Tidbits

West Virginia Trivia & Tidbits

Looking for West Virginia trivia? Try our list West Virginia little know facts, tidbits and trivia.

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Towering nearly 900 feet above the North Fork Valley in Pendleton County (pop. 8,196), Seneca Rocks quartzite formations are among the state's best-known landmarks.
Riders fly by wire on zip lines through an endangered hemlock forest at New River Gorge TreeTops Canopy Tour in Lansing.
Golden trout abound in Grant County (pop. 11,299), home to two fish hatcheries: the Petersburg (pop. 2,422) Hatchery and the Spring Run Waterfall and Hatchery, south of Petersburg near Dorcas. The golden trout is a color mutation of the rainbow trout and was developed with selective breeding at the Petersburg hatchery.
The oldest settlement in the Kanawha Valley is Cedar Grove (pop. 862) on the banks of Kellys Creek, where Walter Kelly moved in 1773 from North Carolina. The town was incorporated in 1902.
A room of the Clarksburg-Harrison Public Library in Clarksburg (pop. 16,743) is devoted to the writing of Braxton County native Gray Barker, who fueled America's fascination with UFOs. He created the "Men in Black" concept that government agents investigate UFOs and paranormal activities and silence people who know too much. Barker died in 1984.
Founded in 1904, Davis & Elkins College in Elkins (pop. 7,032) is named in honor of U.S. Sens. Henry Gassaway Davis and Stephen Benton Elkins, who were responsible for bringing the first railroad into the area.
A former mountaintop coal-mining site in Mingo County (pop. 28,253) has been transformed into the Twisted Gun Golf Club, an 18-hole course that opened in 2002.
Virginia Point Park in Kenova (pop. 3,485) is situated at the state's most westerly point at the confluence of the Ohio and Big Sandy rivers.
—The state's second oldest county is Berkeley County (pop. 75,905), which was created in 1772 from the northern third of Frederick County, Va., (pop. 59,209).
—Built in 1832, the native limestone Van Metre Ford Bridge, which spans Opequon Creek near Martinsburg (pop. 14,972), is notable for its wide, graceful stone arches.
—The state's only natural lake is Trout Pond in the George Washington National Forest in Hardy County (pop. 12,669).
—In 1968, Jon Dragan and family members began operating the state's first commercial rafting company, Wildwater Expeditions Unlimited, in Thurmond (pop. 7) on the New River.
—In 1903, Michael Owens invented an automatic bottle-making machine that revolutionized the glass industry. Previously, manufacturers had to blow glass to produce bottles. Owens was born in 1859 in Mason County (pop. 25,957).
—At Confederate Cemetery in Lewisburg (pop. 3,624), a mass grave of 95 unknown Confederate soldiers who died at the Battle of Lewisburg on May 23, 1862, is laid out in a cross design.
–Opened in 1932, Stewart's drive–in in Huntington (pop. 51,475) is still serving hot dogs and root beer delivered by carhops. The drive–in is operated by a fourth generation of the family of founders John and Gertrude Mandt.
—The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's national fish hatchery at White Sulphur Springs (pop. 2,315) ships rainbow trout eggs to fish hatcheries across the nation and operates a research program intended to restore the wild freshwater mussel population to the Ohio River.
—Drills and other equipment from the coal mining industry are used to create the hazards at Coal Country Miniature Golf in Fairmont (pop. 19,097).
—Dolly Sods, in the Monongahela National Forest, is an area of high-elevation windswept plains and the Red Creek canyon in Tucker (pop. 7,321), Randolph (pop. 28,262) and Grant (pop. 11,299) counties. It is named after the Dahle family, which homesteaded the land called “sods.”
—The architect for the state Capitol in Charleston (pop. 53,421), dedicated in 1932, was Cass Gilbert, who pioneered the modern skyscraper when he designed the 60-story Woolworth Building, completed in 1913, in New York City.
—The 1918 brick jail in Charles Town (pop. 2,907) was rededicated in September after a $2.3 million renovation. Pro-union miners were held in the jail after the 1921 Battle of Blair Mountain, when 10,000 coal miners fighting to unionize faced off against federal troops.
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