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Friday, March 31, 2023

History

Welcome to the History news directory at West Virginia Explorer, where you’ll find an archive of the most recent West Virginia history news published at West Virginia Explorer.

Many early almanacs printed out of Wheeling, West Virginia

Farmers converse near old Fort Henry at Wheeling, c. 1777.
Thanks to the Internet, almanacs aren't printed as they once were, but in West Virginia, where communications were hampered by the mountains, these useful...

Ancient stone walls on Armstrong Mountain no old-timer's tale

A historic marker along U.S. 60 promotes the location of the Mount Carbon Walls.
If you grew up listening to the lore of old-timers in southern West Virginia, chances are you've heard of mysterious stone walls atop Armstrong...

Legend of ancient warpath along the W.Va. Turnpike is fact

The West Virginia Turnpike follows part of an ancient warpath through the West Virginia hills.
Older folks who live in the valley of Paint Creek may recall legends about how the stream was named: an ancient warpath followed it...

How a circus clown helped relocate W.Va. capital to Charleston

Lolo, the clown, helped establish Charleston as the capital of West Virginia.
It might sound like a joke, but it's true that a circus clown helped relocate the West Virginia capital from Wheeling to Charleston, its...

Tale of Eckerlin Brothers portrays struggle for religious freedom

A historic marker along the Cheat River recalls the settlement of Dunkards in the mid-1700s.
The history of West Virginia is filled with stories of religious diversity—of hermits and holy men and women who escaped the clamor and confines...

Civil War-era mystery of Burning Springs remains unsolved

Visitors gather at Burning Springs Park.
BURNING SPRINGS, W.Va. — Curious motorists traveling the valley of the Little Kanawha River southwest of Parkersburg may or may not stop at historic...

Ancient West Virginia forests once a mosaic of landscapes

Forests in what became West Virginia were managed in ways we're only beginning to understand.
Historians once assumed that West Virginia had been shaded by a vast unbroken forest, but an expert on old forests in the Mountain State...

Rare memoir recalls national park before Thurmond ghost town

Riding horseback, Captain William Thurmond was a familiar site in the New River Gorge.
Perhaps no small town in West Virginia has gained the worldwide notoriety that the tiny Town of Thurmond has enjoyed. A ghost town located...

Untangling the tale of frontier heroine Mary Draper Ingles

Mary Draper Ingles is immortalized in bronze at Radford, Virginia.
The tale of Mary Draper Ingles—of her escape from Shawnee captors and her return through the mountains—is in many senses the ideal American frontier...

Strange carvings greeted early West Virginia explorers

Images of beasts and men decorate a boulder at the Half-Moon archaeological site, now submerged beneath the Ohio River.
When pioneers and other explorers first ventured into what would become West Virginia, they encountered artifacts of a much earlier age — carvings, burial...

Bizzare 'Wild West' massacre erupted in Cowen, W.Va., in 1905

Richwood, West Virginia (WV) in 1910 was the center of a booming timber industry.
Cowen today is a sleepy town of 500, perhaps best known for its location near a quiet lake, but it was hardly so in...

Wolf Moon recalls W.Va. as last domain of wolves

The Wolf Moon customarily rises over the West Virginia hills in January.
The Wolf Moon of January recalls a time when the howls of wolves haunted the Mountain State, the final eastern stronghold in the U.S....

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