Portal:West Virginia

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The West Virginia Portal

Panorama northwest, northeast and east from a ridge along West Virginia Route 42 between Elk Garden and Sulphur City in Mineral County, West Virginia (2016)

West Virginia is a landlocked state in the Southern and Mid-Atlantic regions of the United States. It is bordered by Pennsylvania and Maryland to the northeast, Virginia to the southeast, Kentucky to the southwest, and Ohio to the northwest. West Virginia is the 10th-smallest state by area and ranks as the 12th-least populous state, with a population of 1,793,716 residents. The capital and most populous city is Charleston with a population of 49,055.

West Virginia was admitted to the Union on June 20, 1863, and was a key border state during the American Civil War. It was the only state to form by separating from a Confederate state, one of two states (along with Nevada) admitted to the Union during the Civil War, and the third state to separate from another state, after Kentucky and Maine separated from Virginia and Massachusetts in 1792 and 1820, respectively. Some of its residents held slaves, but most were yeoman farmers, and the delegates provided for the gradual abolition of slavery in the new state constitution. The state legislature abolished slavery in the state, and at the same time ratified the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery nationally on February 3, 1865.

West Virginia's northern panhandle extends adjacent to Pennsylvania and Ohio to form a tristate area, with Wheeling, Weirton, and Morgantown just across the border from the Pittsburgh metropolitan area. Huntington in the southwest is close to Ohio and Kentucky, while Martinsburg and Harpers Ferry in the eastern panhandle region are considered part of the Washington metropolitan area, between Maryland and Virginia. West Virginia is often included in several U.S. geographical regions, including the Mid-Atlantic, the Upland South, and the Southeastern United States. It is the only state entirely within the area served by the Appalachian Regional Commission; the area is commonly defined as "Appalachia". (Full article...)

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Entries here consist of Good and Featured articles, which meet a core set of high editorial standards.

Adamle on a 1951 football card

Anthony Adamle (May 15, 1924 – October 7, 2000) was an American professional football player who was a linebacker and fullback in the All-America Football Conference (AAFC) and the National Football League (NFL). He played his entire career for the Cleveland Browns before retiring to pursue a medical degree.

Adamle grew up in Cleveland, Ohio, and was a star fullback on his Collinwood High School football team. He attended Ohio State University in 1942, but his college career was cut short by World War II. After a stint in the United States Army Air Force, Adamle returned to finish his education at Ohio State in 1946. He soon dropped out of school, however, and joined the Browns. Cleveland won AAFC championships in each of Adamle's first three years, after which the league folded and the Browns were absorbed by the more established NFL. Cleveland continued to succeed in the NFL, winning the 1950 championship and advancing to the 1951 championship but losing to the Los Angeles Rams. Adamle left the Browns after the 1951 season to pursue a medical degree, but he came out of retirement briefly in 1954 as the Browns won another NFL championship. (Full article...)

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The U.S. state of West Virginia was formed out of western Virginia and added to the Union as a direct result of the American Civil War (see History of West Virginia), in which it became the only modern state to have declared its independence from the Confederacy. In the summer of 1861, Union troops, which included a number of newly formed Western Virginia regiments, under General George McClellan drove off Confederate troops under General Robert E. Lee at the Battle of Philippi in Barbour County. This essentially freed Unionists in the northwestern counties of Virginia to form a functioning government of their own as a result of the Wheeling Convention. Before the admission of West Virginia as a state, the government in Wheeling formally claimed jurisdiction over all of Virginia, although from its creation it was firmly committed to the formation of a separate state.

