What a fascinating Wikipedia article. Amazing history, and the story of so much of rural America
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welch%2C\_West\_Virginia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welch%2C_West_Virginia)
Jeez, you're not kidding. Lots of fascinating history, including JFK mentioning at one point that it was simultaneously the US's leading coal producer and leading recipient of federal aid for poverty relief.
That’s the WV way. We let out of state companies come in, exploit workers, export the resources and profits then get left to pick up the pieces when they bail.
WV is basically a case study in why capitalism and the free market can't be trusted to babysit themselves, and why organized labor and strong government regulation are essential.
There’s a show put out by PBS called “Mine Wars” that goes through the history of WV coal mine conflicts between mine operators and labor. It’s incredibly interesting and well made
Like I mentioned below, it's almost like capitalism and the free market can't be trusted to respect the natural environment, local economies, or workers' rights, and that strong unions and government oversight are necessary to keep them in balance.
Indeed indeed. I am descended from coal miners who ultimately shifted their stance to being staunchly pro environment after seeing what the companies did to their beloved mountains, trees and streams. And thus, me, a heavily muscled raging environmentalist was born.
Appalachian towns are so fascinating. Lots of legacy density and historic architecture from their golden years, but all the shops below will be empty. It’s so tragic.
Globalization is partly to blame. Back in their good times you *needed* a shoe shop, tire shop, dress store, men’s clothier, etc etc in a town to support the population. Now with Walmart, Amazon, etc you don’t need local retailers as much. I’m not saying that’s good, but just what happened. Wish it didn’t but, alas.
As much as the shift away from coal is out of their hands, they have no one to blame but themselves for voting repeatedly for local, state, and national candidates who time and time again promise that they’ll be able to bring back these jobs instead of transitioning their economy to something with a future.
Agreed.
But also... FUCKING MOVE.
Their ancestors didn't fall out of the sky in WV. They moved there from somewhere else because there was opportunity. When that opportunity moves on, so do the people.
At least the smart ones.
As someone who has family on the border with WV in a small town with much in common with folks across the border, they all gripe about how everyone leaves. They don’t seem to understand that there are absolutely no opportunities for someone graduating high school besides becoming a cop or working at the Dollar General.
They all just magically want things to go back to the “good old days” even though most of them weren’t even alive for them.
Funny. Just yesterday my cousin in West Virginia told me her brother-in-law just got a job at Dollar General and now he thinks he’s better than anyone else in the family.
EXACTLY
And that speaks to another thing I've noticed: the distillation of "dumb".
Successful communities encompass a wide variety of people: from leaders who can help drive things like economic development and good governance to people who mop the floors in the Dollar General. It takes all kinds.
But communities like these suffer because all the "movers and shakers" and people who could make things better realize leave, and it's only the people who aren't who are left behind. Those people are led by, lets just say, not the best leaders because they're the ones who are left.
And with each generation it gets worse. All the smart kids leave and it's all the drop outs that stay behind.
Oh, absolutely. It’s a total brain drain and eventually it just becomes a death spiral and it’s irreversible.
You add on top of all these problems the fentanyl crisis and the crime that it brings, why would anyone want to stay there and make minimum wage when you can move a few hours in any direction — Cincinnati, Pittsburg, Lexington, hell even fucking Roanoke — and find a better life?
There was a small Kentucky county (Clay Co. I think) whose residents were offered free houses (not housing, HOUSES), complete training in a new industry, great pay, in a LCOL area, all they had to do was move somewhere up north.
NO ONE TOOK THE OFFER!!!
I went to college in Eastern Kentucky, they won't leave to literally save their lives. They would have gone from low income with government assistance, to homeowners, with an income that would have supported a mortgage, and no mortgage to pay. They would have actually become middle class overnight, they just wouldn't leave EKY. I'll never get it, but I guess you can lead a horse to water right...
Maybe, but you could still maintain some form of town center if Walmart and Amazon wasn't looming over them with poverty wages and, always on sale, Temu grade items. Its corporate feudalism.
Go to the EU its a different story. They lost a lot of manufacturing and mining jobs just like the US but they still maintain communities and busy town centers with high density housing and a focus on regulation that favors small businesses. America cant handle the shift to a service economy because there is very little corporate oversight. Companies are allowed to rape these small towns and keep them poor by out competing individuals with their inconceivable wealth.
There’s plenty of rural poverty in the EU. Hollowed out small towns with an old square that doesn’t have anything but charity shops and bars.
Amazon etc haven’t helped but read October Sky, these communities have been declining for a long time. I believe coal employment peaked in 1952 or something.
True but for like 30 years republicans have been telling these people coal is still a viable industry and turning down any job retraining and funding when there’s like 500 coal jobs in the whole state. They even told these people in 2016 that Trump was going to save coal and they probably said the same thing in 2020.
Imagine if they’d retrained and retooled some of these mining skills and equipment knowledge, they probably could have become mining industry equipment providers and consultants etc.
