Matthew Lunsford

As it does many weekends, the Mullins family of Berea loads camera bags, clothes and camping gear into its car. This time the destination is Kayford Mountain, West Va., where Nick Mullins will speak out against mountaintop removal. The summer before, the family traveled the eastern United States speaking out against the practice.
Until a few years ago, Nick, 35, was a fourth-generation coal miner in Virginia. He remembers as a boy watching as coal companies stripped away the mountain above his family&#8217;s home in Clintwood, Va. As an adult, he went to work mining coal underground.
With the increasing concern about the negative impact of mountaintop removal and the unsafe practices he was observing at underground mines, Nick began to question how he was supporting his family.
“There were a lot of nights where I stared at the door, and I didn&#8217;t want to go to work,&#8221; Nick says. &#8220;I felt ashamed for the years that I wanted to be a miner so bad.”
He also did not want his son to grow up to be a fifth-generation coal miner, but Nick continued to work as a miner until after his family&#8217;s home burned to the ground in July 2010. The fire was the spark that ignited change. Nick and his wife, Rusti, decided to move to Berea because of the community&#8217;s focus on sustainability and preserving Appalachia.
With the family&#8217;s move to a a four-acre plot of land just west of Berea, Appalachia found an unlikely hero in Nick.
Nick and Rusti applied to and were accepted to Berea College where Nick majors in communications with a minor in sustainability and environmental studies. Rusti is studying history. Nick was elected president of Bereans for Appalachia, a student group working to better the region. Their two children, Daniel, 12, and Alex, 9, settled into school.
Nick and Rusti are doing everything they can to be self-sustaining in their daily lives, including heating with wood obtained from a tree-removal service, collecting rain water and composting.
Ultimately, their goal is to heal Appalachia and make it a better place for their children.

Better days ahead