West Virginia University Football Coach Bill Stewart has announced that the football program will display a helmet decal to honor the 29 coal miners who were tragically killed in the Upper Big Branch mine disaster on April 5.

The decal will be a white circle with a black number 29 in the middle of the circle. This decal will be displayed for the WVU Gold-Blue Game on Friday, April 30, and throughout the entire 2010 football season.

“These 29 miners deserve our respect,” said Stewart, who lost his uncle, Buss Williams, in a mining accident in 1961. “This is a way we can honor what these guys stood for. They were true West Virginians who were working to support their families. That blue collar work ethic is what our program is all about.

“President Jim Clements, Reed Williams, Jock Sanders, Chris Neild, J.T. Thomas and I were invited by Governor Joe Manchin to attend the wreath hanging ceremony in Charleston on Monday. Being there with our group from West Virginia, the Governor, Senator Jay Rockefeller, Congressman Nick Rahall and U.S. Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis, it was an honor for me to have the opportunity to attend this event in remembrance of these fine West Virginians, who gave their lives in the coal mine disaster.”

-WVU-

04/14/10

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