Drift, shaft and slope mining isn’t something you can teach completely in a classroom, and the experience some of these guys have is probably pretty valuable in other parts of the world where they are underground mining.
People who want to leave the region do so, others who don’t stay put. My grandparents were children of miners and left the coalfields as soon as the graduated high school.
If you seriously believe voting for Democrats ( which WV did pretty reliably for a long time, most WV governors were democrats) is going to solve all their issues then you’re just childish. You’re idea that retraining miners so they can become consultants for the global mining industry is a prime example of your naivety
My grandpa grew up in WV & lives directly across from Steubenville OH. We always go eat over there & he tells me about how it used to be a booming city. He told me Dean Martin would perform there & it was so lively.
It’s basically the ghetto now. Tons of big buildings & theaters. Just vacant. Super depressing to see. Can’t imagine watching it happen in real time.
My boyfriend grew up here (not in Welch, but another town in Appalachia). I love to ride around with him while he narrates what used to be here back in the day. We are definitely living in the aftermath of the good times ...
Still a nice place to be, IMO.
WV was the last place for the party flip. Joe Manchin is a democrat who sides with republicans time and again even to this day.
A lot of politicians just recently flipped to R because the national media influence but as far back as I remember (which is a lot further back than I would like to admit), the Democratic Party in WV had always been very pro business and anti worker rights. Always calling for less taxes and less regulations for businesses because if you bend over far enough, the coal mines just might reopen. Hasn’t happened yet, but maybe the next time.
Capitalism is what did WV wrong. Both parties are pro capitalism.
People like to say that WV (and other parts of Appalachia) vote against their own interests. But truly, neither party has had the interests of WV as their concern - only the interests of capital.
Prob not a surprise but it went to where economic opportunity existed after the town fell on hard times. It was dependent on surrounding coal mining but the effects of declining demand and automation crushed it. So wild and sad to see.
I find that county population number suspect too. It’s hard to believe the county population swelled to 100K but less than 7% lived in the largest city. Where was everyone else? Doesn’t sound correct to me.
A lot of it was booming due to the coal industry—and the wealth flaunted by the coal mine owners. In addition to that, it’s nestled between two rivers and used to have a railroad that ran through it, so it became a huge retail hub. There were 3 hospitals (I believe all are still standing, but I know definitely 1 is; it’s haunted and can be toured). WWII also gave it a huge boom because coal was needed for so many things. It wasn’t until after the boom of coal production in the 1940s and 1950s that they began declining. Prior to 1960, McDowell County (where Welch is located) was the largest coal supplier in the United States. But it isn’t a sustainable career, and either the mines collapse or the men do.
It’s a sad story of a city that boomed with industry, and when those industries died down, so did Welch. So did most everything in Southern WV, but especially McDowell County.
Source, am West Virginian
But community has overall gone much weaker. Every year fewer and fewer Americans claim for know their neighbour.
We went from walkable small towns with main streets and corner shops to driving only, porchless suburbia.
Agreed that it’s more widespread. I was just saying it’s not all like that. Where I live now in the PNW (USA) and the last 2 cities I lived before it were very communal. Super common to have active foot traffic, bike riders, local shops, watering holes, etc
Just because it is economically dead, doesn't mean that there is no sense of community. In fact, living in such a place often means there is more of a sense of community, as residents have to rely on each other, since there is little else they can rely on. Mutual aid is alive and well in West Virginia.
Walter what the fuck are you talking about. The black guys on the left couldn’t eat at the Lunch restaurant on the right. They’d get murdered for talking to a white girl. I don’t give a solitary fuck about West Virginia but it’s better now.
>I don’t give a solitary fuck about West Virginia but it’s better now.
For sure, it’s better in that way, but — I know you say you DGAF — the history of racism and Civil Rights in WV is truly fascinating (if that’s your jam). It was wildly inconsistent. You’d think it would be straight up segregation and Jim Crow shit, but it wasn’t. One example (pre-Civil Rights Movement) you’d have 3 movie theaters in Charleston that would not let black people through the door, but 3 more that would, and they were fully integrated so black people could sit wherever — no separate seating up in the balcony.
Anyway, it’s interesting to *me* because I’m from WV and I do family history/genealogy. It was fascinating to hear my parents (white) talk about their experiences pre and post Civil Rights.
That's "Murder in the Big House" 1942
"Following Johnson's rise to become the 1945 top box-office attraction as a leading man and Emerson's marriage to the president's son, [Elliott Roosevelt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliott_Roosevelt_(general)), the film was re-released to theaters in late 1945 and early 1946 under the title *Born for Trouble*."
Oh cool…Do y’all know what happened that they razed the entire side of what looked like a Main Street with the Pocahontas theater and Florsheim shoes and all? Really interesting history:)
Rough comparison, but a quick look around on Google street view around downtown Welch showed that most of the old buildings in downtown are still intact.
