“One weekend every March, almost every resident in this town crowds the tan-and-gray bleachers of the local armory to watch their friends and neighbors beat each other bloody. The boxing-brawling event … draws more than 2,000 spectators a night in a 3,000-person city nestled so deep in the mountains that your cellphone won’t ring. The winners leave with a trophy, a jacket and a check for $1,000 — the same take-home as a few weeks of soot-covered work in the local mines.” WaPo’s Wesley Lowery takes you to the Rough N Rowdy, where a forgotten town dukes it out once a year. “On weekends, and many weeknights, people gather around 30-packs of beer in their garages; there’s no bar and the nearest watering hole is nearly an hour’s drive.”

+ “From coal to broadband to Trump’s budget, The Daily Yonder reports on rural life for the people actually living it.”