Local History

Rumors of War, Volume II of the Kanawha Chronicles was penned by by Helen Margaret Bassitt. While the first volume of the Kanawha Chronicles, Tales from Coalsmouth, focused primarily on people who were among the first settlers of southern West Virginia, this second volume, Rumors of War, examines the influential lives led by some of the descendants of those early pioneers.

To know the story of St. Albans, West Virginia, you have to start in Culpeper, Virginia. In the 1700s, the Reverend John Thompson was minister of the St. Mark’s Parish in the Culpeper area. The Reverend’s son, Phillip Rootes Thomson, and
Philip’s wife, Sarah “Sallie” Slaughter (both of them pictured on the front cover, above), traveled west and became the first settlers of a place called Coalsmouth.

A gallant woman's struggle. Polio was one of the most dreaded childhood diseases of the 20th century in the United States, crippling thousands, mostly young children. Such was the case with Betsy Fletcher Rae, who was stricken with polio in 1940, when she was just 9. Rea of Hope is her story.

(2 DVD discs - 6 ½ hours)

The popular 6½-hour documentary has been reissued as a special two-DVD set and is available for sale. Originally broadcast on public television in West Virginia and later broadcast nationally and sold in a VHS format, West Virginia weaves motion picture footage, historic photographs, first-person interviews, quotes from letters and diaries, and live cinematography into a compelling narrative enhanced by a rich musical score.

Regional Bestseller — Buffalo Creek Valley of Death is a reprint of a classic title by Dennis Deitz and Carlene Mowery. This revised edition, in an 8.25" x 11" softcover format, includes new, never-before-published photos from the tragic event.

Cavender melds folklore, medical anthropology, and Appalachian history and draws extensively on oral histories and archival sources from the 19th century to the present. He provides a complete tour of ailments and folk treatments organized by body systems, as well as information on medicinal plants, patent medicines, and magico-religious beliefs and practices. He investigates folk healers and their methods, profiling three living practitioners: an herbalist and a Native American healer. The book also includes an appendix of botanicals and a glossary of folk medical terms.

What can we do, as individuals, as a nation, to propel ourselves safely ahead in uncertain times? Homer Hickam looked no further than his hometown of Coalwood, West Virginia, to find the answers to that question. Using the simple homespun values and ideals that were instilled in the residents of this small coal mining community he offers four simple attitudes to overcome the fear in a post September 11th atmosphere.

Coal Camp Memories is a one-act play, written and performed by Karen Vuranch. Karen conducted historical research as well as many oral history interviews with those who lived in the coalfields and coalcamps of the Mountain State. The result celebrates the lives of women in coal communities in a tender and poignant story that will recreate an era and delight audiences. “Karen Vuranch’s Coal Camp Memories dramatically illuminates an often neglected but vital dimension of coal life and culture - the female perspective.” Dr. Fred Barkey, Professor Emeritus, Marshall University

The Story of America's Largest Labor Uprising

The Battle of Blair Mountain covers a profoundly significant but long-neglected slice of American history-the largest uprising on American soil since the Civil War. In 1921, some 10,000 West Virginia coal miners, outraged over years of brutality and lawless exploitation, picked up their Winchesters and marched against their tormentors, the powerful mine owners who ruled their corrupt state. For ten days the miners fought a pitched battle against an opposing legion of deputies, state police, and makeshift militia.