Collections

Ledger of the Methodist Episcopal Church of Wadestown, WV. Includes lists of pastors, members, baptisms, marriages, and collections.

Papers of the managing editor of the Parkersburg DAILY STATE JOURNAL, 1889-1895, editor of the WEST VIRGINIA SCHOOL JOURNAL, and member of the English faculty of West Virginia University, 1895-1925. The collection includes manuscripts of Barbe's published poetry and unpublished short stories, correspondence, notes, speeches, class lectures, illustrations for short stories drawn by John Rettig, a scrapbook of clippings of reviews and correspondence relating to Barbe's book, GOING TO COLLEGE, and memorabilia. The correspondence includes letters, in some cases accompanied by holograph verse, from Winston Churchill, Richard Harding Davis, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, Hamlin Garland, R.W. Gilder, Edward E. Hale, William H. Hayne, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, Julia Ward Howe, William Dean Howells, Rupert Hughes, Stephen Leacock, Nicholas Vachel Lindsay, Amy Lowell, Brander Matthews, Margaret Prescott Montague, Bliss Perry, Melville D. Post, Edwin Arlington Robinson, Booth Tarkington, Charles Dudley Warner, Barrett Wendell, William Allen White, W.L. Wilson, and Owen Wister. There is also a volume of mounted holograph letters, 1884-1895, from the following American authors, a few of whom are also included in the general collection: Edward W. Bok, George W. Cable, Kate Chopin, Danske Dandridge, Oliver W. Holmes, Clifford Lanier, Sidney Lanier, Thomas Nelson Page, Margaret J. Preston, James Whitcomb Riley, and John G. Whittier. Most letters are brief and many are simple acknowledgements.

Papers of Waitman T. Willey (1811-1900), one of the founders of West Virginia. This collection includes letters to Harrison Hagans outlining the varied nature of opposition to the New State in Congress and Willey's position on slavery; letter from the Quartermaster General requesting support of a reorganization bill; cards and social invitations; and obituary clippings.

Papers of Waitman T. Willey (1811-1900), lawyer, senator, and founding father of West Virginia. A resident of Monongalia County, Willey was a delegate to the Constitutional Convention of 1850, the Secession Convention of 1861, the First Wheeling Convention of 1861, and the Constitutional Convention of 1871. He was U.S. Senator from the Restored Government of Virginia (1861-1863) and Senator from West Virginia (1863-1871). Includes several thousand pieces of incoming correspondence to Waitman T. Willey dating from 1833 to 1900 (bulk 1859-1869) concerning political, social, and economic affairs. There is much material on the temperance movement in Virginia (1845-1860), the Civil War, and the statehood movement in West Virginia. Also includes miscellaneous financial records (1837-1869) and legal papers (1820-1856); Willey's diary (entries from 1830-1899, posthumously added clippings through 1908); and other material. For more information about Willey, see the Historical Note.

The collection contains the papers of Manley Morrison Caldwell, an attorney in Wytheville and Roanoke, Virginia, and his law partner and father-in-law, James A. Walker, consisting largely of Caldwell's professional legal and business papers and documents gathered and created by him in the course of acting as the executor of Walker's will.

Photocopies and transcriptions of Bible records for the Jones, Wallace, and Testerman families. Original Bible records are in the possession of Miss Lorena Wallace, Beckley, West Virginia.

Military papers and correspondence of the chief musician, First West Virginia Infantry and Thirtieth Regiment, United States Infantry Volunteers, 1898-1915; clippings of Mestrezat's letter from the Philippines in 1900; copies of letters written by Charles A. Mestrezat, Fourteenth Regiment, Pennsylvania Cavalry, 1862-1864, from various places in western Virginia, Richmond, and Belle Island where he died in a military prison, and papers relating to the history of the 201st Infantry, West Virginia National Guard.

Includes more than 700 .jpg photographs on compact disc (CD) regarding coals towns and mining in Fayette and Raleigh Counties, West Virginia. Includes paper copy of thumbnail index (found on the CD) to images in the collection. Other counties featured include Kanawha, Putnam, and Summers. Selected materials are available online as higher resolution .tif files.