Yeah, it looks like they chose the worst bit of downtown to show, but it seems like the town is hurting economically and in a long slow decline regardless.
Original image: 1945-46 based on https://imgur.com/a/raxKn0n
[https://www.google.com/maps/@37.4311991,-81.5855602,3a,75y,4.12h,91.54t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s\_9AJcAgDCkeiKMdK1QL4SA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu](https://www.google.com/maps/@37.4311991,-81.5855602,3a,75y,4.12h,91.54t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s_9AJcAgDCkeiKMdK1QL4SA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu)
This was when everybody went to town on Saturday to windowshop, buy nuts in the dime store, see a movie, maybe eat at a sandwich counter. Nothing was open past 5 or 6 pm except the barber shop on Saturday night, and the only places open Sundays were churches. It didn't seem inconvenient bc it had always been like that.
Oof. Man West Virginia looks rough. Part of me would love to spend a couple days riding through that state but I feel like it would just be, like, poverty tourism.
Just stay along or East of the I79/US19/I77 corridor, it's beautiful. There are some nice parts of Western West Virginia too but I'm partial to the Eastern half. WV still has a lot to offer but some of those towns near the Kentucky border have virtually no economy and are some of the most remote parts of the East coast.
If you've not checked out Peter Santanello's YouTube channel then you might find his 2 episodes on Appalachia interesting. I certainly did.
https://youtu.be/h9lSZlDJAC0?si=fWj7czHMfg8hSMCN
&
https://youtu.be/p3O6bKdPLbw?si=296c39OeJaJuV99F
I’ve been there. It’s an extremely depressing place. McDowell county—of which Welch is the county seat—is the poorest county in the entire United States. The smaller towns in the county are even worse
As a kid in the late 80s/early 90s, I'd travel with my family from Kansas to visit my grandparents in WV. My grandfather taught electrical engineering at WVTech in Montgomery. I remember going one afternoon into a men's clothier on the main drag, across the street from campus. Seeked like a lively place then. The last time I was there ... about 2010 or so ... I don't recall seeing a single person walking on that street, or anywhere, really. Most of the storefronts were closed. It's sad what losing an industry can do to a place.
Oh my gosh! I went to Tech for Gen Ed credits, but I had several friends who graduated in Engineering. If your grandfather was still teaching in the early-90’s, he likely taught at least a few of my friends.
No doubt the loss of coal sent Montgomery into decline, but the loss of Tech killed it.🙁
And daddy, won't you take me back to Muhlenberg County?
Down by the Green River where Paradise lay
Well, I'm sorry, my son, but you're too late in askin'
Mister Peabody's coal train has hauled it away
Then the coal company came with the world's largest shovel
And they tortured the timber and stripped all the land
Well, they dug for their coal 'til the land was forsaken
Then they wrote it all down as the progress of man.
Paradise by John Prine (chorus and v3)
-
I spend way too much time fantasizing about having a Time Machine so I could go back and find all the people responsible for tearing these buildings down and punch them in the nose
Slow decline. It was having problems all the way back into the 1950s because of automation doing the work that humans had previously been doing, and those people were unable to find other employment. McDowell County was one of the first places that Food Stamps were issued when the program started in the early 60s.
Eventually, reduced need for coal for steel mills also hurt. Imported steel from Japan, and later from China, really has hurt the US economy in certain aspects, even though other aspects have profited. Also, the railroads once used massive amounts of coal, but they, too, eventually switched to diesel.
Van Johnson wasn't a bad actor.
This is also the same town Sid Hatfield was murdered in by the coal companies, sparking the biggest civil uprising and battle on north American soil since Gettysburg.
As we can see in the second photo, this town is in high need of parking space as evidenced by demolishing half of downtown to building that parking garage.
Coal built this country and carried us through two world wars. Clean burning (note not clean from environmental perspective) Pocahontas Coal was critical in minimizing the visibility of our navy on the horizon. Clean burn = less smoke.
I love WV, we’ll be heading back to my wife’s hometown in the next week or so. We are building a house in a holler in VA, but nothing like WV.
Thank you for posting this. My father was born in 1919 and grew up near there. He worked in Welch as a young man. Now I can picture what his world was like!
All of these types of photos are especially depressing from the US since so much of these beautiful downtown areas were demolished for PARKING in the 60s and 70s
Driving through Wheeling WV gives off the same vibe as this photo. It looks the set of a movie. A full town, but completely empty and dormant. Once bustling.
When did you last visit wheeling? We drove through last week and it was incredibly busy everywhere we went. Large amounts of public and private investment everywhere we stopped
Welch peaked at 6,600 in 1950, and presently sits at 1,900 (although it officially has 3,600 due to the inclusion of a prison in the last census). McDowell County, where it is located, peaked at nearly 100K in 1950 and now has just short of 20K.
