Bucks Artist Pens Song, Video for Linemen

They have been working 10-, 12- and 16-hour shifts in the days since Hurricane Sandy left nearly a million Philadelphia-area electric customers in the cold and the dark.

The linemen working round-the-clock to restore power to a darkened East Coast have been unsung heroes. That is, until now.

LisaBeth Weber, a Bucks County artist, has written a song and created a video to honor the contributions of people who she says are too often taken for granted.

"The first responders - police, fire and EMS -  they're often thanked for their work, as they should be," Weber said. "But these linemen, who are working in sometimes really difficult situations, a lot of time, they’re saving lives, too, but no one really says thank you."

Weber, who lives in Carversville, wrote the song "Trouble Man" on Aug. 28, 2011. She'll never forget the date, because it was the day that Hurricane Irene pounded Bucks County.

After the song was written, she tried to create a video to go with it.

But it just didn't feel right, and after awhile, she put the project on the shelf.

"Something was telling me to wait," Weber told Doylestown Patch on Friday evening. "Now, I know why."

When Hurricane Sandy hit Bucks County earlier this week, Weber's creative fire was rekindled.

She surfed the 'net, checking local news websites and the Facebook feeds of her friends and social media circle in and around Doylestown, looking for images of the storm's aftermath and cleanup.

She found photos of trees down across Route 202 in New Britain Borough, utility trucks working in Doylestown Borough, and so much more. She began contacting the photographers for permission to use their images.

A friend, Michael Wood, who works at PPL, also contributed photographs of the company's linemen working.

"I wanted images that really told the universal story, the story of this community of linemen, who really are just responding amazingly to our need," Weber said.

Included in the montage are photos of guys from Gulf Coast Lineman who came up from Louisiana this week to help restore power in Bucks County. They're working in an area near Weber's home.

Within two days, Weber's video was done. She posted it to YouTube and sent out the link. The response already has begun.

"It means so much to me that you wanted to write a song about our linemen," one woman wrote to Weber, after watching the video.

In past years, the artist has created custom lapel pins to commemorate events such as 9/11 and Hurricane Andrew, in 1992, donating the proceeds to charity. In 2010, she created a pin to raise money for disaster relief after the earthquake in Haiti.

Weber said she hopes the song and video help tell a story that doesn't often get told.

"I have some friends who worked for power companies," she said, "and the work they do is so important. They deserve to be recognized."