Americans around the country are struggling through this recession. But in southern West Virginia, coal-mining communities have been living with economic downturns for decades. The first bust hit in the fifties and sixties, then 20 years later, the coal mines closed again. Discouraged by the dangers of mining and the lack of alternative jobs, many working-age people have moved away. In some towns, the elderly are the only ones who remain.

Sierra Crane-Murdoch reports from one town along the Coal River where more than a dozen older women raise their spirits with weekly dances. Angela Evancie co-produced this story.