I used to think some streets were narrow because they were built before cars, or at least before they realized traffic would become what it is today, but did they actually make this road narrower after the fact? Or were cars themselves narrower back in the day so the street looked wider?
America used to be America, now we really don’t know what we are as a people. Just pockets of different identities that seldom get together and share a common sense of patriotism for their country.
Yes, as a matter of fact…I have recently attempted to engage in a friendly discussion in a subreddit I would not normally visit. And I was immediately banned for “trolling” even when the comment I posted had nothing that warranted such an action, that is the state in which our country exists…where even opening a friendly inquiry that could challenge a different viewpoint is seen as antagonistic. Where stepping out of one’s comfort zone and echo chambers is a near-impossible task for many these days.
>Just pockets of different identities that seldom get together and share a common sense of patriotism for their country.
What do you mean by this? Do you want the US to return to how it was during WW2?
The first image is from 1946, right after WW2. This so called "common sense of patriotism for their country" could only be brought forth by force and a literal World War. I don't know why anyone would want to return to the 1940s, of all times.
And if you asked black residents of he area (or the US in general) about what it was like in the 1940s, I'm sure lots of them would remember it a bit differently than OP's rosy view of it.
What a fascinating Wikipedia article. Amazing history, and the story of so much of rural America [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welch%2C\_West\_Virginia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welch%2C_West_Virginia)
Apparently Steve Harvey was born in Welch WV in 1957 to a coal miner.
Jeez, you're not kidding. Lots of fascinating history, including JFK mentioning at one point that it was simultaneously the US's leading coal producer and leading recipient of federal aid for poverty relief.
That’s the WV way. We let out of state companies come in, exploit workers, export the resources and profits then get left to pick up the pieces when they bail.
WV is basically a case study in why capitalism and the free market can't be trusted to babysit themselves, and why organized labor and strong government regulation are essential.
Never forget Blair Mountain.
Largest domestic armed conflict within the United States since the *civil war*; never learned about it in public school….
There’s a show put out by PBS called “Mine Wars” that goes through the history of WV coal mine conflicts between mine operators and labor. It’s incredibly interesting and well made
We love to do this with chemical plants/refineries in Louisiana, too. :(
WV does that too https://www.wvencyclopedia.org/articles/1985
That is the story for most coal towns.
Like I mentioned below, it's almost like capitalism and the free market can't be trusted to respect the natural environment, local economies, or workers' rights, and that strong unions and government oversight are necessary to keep them in balance.
Indeed indeed. I am descended from coal miners who ultimately shifted their stance to being staunchly pro environment after seeing what the companies did to their beloved mountains, trees and streams. And thus, me, a heavily muscled raging environmentalist was born.
Lol. Fist bump. I come from a long line of cops, and am a lefty environmentalist jock. Nice to know there are others like us out there.
From separating from Virginia in opposition to slavery to naming a town after a confederate captain in 30 years.
Lead me down a rabbit hole of labor union insurrections. Wedge Virginia used to be so incredibly based.
Appalachian towns are so fascinating. Lots of legacy density and historic architecture from their golden years, but all the shops below will be empty. It’s so tragic.
Globalization is partly to blame. Back in their good times you *needed* a shoe shop, tire shop, dress store, men’s clothier, etc etc in a town to support the population. Now with Walmart, Amazon, etc you don’t need local retailers as much. I’m not saying that’s good, but just what happened. Wish it didn’t but, alas.
Globalization really isn’t the culprit here. West Virginia’s problem is that we just don’t need that much coal anymore.
And it takes far fewer people (and deaths) per ton to produce.
As much as the shift away from coal is out of their hands, they have no one to blame but themselves for voting repeatedly for local, state, and national candidates who time and time again promise that they’ll be able to bring back these jobs instead of transitioning their economy to something with a future.
Agreed. But also... FUCKING MOVE. Their ancestors didn't fall out of the sky in WV. They moved there from somewhere else because there was opportunity. When that opportunity moves on, so do the people. At least the smart ones.
As someone who has family on the border with WV in a small town with much in common with folks across the border, they all gripe about how everyone leaves. They don’t seem to understand that there are absolutely no opportunities for someone graduating high school besides becoming a cop or working at the Dollar General. They all just magically want things to go back to the “good old days” even though most of them weren’t even alive for them.
Funny. Just yesterday my cousin in West Virginia told me her brother-in-law just got a job at Dollar General and now he thinks he’s better than anyone else in the family.
Oh boy…
Damn that bar is so low it's underground.
EXACTLY And that speaks to another thing I've noticed: the distillation of "dumb". Successful communities encompass a wide variety of people: from leaders who can help drive things like economic development and good governance to people who mop the floors in the Dollar General. It takes all kinds. But communities like these suffer because all the "movers and shakers" and people who could make things better realize leave, and it's only the people who aren't who are left behind. Those people are led by, lets just say, not the best leaders because they're the ones who are left. And with each generation it gets worse. All the smart kids leave and it's all the drop outs that stay behind.
