"THE LADY ON THE DIVIDE"

In December 1985, after seven years of all volunteer labor, the community of Butte, Montana, installed a figure as large as the Statue of Liberty on the Continental Divide. The statue, designed and constructed by unemployed miners during the recession following the closure of the Anaconda copper mines, began as the small project of one man dedicated to his wife and evoled into a massive undertaking that held the depressed community together. Twenty years later, this short film relives the story of "Our Lady of the Rockies" and weaves together new hopes with grim historical realities in the uncertain aftermath of a resource extraction economy.

Category:

Entertainment

Tags:

• Butte
• Superfund
• pollution
• resources
• extraction
• gold
• copper
• montana
• virgin
• mary
• catholic
• jon
• stewart
• berkeley
• pit
• mine

[sirflipper]

on my first trip to Butte it was dark and I looked up and saw it, I said "holy mary what is that" that got a real big laugh. foot in mouth huh?

[EcoRover]

THEIR lady of OUR rockies? Oh yeah: Earth Mother Goddess = Mary "mother of god" = Gaia = Ceres etc. All them goddesses are pretty much the same. In a mining culture, a statue and prayers to the Earth Mother Goddess is a way of seeking mediation and forgiveness for the horrible damage that mining has inflicted upon the body of the Earth Mother. At's OK I 'spose: if you're going to rape your mother, at least you should feel a little guilty about it!

[hazelton22]

"Our Lady of the Rockies" - sounds like a statue of Mary, mother of Jesus Christ, which is not an Earth Mother Goddess.

[EcoRover]

What a wonderful tribute to the Earth Mother Goddess! This is a common response of miners in communities after they have trashed the earth; it is a way of seeking female intercession and forgiveness.

[GoateeIncorporated]

She's called the "Lady of the Rockies".