After Lee's departure, western Virginia continued to be a target of Confederate raids. Both the Confederate and state governments in Richmond refused to recognize the creation of the new state in 1863, and thus for the duration of the war the Confederacy regarded its own military offensives within West Virginia not as invasion but rather as an effort to liberate what it considered to be enemy-occupied territory administered by an illegitimate government in Wheeling. Nevertheless, due to its increasingly precarious military position and desperate shortage of resources, Confederate military actions in what it continued to regard as "western Virginia" focused less on reconquest as opposed to both on supplying the Confederate Army with provisions as well as attacking the vital Baltimore and Ohio Railroad that linked the northeast with the Midwest, as exemplified in the Jones-Imboden Raid. Guerrilla warfare also gripped the new state, especially in the Allegheny Mountain counties to the east, where loyalties were much more divided than in the solidly Unionist northwest part of the state. Despite this, the Confederacy was never able to seriously threaten the Unionists' overall control of West Virginia. (Full article...)

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The following are images from various West Virginia-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1The Linsly Institute building in Wheeling, West Virginia, which served as the state's first capitol building from statehood in 1863 until March 28, 1870, when the capitol was transferred to Charleston, West Virginia (from History of West Virginia)
Image 2Harpers Ferry alternated between Confederate and Union rule eight times during the American Civil War, and was finally annexed by West Virginia. (from West Virginia)

Racial plurality in West Virginia by county, per the 2020 U.S. census

Legend

Non-Hispanic White

70–80%

80–90%

90%+

(from West Virginia)

Image 41715 Nicolas de Fer map showing the Native American areas known as Tionontatacaga and Calicuas (from History of West Virginia)
Image 5Votes by county in the October 1861 statehood vote (from West Virginia)
Image 6Child labor in the coal mines of West Virginia, 1908 (from West Virginia)
Image 7Abraham Lincoln Walks at Midnight, a statue on the grounds of the West Virginia State Capitol (from West Virginia)
Image 8Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, changed hands a dozen times during the American Civil War. (from History of West Virginia)
Image 9The West Virginia State Capitol in Charleston is home to the West Virginia Legislature. (from West Virginia)
Image 10Thomas Lee, the first manager of the Ohio Company of Virginia (from History of West Virginia)
Image 11Counties (in blue) approving Virginia's secession from the U.S. (from History of West Virginia)
Image 12Seneca Rocks, Pendleton County (from West Virginia)
Image 13The Veterans Memorial Bridge carries US 22 from Weirton WV into Ohio. (from West Virginia)
Image 141751 Fry-Jefferson map showing early ferries and established colonial borders before the French And Indian War (from History of West Virginia)
Image 15Bituminous coal seam in southwestern West Virginia (from West Virginia)
Image 16From left, Senator Joe Manchin, Energy Secretary Rick Perry, Senator Shelley Moore Capito, and Representative David McKinley (2017) (from West Virginia)
Image 17West Virginia is situated in the Appalachian Mountains, bounded by Allegheny Mountains, Ohio and Big Sandy rivers, and the Cumberland Mountains. (from West Virginia)
Image 18The iconic New River Gorge Bridge near Fayetteville (from West Virginia)
Image 19Saturday afternoon street scene, Welch, McDowell County, 1946 (from West Virginia)
Image 20West Virginia Independence Hall, site of the Wheeling Convention (from History of West Virginia)
Image 21A view of the New River in West Virginia, the world's third-oldest river geologically (from History of West Virginia)
Image 22Bluefield, a major center for coal mining, in 2014 (from West Virginia)
Image 23Map of Virginia dated June 13, 1861, featuring the percentage of slave population within each county at the 1860 census and the proposed state of Kanawha (from West Virginia)
Image 24State of Westylvania proposed to the U.S. Congress (from West Virginia)
Image 25A slave woman tending to a white baby in West Virginia, 1865 (from West Virginia)
Image 26Escaped slave broadside, Hampshire County, West Virginia, 1845 (from West Virginia)
Image 27West Virginia population density map (from West Virginia)
Image 28Packed circles diagram showing estimates of the ethnic origins of people in West Virginia in 2021. (from West Virginia)
Image 29Thomas Lee, the first manager of the Ohio Company of Virginia (from West Virginia)
Image 30A toll plaza on the West Virginia Turnpike (from West Virginia)
Image 31Turnout by county in the October 24, 1861, West Virginia statehood vote (from History of West Virginia)
Image 32Francis H. Pierpont, a leader during the Second Wheeling Convention (from West Virginia)
Image 33Spruce Knob is the highest point in West Virginia and the Allegheny Mountains. (from West Virginia)
Image 34Historical coat of arms of West Virginia (illustrated, 1876) (from West Virginia)
Image 35Köppen climate types of West Virginia, using 1991-2020 climate normals (from West Virginia)
Image 36John S. Carlile, a leader during the First Wheeling Convention (from History of West Virginia)
Image 37Shaded relief map of the Cumberland Plateau and Ridge-and-valley Appalachians (from West Virginia)

