"Andra McAnulty spent his whole life campaigning for better working/living conditions for the less well off members of society. After he and his family were involved in The Blantyre Pit Disaster, which cost the lives of 115 miners, he devoted the rest of his life to improving the lot of his fellow miners and their wives and families. Despite having left school at the age of ten, he eventually became the Chairman of both the Blantyre Parish Council and the Blantyre School Board and the first president of Lanarkshire Mineworkers Union. He also gave great service to the community as a Justice of the Peace. He and his wife had twelve children and the book describes the harsh living conditions that they and other mining families of their era endured as they struggled to survive and also the individual, tragic incidents which led to the death of each of his five sons in adulthood"--Back cover.