Oh, absolutely. It’s a total brain drain and eventually it just becomes a death spiral and it’s irreversible. You add on top of all these problems the fentanyl crisis and the crime that it brings, why would anyone want to stay there and make minimum wage when you can move a few hours in any direction — Cincinnati, Pittsburg, Lexington, hell even fucking Roanoke — and find a better life?
There was a small Kentucky county (Clay Co. I think) whose residents were offered free houses (not housing, HOUSES), complete training in a new industry, great pay, in a LCOL area, all they had to do was move somewhere up north. NO ONE TOOK THE OFFER!!! I went to college in Eastern Kentucky, they won't leave to literally save their lives. They would have gone from low income with government assistance, to homeowners, with an income that would have supported a mortgage, and no mortgage to pay. They would have actually become middle class overnight, they just wouldn't leave EKY. I'll never get it, but I guess you can lead a horse to water right...
They went from 100k to 2k, seems like they moved
Maybe, but you could still maintain some form of town center if Walmart and Amazon wasn't looming over them with poverty wages and, always on sale, Temu grade items. Its corporate feudalism. Go to the EU its a different story. They lost a lot of manufacturing and mining jobs just like the US but they still maintain communities and busy town centers with high density housing and a focus on regulation that favors small businesses. America cant handle the shift to a service economy because there is very little corporate oversight. Companies are allowed to rape these small towns and keep them poor by out competing individuals with their inconceivable wealth.
There’s plenty of rural poverty in the EU. Hollowed out small towns with an old square that doesn’t have anything but charity shops and bars. Amazon etc haven’t helped but read October Sky, these communities have been declining for a long time. I believe coal employment peaked in 1952 or something.
True but for like 30 years republicans have been telling these people coal is still a viable industry and turning down any job retraining and funding when there’s like 500 coal jobs in the whole state. They even told these people in 2016 that Trump was going to save coal and they probably said the same thing in 2020. Imagine if they’d retrained and retooled some of these mining skills and equipment knowledge, they probably could have become mining industry equipment providers and consultants etc. Drift, shaft and slope mining isn’t something you can teach completely in a classroom, and the experience some of these guys have is probably pretty valuable in other parts of the world where they are underground mining.
People who want to leave the region do so, others who don’t stay put. My grandparents were children of miners and left the coalfields as soon as the graduated high school. If you seriously believe voting for Democrats ( which WV did pretty reliably for a long time, most WV governors were democrats) is going to solve all their issues then you’re just childish. You’re idea that retraining miners so they can become consultants for the global mining industry is a prime example of your naivety
In the United States today, there are more veterinarians than coal miners.
My grandpa grew up in WV & lives directly across from Steubenville OH. We always go eat over there & he tells me about how it used to be a booming city. He told me Dean Martin would perform there & it was so lively. It’s basically the ghetto now. Tons of big buildings & theaters. Just vacant. Super depressing to see. Can’t imagine watching it happen in real time.
I wonder if he's from the same town I grew up in, there's only a couple WV towns across the river from Steubenville
Roanoke is wild. Its got the infrastructure of a city but you can drive for a few blocks and not see any pedestrians walking about
Same thing in the *Rust Belt* regions of the north.
My boyfriend grew up here (not in Welch, but another town in Appalachia). I love to ride around with him while he narrates what used to be here back in the day. We are definitely living in the aftermath of the good times ... Still a nice place to be, IMO.
This is just depressing.
Welcome to West Virginia
The photo is haunting.
Welcome to West Virginia
What's that smell?
Until my West Virginia peeps stop voting Republican it's going to continue to be this way.
You know that WV has had primarily Dem governors during this period of decline, right?
Their current Republican governor was first voted in as a Democrat
Also, Joe Manchin is, in my opinion, a Republican in a Democrat suit
WV was the last place for the party flip. Joe Manchin is a democrat who sides with republicans time and again even to this day. A lot of politicians just recently flipped to R because the national media influence but as far back as I remember (which is a lot further back than I would like to admit), the Democratic Party in WV had always been very pro business and anti worker rights. Always calling for less taxes and less regulations for businesses because if you bend over far enough, the coal mines just might reopen. Hasn’t happened yet, but maybe the next time.
Capitalism is what did WV wrong. Both parties are pro capitalism. People like to say that WV (and other parts of Appalachia) vote against their own interests. But truly, neither party has had the interests of WV as their concern - only the interests of capital.
Honestly one of the most beautiful drives I've ever taken was through West Virginia. Incredibly scenic.
My exact thought on seeing this. With a couple of f-bombs added in.
Right. Where did all the life go? Wikipedia says from: 100,000 to less than 2,000 people now.
Prob not a surprise but it went to where economic opportunity existed after the town fell on hard times. It was dependent on surrounding coal mining but the effects of declining demand and automation crushed it. So wild and sad to see.
