In 1913, the Southern Colorado coal fields exploded into a war between the newly organized United Mine Workers of America and the Rockefeller-owned Colorado Fuel and Iron. The company's history had been marked by violent deaths in mine explosions and infant mortalities from disease caused by squalid conditions in the company-owned camps. The Death of Spring tells the story of Vincenzo, an Italian immigrant, who searched for the American dream only to find the harsh realities of life in the coal camps.