The mountains and hollers of West Virginia are dotted with the remnants of communities past, reminders of earlier times when gossip was exchanged at post offices, when general stores were locally owned, when education was tailored, and when neighbors knew their neighbors. Braxton County is no exception, with the region’s heyday coming in the early parts of the 20th century when employment was mostly centered around extractive industries: coal mining, timbering, and natural gas production. Its population peaked decades ago with nearly 24,000 residents. Today, just a few small cities call this mostly rural county over 12,000 home: Sutton, Gassaway, Burnsville, and Flatwoods, primarily nestled along the Elk River and Interstate 79. With 516 square miles to explore, you don’t have to travel far to get away from the hubbub of activity, and that’s where you encounter Wilsie. Located at the juncture of two branches of Dry Fork, not much remains other than an old general store and an old post office that closed in mid-2005, surrounded by the remnants of an old school and several shuttered houses. Interestingly, the false front of the general store was cut off and tagged with the name of the store and a reminder that it was “closed for remodeling.” It doesn’t appear that any work has been completed on the buildings which are in a state of severe disrepair. In the vicinity of Wilsie is a long-abandoned two classroom school, one of hundreds that dotted the hollers and hilltops of the state. Simple…
Tag: West Virginia
The Irish Corner district of Greenbrier County, West Virginia is dominated by large family farms, the remains of early mills and industries, country churches, and stately residences. Initially isolated by rough terrain and a lack of good roads, the rural setting is seeing an uptick in residential development that could potentially change the character of the region. Many years ago, I visited the Irish Corner region and documented some of the churches and houses I came across while randomly driving down the back roads. More recently, I trekked through the area with my girlfriend to see what’s changed. We started the morning making an impromptu visit to the Prince train station as the Amtrak Cardinal line made a brief stop to allow for the departure of a few passengers. Constructed in 1946 for the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad, the Art Moderne depot was designed by the Garfield, Harris, Robinson & Schafer architectural firm of Cleveland. It features Streamline Moderne stainless steel lettering spelling out Prince on the exterior, and terrazzo flooring inside with an embedded “Chessie” kitten logo. Up the hill from the Prince train station along Route 41 is the ironic Laurel Lodge No. 104 with its iconic lettering set in blond brick. What I assumed was an older building was actually built in 1964 to replace a burned Masonic facility in Lawton. Interestingly, furnishings and floorings for the new building came from the Thurmond Lodge in Thurmond, while brick, roofing materials, and slate came from the old McKendree Hospital. We…
Located in rural Monroe County, West Virginia is Sinks Grove, named for the many sinkholes throughout the area. It could be mistaken for just another rural community that is slowly disappearing into the landscape, but I found it fascinating for the variety of abandoned and historic buildings that still existed. The most visually interesting out of all of them is the shuttered Bob & Bob Speleo General Store with its handpainted sign that is adorned with the faded motto “Cavers Serving Cavers.” Constructed circa 1910, it was operated as a general store and gasoline station by numerous proprietors including Roy and Edna Burwelll between 1959/60 and 1974. The building was then purchased by Bob Liebman who operated “Bob & Bob,” a spelunking supply business. Liebman was born in 1942 in Los Angeles, California, growing up with an interest in trains, bowling, caves, and caving. 1 In 1968, while attending San Jose State College, he went on his first caving trip to Soldiers Cave with a club named the “Alpiners.” The club provided helmets and carbide lamps. Hooked on underground exploration, Liebman joined the Southern California Grotto and then the National Speleological Society in 1969. In 1970, Liebman met Bob Addis at the So Cal Grotto. While traveling down the coast of Oregon after attending a caving convention in White Salmon, Washington, the pair stopped at a hardware store looking for carbide lamps which were becoming scarce. 1 Borrowing money from Addis, Liebman purchased all of the lamps and the pair…
The centerpiece of the annual Ceredo-Kenova AutumnFest in Kenova, West Virginia is the famous Pumpkin House.
I’ve always been curious about this cool neon sign on the side of some concrete silos in Clarksburg, West Virginia.
Nestled in the heart of Greenbrier County, West Virginia, the Blue Sulphur Springs Resort whispers tales of its grandeur and subsequent oblivion from a past era.
Tucked away under the dense canopy of McDowell County, West Virginia, lies the forgotten Prunty Trade School.
The drive along Zenith Road to the unincorporated community of Zenith, West Virginia is a step back into time.
Work is progressing on the stabilization of the shuttered Sweet Springs Resort in eastern West Virginia.
often passed by an abandoned roadside curiosity in southern West Virginia for years. During a Sunday drive through the countryside with my girlfriend, I decided to pull off the road and check out a rambling collection of five buildings.
I had expected to come across a waterfall or two along a road that was aptly named Falls Run Road, but instead, I came across a beautiful 1969 Chevrolet C10 step side pickup truck. Based on the license plate, it has not been registered since 1990.
People always seem to gravitate toward the latest “Instagram” hotspot in West Virginia, but there is so much to discover—sometimes even alongside the road!
A deeply overcast morning provided the perfect setting for aerials of the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum, later known as the Weston State Hospital, in Weston, West Virginia.
Imagine standing in the heart of the Pocahontas Coalfield region of southwest West Virginia, surrounded by the rugged topography of the mountains. Amidst this landscape lies the abandoned Algoma Company Store and Offices.
Tucked away inside an abandoned and collapsing funeral home in the coalfields of West Virginia is a beautiful 1963 Chevrolet Impala. Based on the license plate, it has not been registered since 1989.
In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, West Virginia had thousands of schools that were gradually closed through consolidations. The isolated Prosperity School atop Great Flat Top Mountain remained open far longer than others.
Mining in the Winding Gulf coalfield of West Virginia began in the early 1900s, producing low-volatile smokeless coal, including metallurgical coal suitable for use in steel making. Mining was centered on the thick Beckley seam until it was economically exhausted by the 1950s, and the Pocahontas seam until the late 1980s.
But after the coal seams were exhausted, these coal camps were all but abandoned and today, only a few reminders of this booming era remain.
I was pretty excited to come across two notable churches in the Winding Gulf that are still extant.
Years ago, when I first started to explore the coalfields of Appalachia, I would venture down the Tolsia and King Coal highways toward Williamson, West Virginia. Atop College Hill was the old Williamson Memorial Hospital, a place that I had long wanted to venture inside of. On April 11, 2021, I finally had my chance.
The abandoned Lake Shawnee Amusement Park in southern West Virginia is probably home to more ghostly tales than any other place in the region—but they are just that, stories told as truths that have at times come at the expense of Native Americans.