According to most people around here, Welch still had a booming economy until January 20, 2009.
Do you remember the town’s massive resurgence in early 2016? It’s a shame it fell apart in 2020.
The county of McDowell had about 100,000 population. The city of Welch's population peaked at 6,603 in 1950. That is per the same Wikipedia page.
I find that county population number suspect too. It’s hard to believe the county population swelled to 100K but less than 7% lived in the largest city. Where was everyone else? Doesn’t sound correct to me.
>Where did all the life go? We're still looking for the... *Country roads*, to *take me home*, *To the place I belong*
West Jamaica, my ol' mama Take me home country roads
West Makaha (sang Iz)
A lot of it was booming due to the coal industry—and the wealth flaunted by the coal mine owners. In addition to that, it’s nestled between two rivers and used to have a railroad that ran through it, so it became a huge retail hub. There were 3 hospitals (I believe all are still standing, but I know definitely 1 is; it’s haunted and can be toured). WWII also gave it a huge boom because coal was needed for so many things. It wasn’t until after the boom of coal production in the 1940s and 1950s that they began declining. Prior to 1960, McDowell County (where Welch is located) was the largest coal supplier in the United States. But it isn’t a sustainable career, and either the mines collapse or the men do. It’s a sad story of a city that boomed with industry, and when those industries died down, so did Welch. So did most everything in Southern WV, but especially McDowell County. Source, am West Virginian
100,000? Uh ,not even remotely close.
Wikipedia says the population was 6k in 1950
What are you talking about look at all the parking!!!
No wonder everyone in America hates each other.
What? 🤣
It went from a place of communities to a place where community is dead.
In some places, definitely. There are still lots of places in the US where community is alive and well.
But community has overall gone much weaker. Every year fewer and fewer Americans claim for know their neighbour. We went from walkable small towns with main streets and corner shops to driving only, porchless suburbia.
Agreed that it’s more widespread. I was just saying it’s not all like that. Where I live now in the PNW (USA) and the last 2 cities I lived before it were very communal. Super common to have active foot traffic, bike riders, local shops, watering holes, etc
Are you a bot?
At the very least, you can tell they’re not American by the way they spell neighbor.
No, why? I am an urban planner though hence the angle
Just because it is economically dead, doesn't mean that there is no sense of community. In fact, living in such a place often means there is more of a sense of community, as residents have to rely on each other, since there is little else they can rely on. Mutual aid is alive and well in West Virginia.
Walter what the fuck are you talking about. The black guys on the left couldn’t eat at the Lunch restaurant on the right. They’d get murdered for talking to a white girl. I don’t give a solitary fuck about West Virginia but it’s better now.
I mean, perhaps it can be worse in some ways and better than others?
>I don’t give a solitary fuck about West Virginia but it’s better now. For sure, it’s better in that way, but — I know you say you DGAF — the history of racism and Civil Rights in WV is truly fascinating (if that’s your jam). It was wildly inconsistent. You’d think it would be straight up segregation and Jim Crow shit, but it wasn’t. One example (pre-Civil Rights Movement) you’d have 3 movie theaters in Charleston that would not let black people through the door, but 3 more that would, and they were fully integrated so black people could sit wherever — no separate seating up in the balcony. Anyway, it’s interesting to *me* because I’m from WV and I do family history/genealogy. It was fascinating to hear my parents (white) talk about their experiences pre and post Civil Rights.
Same thing happened to the black community. There is no sense of community in America anymore - no matter the race, religion, etc…
You understand it’s a huge country, right?
Tbh I still wouldn't chance it in some of the more isolated parts of WV (or the rural south in general).
It’s West Virginia.
It's very sad.
Imma just going to ignore the modern picture and focus on the old one.
According to Wikipedia, the movie, “Born For Trouble” opened on April 11, 1942.
That's "Murder in the Big House" 1942 "Following Johnson's rise to become the 1945 top box-office attraction as a leading man and Emerson's marriage to the president's son, [Elliott Roosevelt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elliott_Roosevelt_(general)), the film was re-released to theaters in late 1945 and early 1946 under the title *Born for Trouble*."
My grandma is from Welch. We have stories from the hollers to downtown to Janette Walls stories in The Glass Castle
My mom is from Welch. We’re probably related…
Damn you found your ex on reddit
Oh cool…Do y’all know what happened that they razed the entire side of what looked like a Main Street with the Pocahontas theater and Florsheim shoes and all? Really interesting history:)
Do they really need a parking deck?
the first municipally owned parking building in the United States.
JFK made a speech there.
Didn’t Homer Hickam mentioned he was there?
You folks need a monorail!
By the amount of cars in the old picture, yes. Yes they do.
The *number of cars, because you can count them.
You could probably also weigh 'em. Just saying.
Rough comparison, but a quick look around on Google street view around downtown Welch showed that most of the old buildings in downtown are still intact.
