Lyrics of "CENTRALIA" - Matthew Joseph

A small town in Pennsylvania goes by the name of Centralia
It lies beside highway 61 on top of 24 million tons
Of anthracite coal, a poor man’s gold

In ’62 a fire broke through down into the coal seam
It was Good Friday so folk were delayed listening to the preacher’s sermon
While they prayed it smouldered through the subterranean seams
And to their dismay for the rest of their days they’d watch the smoke rise eerily

Oh Centralia, a real smoking town
They say it’ll burn for a thousand years
From the coal buried underground
All the people of Centralia packed up and moved away
Except for a few old timers who’ll never be cold again

Well through all the smoke and 20 years not a lot had been done
Dizzy heads and stricken souls from carbon monoxide in the lungs
A 12 year old boy called Todd Domboski was playing in the garden
When a plume of smoke and a big black hole nearly sucked him under ground
(His cousin saved him though)

So Congress gave 42 million dollars to evacuate the town
Jobs were lost, houses knocked down before they burnt to the ground
Highway 61 was closed, nothing but cracks and big old holes
Who’d have thought so much trouble could be caused from a pile of coal

Oh Centralia, a real smoking town
They say it’ll burn for a thousand years
From the coal buried underground
All the people of Centralia packed up and moved away
Except for a few old timers who’ll never be cold again

Some call this place hell on earth but to most it’s just a ghost town
But you won’t see no ghosts just a lot of smoke steaming from the ground
It looks like a meadow with a few roads but the church can still be found
Where every Sunday people pray for the rain to put it out (It keeps on burning though)

In 2016 it is said that these folks will return to town
To dig up an old time capsule their elders buried in the ground
All those memories, all those letters to remind them how it was
Will most likely have burnt to cinders because that’s what a fire does

Oh Centralia, a real smoking town
They say it’ll burn for a thousand years
With all the coal buried underground
All the people of Centralia packed up and moved away
Except for a few old timers who’ll never be cold again

So that’s the story of Centralia, Pennsylvania, USA.

Words by Matthew Joseph ©