The State Historic Preservation Office (SHPO) of the West Virginia Division of Culture and History has published “Historic Recreation,” a 13-month calendar highlighting the Mountain State’s sports and recreation opportunities, including historic football fields and basketball courts, hunting and fishing lodges, swimming pools, golf courses and much more. The public is invited to request a copy of the free calendar while supplies last.
“Our beautiful terrain is a special natural resource that, from our state’s earliest years, we have enjoyed through outdoor recreation and sports,” said Susan Pierce, deputy state historic preservation officer for the Division.
Each month, the calendar focuses upon a different historic building, camp, state park, trail or structure in West Virginia, including the Weiss Knob Ski Area in Tucker County, the first modern downhill ski resort in the state and the first commercial ski area south of the Mason-Dixon Line; the Williamson Field House in Mingo County where West Virginia stars Jerry West, “Hot Rod” Hundley, Hal Greer and Earl Lloyd, the first black player drafted for the National Basketball Association, played; Berkeley Springs State Park in Morgan County where George Washington visited to “take the waters”; and the New River Gorge Bridge in Fayette County, the longest single-span steel arch bridge in the United States that was listed this year in the National Register of Historic Places.
It also features the Oakhurst Links in Greenbrier County, America’s first golf club, where golfers today still watch for sheep on the course; Camp Caesar in Webster County, a smaller version of Jackson’s Mill 4-H Camp, built with funds raised by the boys and girls who attended it; Cameron Pool in Marshall County, built in 1939 as a Public Works Administration project; and The East-West Stadium in Marion County, which hosted the first integrated football game in West Virginia between Dunbar and Fairmont Senior high schools in 1954.
Other topics covered include Jefferson Rock in Jefferson County, a favorite stopping point on the Appalachian Trail which prompted Thomas Jefferson to say that the view “was worth a voyage across the Atlantic”; Cheat Mountain Club in Randolph County where the “Vagabounds,” John Burroughs, Henry Ford and Thomas Edison, stayed in 1918 while on a camping tour of the Appalachians; Elizabeth Moore Hall in Monongalia County, built in 1928 on the site of the Woodburn Female Seminary in Morgantown; Camp Washington-Carver in Fayette County, the first known Negro 4-H Camp in the country, and also a Works Progress Administration project completed in 1942; and Oaks Field in Kanawha County, built in 1941 as the home for the South Charleston Black Eagles football team.
To request a free copy of the calendar, write to West Virginia Division of Culture and History, 2014 Calendar, The Culture Center, 1900 Kanawha Boulevard., E., Charleston, W.Va. 25305 or call Conni McMorris at 304-558-0240 or e-mail her at conni.l.mcmorris@wv.gov. “Historic Recreation” 2014 calendar was funded in part by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior.