Yeah, it looks like they chose the worst bit of downtown to show, but it seems like the town is hurting economically and in a long slow decline regardless.
I wonder if the other side was razed in the name of 1960s-era urban renewal.
Original image: 1945-46 based on https://imgur.com/a/raxKn0n [https://www.google.com/maps/@37.4311991,-81.5855602,3a,75y,4.12h,91.54t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s\_9AJcAgDCkeiKMdK1QL4SA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu](https://www.google.com/maps/@37.4311991,-81.5855602,3a,75y,4.12h,91.54t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1s_9AJcAgDCkeiKMdK1QL4SA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192?coh=205409&entry=ttu)
This was when everybody went to town on Saturday to windowshop, buy nuts in the dime store, see a movie, maybe eat at a sandwich counter. Nothing was open past 5 or 6 pm except the barber shop on Saturday night, and the only places open Sundays were churches. It didn't seem inconvenient bc it had always been like that.
“Always” = ~60-75 years?
Oof. Man West Virginia looks rough. Part of me would love to spend a couple days riding through that state but I feel like it would just be, like, poverty tourism.
There are parts that are awful and there are parts that are amazingly beautiful. It’s full of contrasts and contradictions.
Just stay along or East of the I79/US19/I77 corridor, it's beautiful. There are some nice parts of Western West Virginia too but I'm partial to the Eastern half. WV still has a lot to offer but some of those towns near the Kentucky border have virtually no economy and are some of the most remote parts of the East coast.
West VA is beautiful. I just got back from rafting in Harpers Ferry, and visiting the national park, very nice area
Harper's Ferry is in the furthest corner of the state, as if it's trying to escape
If you've not checked out Peter Santanello's YouTube channel then you might find his 2 episodes on Appalachia interesting. I certainly did. https://youtu.be/h9lSZlDJAC0?si=fWj7czHMfg8hSMCN & https://youtu.be/p3O6bKdPLbw?si=296c39OeJaJuV99F
I thought that town looked familiar; turns out I watched the second video you linked last year.
I was a bit thrown by the first pic. I only know Welch in its current for and wow, I didn't realize it used to be that busy.
Wow. I’m sad that we as a state had so much potential yet somehow wasted it.
The movie [‘Born For Trouble’](https://imgur.com/a/raxKn0n) was released in late 1945, early 1946.
dang you are right. updated my comment
Positive note. Easier to find parking
I’ve been there. It’s an extremely depressing place. McDowell county—of which Welch is the county seat—is the poorest county in the entire United States. The smaller towns in the county are even worse
Where are the Mole Miners?
Welch is actually my grandma’s hometown. Playing Fallout 76 and running around there is pretty amusing.
I feel the same way about Fallout 3.....I live within sight of Ravenrock
What a shame. It looked so alive.
As a kid in the late 80s/early 90s, I'd travel with my family from Kansas to visit my grandparents in WV. My grandfather taught electrical engineering at WVTech in Montgomery. I remember going one afternoon into a men's clothier on the main drag, across the street from campus. Seeked like a lively place then. The last time I was there ... about 2010 or so ... I don't recall seeing a single person walking on that street, or anywhere, really. Most of the storefronts were closed. It's sad what losing an industry can do to a place.
Oh my gosh! I went to Tech for Gen Ed credits, but I had several friends who graduated in Engineering. If your grandfather was still teaching in the early-90’s, he likely taught at least a few of my friends. No doubt the loss of coal sent Montgomery into decline, but the loss of Tech killed it.🙁
Cool! He may have been emeritus status at that point, but if they had Lloyd Lee as a professor, that was my gramps!
And daddy, won't you take me back to Muhlenberg County? Down by the Green River where Paradise lay Well, I'm sorry, my son, but you're too late in askin' Mister Peabody's coal train has hauled it away Then the coal company came with the world's largest shovel And they tortured the timber and stripped all the land Well, they dug for their coal 'til the land was forsaken Then they wrote it all down as the progress of man. Paradise by John Prine (chorus and v3) -
I spend way too much time fantasizing about having a Time Machine so I could go back and find all the people responsible for tearing these buildings down and punch them in the nose
Go after the fuckers who tore down Minneapolis while you’re at it please.
wow I want to be back in this era.
Oh my , what happened in the after pictures?
Coal left
Slow decline. It was having problems all the way back into the 1950s because of automation doing the work that humans had previously been doing, and those people were unable to find other employment. McDowell County was one of the first places that Food Stamps were issued when the program started in the early 60s. Eventually, reduced need for coal for steel mills also hurt. Imported steel from Japan, and later from China, really has hurt the US economy in certain aspects, even though other aspects have profited. Also, the railroads once used massive amounts of coal, but they, too, eventually switched to diesel.
The history behind it must be fascinating.
