Search Results

• The Casto Hole

  The Casto Hole is a cave hidden by the woods, located near Limber’s Ridge on the waters of Straight Run, a branch of the Tug Fork of Mill Creek in "Jackson County":https://www.wvencyclopedia.org/articles/931. It was a Unionist refuge during the …

• Jenny Lind House

  … well as the outside. This was especially important if the house had two stories. Cracks opened between these planks as the wood cured, so three- or four-inch battens, also called weather stripping, were nailed over the cracks, resulting in another uniquely …

• Chair Making

  … ‘‘split bottom.’’ Traditional chair joinery entails working with natural drying characteristics of hardwoods, whereby the unseasoned ‘‘green’’ wood of the posts shrinks onto the dry and seasoned horizontal rungs for superior strength and endurance. The …

• S. L. Jones

  Folk artist Shields Landon Jones (October 17, 1901-December 15, 1997) was widely recognized for his hand-carved, painted wood sculptures. Jones was born on a farm in western Monroe County, one of 11 children. Remarking on his childhood, Jones said, ‘‘I …

• West Virginia State Wildlife Center

  … once-resident wildlife were kept in cages until 1986, when roomier pens making use of natural features were installed on a wooded hillside. The facility was renamed the West Virginia State Wildlife Center. More than 20 species of animals are present at …

• Kanawha Madonna

  … 1964 estimated the statue to be around 350 years old. Recent testing dated the wood (though not necessarily the statue) to A.D. 1440 to 1600, and identified the wood as honey locust. A similar figure was found in 1869 in a cave …

• Chemical Industry

  … /1985 plant at Belle, to make ammonia from coal using high-pressure synthesis. In 1927, the plant also began making synthetic wood alcohol, eventually supplying more than 40 percent of the market. The DuPont plant went on to make a number of important …

• Chestnut Blight

  … board feet of lumber in 1919, not counting the vast quantity of timber cut for telephone poles, railroad cross ties, tan bark, wood pulp, and fuel. The nuts were a valuable crop, providing feed for wildlife and domestic swine. They provided a tasty treat …

• Billy Edd Wheeler

  … .org/articles/710, and 15 other plays. He authored several books of poetry, including the hauntingly beautiful _Song of a Woods Colt_, and he co-authored with Loyal Jones of Berea College a popular series of folk humor books. He was inducted into the …

• Wild Foods

  … of mankind. Among the historic food animals no longer found in West Virginia are such extinct species as the passenger pigeon and woods-dwelling bison. Among those still used as food are several species of fish, crayfish, eel, beaver, black bear, frog, …

• Wildflowers

  … leaves flattened by winter snows. The woods become a fascinating kaleidoscope of colors … slipper (moccasin flower) prefers dry, acid woods. The showy orchis grows in rich … summer and fall wildflowers forsake the woods for fields, roadsides, openings, and …

• Wildlife

  … wild turkey, ruffed grouse, bobwhite quail, and wood duck. Game animals also included those … such animals as the beaver, muskrat, mink, wood duck, Canada goose, great-blue heron, … the beaver, river otter, mountain lion, wood duck, black bear, and fisher. As …

• Kyashuta

  … . In 1770, Kyashuta was engaged in his autumn hunt along the Ohio River when he chanced upon George Washington in present Wood County. Washington noted in his diary that he felt obliged to pay compliments to his old acquaintance, ‘‘As this person was …

• Clay Mining

  … fineness, mixed with water in the ‘‘wet pan’’ and poured into brick molds to dry in the sun before being fired by wood in beehive kilns. The process of extracting clay, which was mined in strip mines as well as in underground mines, was modernized from …

• Blanche Lazzell

  … she was commissioned by the "Works Progress Administration":http://www.wvencyclopedia.org/articles/1350 to create several color wood-block prints of scenes in and around Morgantown and a mural for the courthouse titled ‘‘Justice over Monongalia …

• Lebanese and Syrians

  The flow of immigrants from modern day Lebanon and Syria to West Virginia began in the 1880s and peaked in the 1920s. They came as refugees from increasingly rigid Ottoman rule, which after centuries of relative acceptance had grown hostile to Arab …

• Wirt County

  … , January 19, 1848, from portions of Wood and Jackson counties. It was named … -central West Virginia, Wirt is bounded by Wood, Ritchie, Calhoun, Roane, and Jackson counties. … articles/185. Many citizens commute to nearby Wood and Jackson counties to work. …

• George Connard Wolfe

  … self-trained sculptor, was born in Standard, "Kanawha County":http://www.wvencyclopedia.org/articles/1103. He worked in stone and wood. He had been carving since about 1955, when he was discharged from the U.S. Army. Wolfe first carved stones for …

• Woodhicks

  … was a common term for loggers and woods laborers during the heyday of West Virginia … up on farms before taking to the woods. Although hard workers, most of the woodhicks … upon as unsophisticated persons working in the woods, and since at least the 16th …

• World War II

  … National Guard.":http://www.wvencyclopedia.org/articles/179 Felix Stump commanded the aircraft carriers _Enterprise_ and _Lexington_. The Wood County native received the Silver Star, two Navy Crosses, the Army’s Distinguished Service Medal, and …

• Coal River

  … ’s main channel. By 1905, the railroad had taken over the removal of timber from the Coal River region. As the woods were timbered out and logging declined, bituminous coal mining quickly replaced it. Today, railroads extend to the tributaries of both …

• Yeager Airport

  … of debris had been cleared. On May 5, 2017, a cargo plane made a hard landing and skidded off into a steep, wooded hillside. Both the pilot and copilot were killed. In 2017, American, Delta and United were the major airlines serving the airport with …

• Coke Making

  … ":http://www.wvencyclopedia.org/articles/905, but a shortage of wood in Great Britain led ironmaster Abraham Darby to distill the world’s first coke in 1711. With more plentiful wood, American ironmakers relied on charcoal until the 1840s, when …

• Mosses

  … lifted up in large mats without disturbing individual plants. A similar moss is fern moss, which forms carpets over rocks and decaying wood. The plants of fern moss are fern-shaped but have a much more delicate form. Carpet mosses and other ‘‘sheet mosses …

• Auto Racing

  One of the first accounts of auto racing in West Virginia is from the July 4, 1923, holiday. The race took place at Shattuck Park, on a half-mile horse track at the old West Virginia Fairgrounds in South Parkersburg. There was also some early 1920s racing …