Collections : [West Virginia and Regional History Center]

Material written and collected by a former curator of the West Virginia and Regional History Collection that includes bibliographies, transcripts, photostats, papers and historical sketches on various aspects of West Virginia history. Items deal with prominent West Virginia University historians, the Civil War, early settlement, industrial growth, and West Virginia University. A number of letters and circulars discuss the West Virginia Historical Society in 1869.

Correspondence, manuscripts, documents, memorabilia, photographs, journals, drawings, and sketchbooks of David Hunter Strother (1816-1888), a nineteenth century illustrator and writer for Harpers Magazine whose pseudonym, "Porte Crayon", was a household word. Other highlights of his career, all of which are reflected in this collection, are authorship of Virginia Illustrated (1857) and Charleston and its Resources (1878), his work as illustrator for Blackwater Chronicle (1853), service during the Civil War as a Union officer, stint as a newspaper editor, and Consul-Generalship to Mexico (1879-1885). According to Strother's biographer, Cecil D. Eby Jr., his writings linked the two traditions of literature in the south, "the genteel romanticism of the sentimental novelists and the earthy realism of the frontier humorists." In 1872-1875 Strother wrote The Mountains, which Eby considers the first important presentation of West Virginia in literature. The collection includes roughly 590 drawings and sketches, 44 volumes of journals, and several boxes of correspondence. An addendum of 2015/06/13 includes one drawing. An addendum of 2007/02/08 includes correspondence, newspaper clippings, announcements, and photographs regarding Strother and related families of the Eastern panhandle of West Virginia. An addendum of 2021/06/04 contains an abridged transcription by Cecil D. Eby Jr., of Strother's diary, 1879-1880, when Strother was General Consul to Mexico. For contents of the addenda and link to the digital collection: Drawings of David Hunter Strother, please see the Scope and Content Note.

Research papers of Donovan Bond, a professor of Journalism at West Virginia University, regarding the 1772 proposal for a Colony of Vandalia in western Virginia territory, and histories of frontier forts (ca. 1749-1794) in western Virginia. Also includes photocopies of original 18th century documents. Material covers the years 1754-2002.

The collection contains correspondence and papers of the Brown, Selby, Kirkland, Robine, Spong, Strode, Thomas, Waters, Hammond, Billmyer, Shepherd and Hamtramck families. Includes genealogical information on the Brown, Billmyer, Shepherd, and Hamtramck families; ledger, 1795-1796; and a receipt book, 1835-1843, of Walter Brown Selby.