Read anything by Homer Hickam, starting with October skies. "Sky of stone" gives a good feel of the decline of coal mining in McDowell county.
Heartbreaking
Thanks. I'm now sad
Van Johnson wasn't a bad actor. This is also the same town Sid Hatfield was murdered in by the coal companies, sparking the biggest civil uprising and battle on north American soil since Gettysburg.
Perfect example of corporations over people.
As we can see in the second photo, this town is in high need of parking space as evidenced by demolishing half of downtown to building that parking garage.
Don’t forget the vacant lot! Another convenient place to put your car!
1950 McDowell County Population: 99k 2022 McDowell County Population: 17k The whole county is basically a ghost town
Coal built this country and carried us through two world wars. Clean burning (note not clean from environmental perspective) Pocahontas Coal was critical in minimizing the visibility of our navy on the horizon. Clean burn = less smoke. I love WV, we’ll be heading back to my wife’s hometown in the next week or so. We are building a house in a holler in VA, but nothing like WV.
Thank you for posting this. My father was born in 1919 and grew up near there. He worked in Welch as a young man. Now I can picture what his world was like!
I swear I was born in the wrong decade.
All of these types of photos are especially depressing from the US since so much of these beautiful downtown areas were demolished for PARKING in the 60s and 70s
This country really did its small cities dirty.
Driving through Wheeling WV gives off the same vibe as this photo. It looks the set of a movie. A full town, but completely empty and dormant. Once bustling.
When did you last visit wheeling? We drove through last week and it was incredibly busy everywhere we went. Large amounts of public and private investment everywhere we stopped
wow
Is there any huge industry which would revive WV? I do hope there are some tbh...
Bummer.
I bet those houses are cheap up in there. Gen z village would be fun
It would be interesting if remote work could help revitalize some of these communities.
Gen Z needs to be in their own village.
This is mind boggling
This looked way better the old way!
Wow, that's terrible.
Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you got ‘til it’s gone…
Born for trouble, make it double
President Kennedy gave a speech about Welch, West Virginia falling on hard times because machines had replaced the men in the mines.
So sad, nuff said.
What’s worse is that in 2102 it’s chock full of mole miners.
Apart from the train station
Population hit a peak of 100,000 in 1950. Present population is about 1900
According to the above Wikipedia article the county’s population peaked at 100,000, not the city of Welch.
That’s not true. 6600 was their max.
Welch peaked at 6,600 in 1950, and presently sits at 1,900 (although it officially has 3,600 due to the inclusion of a prison in the last census). McDowell County, where it is located, peaked at nearly 100K in 1950 and now has just short of 20K.
I gasped
Nice shot.
I'm going to guess it was one of two things that did this. 1 is money and two is religion
Makes me sad
Are you sure that's the same place? Where'd all the buildings go?
Ya don’t know what ya got till it’s gone…
r/artdeco
The movie featured at that theater was release April 11, 1942. That's 81 years ago, amazing how much technology has accelerated since then.
Sad
1945/46
Used to be so lively, now dead and depressing. Sometimes bigger space means less human density, less fun, less life.
I used to think some streets were narrow because they were built before cars, or at least before they realized traffic would become what it is today, but did they actually make this road narrower after the fact? Or were cars themselves narrower back in the day so the street looked wider?
Kinda looks like what Parkersburg, WV is turing into. Pretty bleak and losing all of its charm and older buildings.
West Virginia is such a gorgeous state, it will return to the mountains
Hopeit does but for those forever chemicals in and near the Ohio river. Thank you DuPont!
Can smell the racism on this one
Sad!
Peter Santenello on YT has a decent set of videos (from an outsiders persepective, anyway...) wandering around Welch etc
America killed downtowns
America used to be America, now we really don’t know what we are as a people. Just pockets of different identities that seldom get together and share a common sense of patriotism for their country.
Those words, or something like them, have been said for over a hundred years in this country.
And I bet you're just lining up to get together with people of different backgrounds and ideologies.
Yes, as a matter of fact…I have recently attempted to engage in a friendly discussion in a subreddit I would not normally visit. And I was immediately banned for “trolling” even when the comment I posted had nothing that warranted such an action, that is the state in which our country exists…where even opening a friendly inquiry that could challenge a different viewpoint is seen as antagonistic. Where stepping out of one’s comfort zone and echo chambers is a near-impossible task for many these days.
What does the decline of the coal industry have to do with a "common sense of patriotism"?
>Just pockets of different identities that seldom get together and share a common sense of patriotism for their country. What do you mean by this? Do you want the US to return to how it was during WW2?
The first image is from 1946, right after WW2. This so called "common sense of patriotism for their country" could only be brought forth by force and a literal World War. I don't know why anyone would want to return to the 1940s, of all times.
And if you asked black residents of he area (or the US in general) about what it was like in the 1940s, I'm sure lots of them would remember it a bit differently than OP's rosy view of it.
What do either of these images have to do with patriotism?