US Route 33 and the Long Way Home

We took a meandering route home from Pittsburgh and the Three Rivers Storytelling Festival . A stop at son Aaron's home in Fairmont, then on to our favorite road--US Route 33 across the center of West Virginia. The way is dotted with tiny communities--like Pickle Street (name derived years ago when a wagonload of pickle barrels overturned in what was then a rutted wagon track of a road), Stumptown and Sand Ridge.

We made several other stops along the way. I'll post the one at Lambert's Winery in a separate post.

This gravestone shaped like a tree has always intrigued me. Today we took the time to stop and look at it and others in the cemetery by the old octagon-shaped church (I thought I'd surely find a photo of it online, but no luck. So next time, a photo of the church--it's really a treasure). I wonder if the man it commemorates was a timberman?


In the same cemetery, my husband found this simple stone on the grave of a Confederate soldier, a member of the horse artillery named John B. Dawson.

Further along our journey, we noticed a sign in Spencer, WV that we'd not noticed before. "Civil War site," it read and an arrow pointed to a road that I thought led only to Wal-Mart.

We followed the road, that turned quickly into a rutted dirt track, to a parking area, then walked another 1/4 mile or more to the top of a hill to see what might be there. What we found was a Civil-War era graveyard, serenely looking over a stupendous view of Spencer and surrounding areas.

Also on the site: the ruins of the home of the Farm Superintendent of the former Spencer State Hospital for the Insane.

The house apparently burned, but the stonework is beautiful, with many arches, and a fireplace still intact.

Evidence of other visitors--raccoon tracks in a mud puddle.

At journey's end--a favorite spot on the porch to think about what we'd seen. Graveyards make us introspective, don't they? I thought about the many veterans' graves we'd seen, from different wars, all side by side in the cemeteries. I wondered about the many stones at Sand Ridge from 1922--what happened that year? An influenza epidemic?

Those thoughts (and a writing prompt on the WV Writers Roundtable) led to this poem:

Follow Me Home

Follow me
to mossy graves of soldiers
from old wars long past
and soon forgotten

Follow me
to farms and land abandoned
where fireplaces stand
to mark their place

Follow me
along a lonely highway
that traces a course
through history

Follow me
on US Route 33
through Pickle Street, Linn,
and Leatherbark

Follow me
remember your ancestors
who lived, worked, died
and left small trace

Follow me
along this twisting two-lane
into the shadows
follow me home

Hundred, Paden City, and Middlebourne Storytelling

Monday was a busy day of storytelling. I left home at 8:00am (a lot later than my usual 6:00am leave time!) and headed north to three small libraries in West Virginia's northern panhandle. It was hot--so hot that I didn't take any outdoor photos. The air was steamy, blue with haze, and it made even breathing difficult. I drove through the tiny communities of Friendly, Grape Island, Ben’s Run, Long Reach, and Sistersville, occasionally running alongside the big river barges as they pushed their loads upstream.

First stop was Paden City. It’s the home of the marble maker Marble King. Most marbles have been made in West Virginia for years, and Paden City has been the chief source. It’s a pretty river town, hugging the banks of the Ohio.

Then it was on to Middlebourne, the county seat of Tyler County. I stopped for lunch in mid-town at Betty’s Diner. As I waited in line to be served, a small boy asked me, “Why are you wearing a red dress?” I explained that I liked red. “Oh,” he replied. “Do you have any blue dresses?” I assured him I did. “How about purple?” I had to think about that. “No, I don’t think I do,” I told him. “Well,” he said, “you should!” I thanked him for his advice.

The audience at Middlebourne had many children who attended a school I’d told stories at recently. To my surprise, they wanted me to tell the same stories, so I did. I added a few new ones too—“Like Meat Loves Salt,” (several variations on the theme here) and “Rindercella” (Archie Campbell's version is here) just for the fun of it.

Here, a young storyteller sprays the audience with the skunk

puppet. You can tell how sad she is to do it! I usually invite children to participate in telling the stories and handling

the puppets. My puppets know the rules: misbehave and it's back in the suitcase! So their child handlers are very careful that the puppets never fight or bite (the first thing most children who don't have puppets want to do with them is make them fight. This rule takes care of that problem).

Hundred is one of my favorite libraries. Only a few children turned out on that hot afternoon, so we sat around a table and swapped stories. I told a few Jack tales, and then we just talked—about snakes and outhouses and canning and other country things.

One lady told about her mother going into an old outhouse that began tipping over when her mother went in. Her mother felt it and shifted her weight so the outhouse tipped the other way. But every time her mother moved, so did the outhouse! Fortunately, the outhouse never tipped completely over and her mother got out safely.

On the drive home, I wondered what kind of purple dress that little boy thought I should wear. I should have asked him; he seemed quite certain about it.

More about Hoo-Hoo Hollow

I googled it to see what I would find--weird stuff! But this lawsuit, from 1947, was fascinating. It sounds like the mail was still carried by horesback at that time:

SIM McGRADY, Claimant, V. STATE ROAD COMMISSION, Respondent. Opinion filed November 3, 1947 MERRIMAN S. SMITH, JuDGE. Janet Lee McGrady, the daughter of claimant Sim McGrady, a rural mail carrier, was carrying the mail from Lester, Raleigh county, West Virginia, on October 3, 194B, when crossing a wooden bridge about one mile from Lester, on Maple Meadow secondary road in Hoo-Hoo hollow, the horse broke through the wooden boards, straining and bruising the stifle joint on its right hind leg. Sim McGrady, the owner of the horse, by way of a compromise.

W. YA.1 REPORTS STATE COURT OF CLAIMS 87 agreement made claim for $38.00, which covered a substitute horse used fourteen days, at $2.00 per day, and veterinarian services of $10.00. Payment of this claim was concurred in by the head of the state road commission and approved by the attorney general. The statute, Michie’s code section 1474(15), official code, chapter 17, article 4, section 33, provides for the inspection and safe maintenance of the bridges in the road system of the state. The record in this claim states that the bridge upon which this accident occurred was in very bad condition. Therefore, the majority of this court recommends an award for the sum of thirty-eight dollars ($38.00) in behalf of the claimant Sim McGrady.

ROBERT L. BLAND, JUDGE, dissenting. Since I do not think that claims against the state involving questions of fact or liability should be submitted to the court of claims for determination under its shortened procedure provision, as has been done in the instant case, I do not concur in the award made. The “shortened procedure” is provided for small claims where no question of fact or liability is in issue.

from the website: http://www.legis.state.wv.us/Joint/court/ReportsbyVolumes/VOLUME%2004%201946_1948.htm