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... that William H. Davis was the first teacher of Booker T. Washington and the first African American to be nominated as a candidate for West Virginia governor in 1888?
... that the Vulcan Bridge, a bridge in Vulcan, West Virginia, was constructed after the mayor requested financial aid from the Soviet Union?
... that professor Ruth Ann Davis made the largest-ever single contribution to Potomac State College of West Virginia University to support nursing scholarships in memory of her mother?
... that after Lew Dickey Sr. broke into the radio business by buying a station in West Virginia, his son would go on to own Cumulus Media?
... that part of West Virginia's Princeton–Deepwater District railway was so steep that only shortened coal trains could ascend it?
... that the general manager of a West Virginia TV station called changing its network affiliation "the hardest decision I've ever had to make"?

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List of films set in Huntington, West Virginia (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by Samz73428091 (talk · contribs · new pages (2)) started on 2024-12-01, score: 20

Glassmaking at Blenko Glass Company (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by TwoScars (talk · contribs · new pages (1)) started on 2024-11-30, score: 23

S. Chris Anders (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by MoviesandTelevisionFan (talk · contribs · new pages (62)) started on 2024-11-29, score: 40
Bluefield Green Book Historic District (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by Acroterion (talk · contribs · new pages (11)) started on 2024-11-26, score: 20

Richard Mitchell (racing driver) (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by Finn Shipley (talk · contribs · new pages (71)) started on 2024-11-28, score: 38

Uncle Abner (character) (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by Garethheathcote (talk · contribs · new pages (7)) started on 2024-11-25, score: 30

Thomasina Clemons (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by Koala15 (talk · contribs · new pages (12)) started on 2024-11-23, score: 30

Yates Crossing, West Virginia (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by Samz73428091 (talk · contribs · new pages (2)) started on 2024-11-22, score: 40
Citizens National Bank building (Martinsburg, West Virginia) (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by Acroterion (talk · contribs · new pages (11)) started on 2024-11-21, score: 40

Buckhannon Board & Care Home, Inc. v. West Virginia Dept. of Health and Human Resources (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by Lethargilistic (talk · contribs · new pages (21)) started on 2024-11-21, score: 20
Virginia Faulkner McSherry (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by Rosiestep (talk · contribs · new pages (21)) started on 2024-11-21, score: 20

Thomas C. Green (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by BD2412 (talk · contribs · new pages (310)) started on 2024-11-20, score: 40

The Golden Rule (Belington, West Virginia) (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by Acroterion (talk · contribs · new pages (11)) started on 2024-11-19, score: 20
Greene Formation (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by SeismicShrimp (talk · contribs · new pages (5)) started on 2024-11-18, score: 52

Hewlet, West Virginia (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by West Virginian (talk · contribs · new pages (7)) started on 2024-11-18, score: 36
Jim Crutchfield (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs | tools) by GPL93 (talk · contribs · new pages (14)) started on 2024-11-15, score: 40

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Sources

^ "Biggest US Cities By Population - West Virginia - 2018 Population". Biggest US Cities. March 4, 2020. Retrieved March 4, 2020.

[1] "Biggest US Cities By Population - West Virginia - 2018 Population". Biggest US Cities. March 4, 2020. Retrieved March 4, 2020.

[1]