Take me home, country roads Bob Denver

I’ve changed this a bit again—I’m doing my quest again today and then next week I will do the 2 different ones—sorry but I had some stuff come up and haven’t been able to complete my 1965 one…DUH…

I left the state of West Virginia when I was 8 years old—I returned off and on—the off getting much longer as the years went by–for many more…My parents returned here eventually, my brother and his wife are there now and my sister has expressed a desire to live there again. I seem the only one who does not desire a permanent return, but then I was always the one who was — well shall we say different?

I have over the years heard much negative about the state but I have found lovely people, history in excess and all manner of beautiful scenery and while the economy has never been great I feel that W.Va has gotten a bad rap and I am not sure why.

My third day 3rd day of this quest would find me in Cameron, the town where my brother was born and we both lived in a house that set lower than the street and has long been gone….but here’s more of me and those stairs again.

Almost heaven, West Virginia,
Blue ridge mountain, Shenandoah river,

2008 M&M HALLOWEEN CERAMIC COFFIN CANDY DISH 2008 NO BOX (263179342117) $30.00

West Va is a prime producer of natural gas and the pan handle is currently the main area this gas is coming from. I appreciate the boost to the economy along with the coal that is currently being mined in the area as well, but I am sorely afraid that this newest source of income—may mean the end to all of the physical reference of those fragile memories of that time.

And most of the farms (even before the gas and coal) have become inactive, with large amounts of the areas being more suburb domicile rather than farms. Some still have horses or other domestic animals but crops aren’t grown, nor are they a source of any major income—so goes progress and I am the first to acknowledge this but still it is sad that a way of life has moved on. I know tell me I’m getting old and sentimental and all that gooey stuff…but…sigh.

And admittedly this was never an easy land to farm and even getting to that farm on roads that were bad in the summer and impassable in the winter didn’t help. It amazes me now that roads I knew from long association of driving same are now labeled They were just badly black topped or as you got further away from the towns they were dirt beaten down by traffic that had been going there for over 100 years. The roads were not labeled, you either know where and how to get there or you wandered about and ask directions from the first person you saw. When I returned a couple of years ago for my mom’s memorial I was amazed that the roads had names–some like Wolf Run which I was familiar, some like Poplar Spring I did not relate to the road that now bears its name…….civilization in a land which I once presumed would never be labeled and registered was an interesting concept of civilization, but the fact that the roads weren’t much improved in possibility still gives me hope that a bit of the old freedom if not accessibility was still in tact.

Life is old there, older than the trees,
Younger than the mountains, blowing like a breeze

This information is from the town of Cameron’s Web Site http://www.cameronwv.com/:

A small town with a population of 946 residents according to the 2010 census. Cameron is located in the Northern Panhandle of scenic West Virginia, Cameron is a growing family-based community rich in religious values, heritage and history.

Cameron was named for an Irishman named Samuel Cameron after the finishing of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad in 1852. At this time the honor of naming the town was given to an Irishman named David McConaughey who christened it Cameron in honor of his friend Samuel Cameron, a railroad official of prominence, who in 1853 took cholera at Moundsville, died, and was taken to Charles Town, Jefferson County, Virginia, for burial.

Country roads, take me home
To the place I belong,

An area of town that has just recently been restored is the old depot which people I may well be related to I see worked on—I have been gone a long time and my contacts with more distant relatives were always kept straight by my grandmother (who could ramble off genealogies that make the Bible’s seem lacking in detail—no disrespect meant just the way it was) and then on their return my mom who wasn’t as good at it but had a much more in-depth background in it than myself. My sister-in-law has spent much time doing genealogies but I miss all the little bits of personal items that my grandmother included (I would listen to her and file away stuff I was too young to understand and when I got older and a name was mentioned I dredged it up from my long term memory—connect it with my new adult perception and that was the best part of my grandma’s accounts the people always were humans and not just she begot him type of thing.

But I am way off my subject—the depot. In the fall of 2006 community volunteers completed installation of the new metal roof on the depot building.

repointing and cleaning of the bricks as well as restoration of all windows and doors. This work, which was finished in late 2008

In September of 2009, Consol Energy generously provided all materials and labor for installation of a french drain needed around the building.

A request for an additional federal grant for Phase III was submitted in January 2009 and approved in July 2009. It was started in 2011 and is obviously finished now and the building is a lovely center piece of the down town area.

West Virginia,
Mountain mamma, take me home
Country roads

We left town after wandering about and headed to another place—-now I have note two things—Ryerson Station and Beeler Station (both names and one a place along route 250 were both once forts….I have heard these names all my life but had no idea they were historical places.

The colonies of Virginia and Pennsylvania claimed the land. In 1774, Virginia built a fort at the confluence of the North and South forks of Dunkard Fork of Wheeling Creek. A shelter from Indian raids, Ryerson’s Fort was used until at least 1784, maybe even 1793. It is unknown when Ryerson’s Fort came to be called Ryerson’s Station. The fort was one of many stations used by rangers who patrolled for raiding Indians. http://www.docs.dcnr.pa.gov/cs/groups/public/documents/document/dcnr_003139.pdf

But we were going to visit the Beeler Station area:

Fort Beeler

in West Virginia Historical Markers

Posted by:

cldisme

N 39° 53.061 W 080° 35.411

17S E 535040 N 4415001

Quick Description: A brief history of Fort Beeler

Location: West Virginia, United States

Date Posted: 7/28/2013 2:49:39 PM

Waymark Code: WMHNW

http://www.waymarking.com/waymarks/WMHNW0_Fort_Beeler

All my memories, gather round her
Modest lady, stranger to blue water

The Beeler Church which is across route 250 from the sign memorializing the Beeler Fort/Station. The church was organized in 1826. It was named because of its location near the site of an Old Indian Fort commanded by Col. Beeler.

The church is no longer functioning or at least that is the information I was given. The Cemetery is large and spans many years. This is another part of West Va. that is a world apart of my life here. Here are people I remember in their final resting places—here are family members who rests here with other family members that have been here many years before my parents entered the world, but are part of what makes me and my loved ones today. This part of my heritage and past and many other people’s as well. It gives me a feeling of belonging and being part of a whole, something I don’t often feel in my busy life in the more modern world.

Beeler Station eventually became a settlement according to Historical Collections of the Counties published in 1879 (by J.H. Neuton et al) , and was built on the farm of Andrew Wilson. I know the town better as Pleasant Valley—and it is just a small place with a store—no traffic light or anything like that. It is of course unincoporated.

Dark and dusty, painted on the sky
Misty taste of moonshine, teardrop in my eye

So returning to West Va. and the places I had lived and set on steps for cute pictures (OK so you don’t think they’re cute–but they’re me so I have to be loyal) and all of this is part of the final journey of my folks to a place they love and a way for me to re-examine and quest after where I am now and where I came from and where I’m going in the future…..and I hope I haven’t bored you too much with my ramblings the last couple of blogs…..I’ll be back to the 60’s next week—two times to make up for my goof this week.