during the event.

Race Matters in Appalachia

On West Virginia Morning, Ashton Marra reports from the Summit on Race Matters in Appalachia held yesterday in Charleston. And on the heels of a new…

On West Virginia Morning, Ashton Marra reports from the Summit on Race Matters in Appalachia held yesterday in Charleston. And on the heels of a new agreement between the United States and China to limit greenhouse gases, Glynis Board explores a new report about ways to reduce emissions in West Virginia.

Race Organizers May Face Fee in Charleston

Race organizers could soon have to pay fees to the city of Charleston for holding their event within city limits.

The Charleston Gazette reports the city’s parks and recreation committee passed a bill outlining rules for the fees last night.

Several racing groups and charity organizations have spoken out against the bill, which calls for fees that range from 500 to a thousand dollars for 5 and 10K racecourses. The bill still needs the approval of city council.

The idea behind the bill is to help the city recoup costs associated with the races, but nonprofit organizations could receive a 50 percent discount on their fees if they list the City of Charleston as an event sponsor.

Fees for established courses are expected to be published by October 1st.