In 1962, a trash fire ignited a seam of anthracite coal beneath Centralia, PA, a thriving mining town of over 3,000 people. By the mid-1980s, giant plumes of smoke and deadly carbon monoxide gases billowed from the fissures in the ground, the local highway cracked and collapsed, trees were bleached white and petrified, as the fire continued to rage unchecked. It wasn't until a young boy nearly died after falling into a smoldering mine subsidence that the government was pressed into action. A brief history of the mine fire will be followed by a viewing of the film The Town That Was.