The fringe group Mountaintop Gun Club, for example, rented private surface land for $1 from concerned landowners. In return, the club established shooting ranges on threatened land in the hopes that the presence of armed individuals might deter coal companies from taking the land by force. Members of the Appalachian Group to Save the Land and People described parts of eastern Kentucky in the late 1960s as a war zone where armed residents faced off daily against coal operators.
