This Week in West Virginia History

William MacCorkle died on September 24, 1930, at age 73. As governor of West Virginia he emphasized road building, higher standards for physicians, and greater accountability for banks and insurance companies.

On September 21, 1929, a state commission ruled that Nancy Hanks—the mother of Abraham Lincoln—was born in what is now West Virginia.

Amateur botanist Lawrence Nuttall was born in Pennsylvania on September 17, 1857. In 1878, he moved to the New River Gorge town of Nuttallburg in Fayette…

Aviator Frank Thomas was born at Lansing in Fayette County on September 16, 1921. Known by the nicknames “Flying Frank” and “Five Dollar Frank,” he flew…

On September 14, 1862, General Jesse Lee Reno was killed during the Battle of South Mountain in Maryland. The Wheeling native was the highest-ranking…

Publicist Sam Mallison was born in North Carolina on September 9, 1894. He worked for several small newspapers in the Tar Heel State before becoming city…

Kermit McKeever died in Charleston on September 8, 1995, at age 85. The man remembered as the “father of West Virginia’s modern state park system” was…

Football coach Fielding Yost died in Ann Arbor, Michigan, on August 20, 1946, at age 75. In 1895 and ’96, the Marion County native played tackle for one…

Musician “Curly” Ray Cline died on August 19, 1997, at age 64. The Logan County native was one of the best bluegrass fiddlers ever to emerge from West…

On August 18, 1749, explorer Pierre-Joseph Celoron de Blainville buried a lead plate at Point Pleasant as part of his task to claim the entire Ohio Valley…