Volume 33, Number 1

On the cover: Coal miner Libby Lindsay at Bethlehem Steel’s Eagle’s Nest mine near Van, Boone County, in 1993. Photograph by Christine Koci. Our story about West Virginia’s coal mining women begins on page 10.

Published by the
STATE OF WEST VIRGINIA

Joe Manchin III, Governor

Kay Goodwin, Secretary
Department of Education and the Arts

Randall Reid-Smith, Commissioner
Division of Culture and History

John Lilly, Editor

Gordon Simmons
Editorial Assistant

Cornelia Crews Alexander
Circulation Manager

BlaineTurner Advertising, Inc.
Publication Design

Spring 2007

2 From the Editor

3 Letters from Readers

8 Current Programs*Events*Publications

9 GOLDENSEAL Good-Byes

10 Sisters in Coal

A History of Women in the West Virginia Mines
By Anna Sale

18 Springtime in Plaugher Hollow

By Lucille Kemper Davisson

26 “I Just Have the Memory”

Wilma Shriver and her Farm
By Carl E. Feather

32 Decoration Day

By Deborah McHenry Ross

34 The Old Brick Church at Lost Creek

By S. Thomas Bond

40 Teen Years in a River Town

New Martinsville in the 1950's
By Edwin Daryl Michael

46 Musical Wood

Violin Maker Harold Hayslett
By Paul Gartner

54 The Purple Fiddle

New Tradition in Thomas
By Carl E. Feather

62 West Virginia Back Roads

Hobart Ellifritt and his Bluebird Motels
By Carl E. Feather

64 2006 Liars Contest

67 Vandalia Time!
Photoessay by Michael Keller

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