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Seeking a new era in the coal mining industry, Josephine Roche applied her years of work in human welfare, training and economics to her new office as president of The Rocky Mountain Fuel Co. Roche was a nationally recognized social and industrial leader.
Roche inherited her father's shares of the company when he died in 1927. She resigned from her position as juvenile referee in Judge Lindsey's Denver. CO courtroom and was appointed an officer at Rocky Mountain Fuel. With a style uniquely her own, Roche earned the respect of the coal miners. Under her leadership, Rocky Mountain Fuel was the first coal mining corporation to officially recognize the United Mine Workers of America. To date, her years of service in the coal industry stand unprecedented.
Roche's reforms
The history of the Colorado mining industry has moments that are true reflections of the "Old West." Rocky Mountain Fuel is no exception. In 1927, the insurrection at the Columbine Mine in southern Weld County occurred. This bloody standoff between striking miners and company guards would leave six men dead and 35 injured.
By 1928, Roche acquired additional shares that gave her control of the company. This allowed her to began to successfully implement her social and humanitarian policies. Over time, Roche won the respect of the miners who began to recognize her sense of fairness and justice for all people.
The 1928 labor agreement sounded like an industrial peace treaty to "established industrial justice, substitute reason for violence, confidence for misunderstanding, integrity and good faith for dishonest practices, and a union of effort for the chaos of the present economic warfare."
Then, in 1931, the idealistic principles instituted at Rocky Mountain Fuel were...