TT2 - Number 12, Anawalt, WV

For today's mission we enlisted the help of my uncle Phil and aunt Kay (hint: Phil is the tall one). We began with an easy trip to Monte Vista Memorial Park in Bluefield, WV where my mother's parents are buried. Finding them was easy and uneventful, but on our way out of the park I thought I spotted a memorial in the shape of a deer. As we drove closer, one turned into two and then five. They may have been standing as still as statues, but they were very much alive and dining on flowers left on the graves.

The next stop was Woodlawn Cemetery in Bluewell, WV. Aunt Kay had stopped there the day before and gotten a map from the office. The map was a little hard to follow and it wasn't long before we were lost. After turning around in a dead end road where they store the burial vaults I took over the map. We found the first two plots with no difficulty, the headstones were right where the map said they'd be, but then we went looking for my aunt Donnalee.

My mother's older sister was so smart she was advanced three grades in elementary school. She was bright and pretty and I've always wished I could have known her. Sadly she died at twenty-one when she was given penicillin for an infection. Our whole family is allergic to the blue mold antibiotic and Donnalee was the first to succumb to this lifesaver turned killer.

When we looked for her where the map said she would be, we couldn't find her. We tried the sections to either side. Uncle Phil remembered parking near a tree when he'd been there as a boy, so we searched around nearby trees. We looked for more than half an hour and found no sign of my aunt. Then just as we were about to give up, I noticed a marker in the shadow of a large black headstone. The sun had risen just enough to shed a little light on it and there she was.


After a quick lunch at a Tudor Biscuit World we left graveyards behind and went looking for my mother's birthplace. In West Virginia coal was king for a hundred years. Even though my grandfather worked for the railroad, the first house he could afford was in a coal mine company town called Number Twelve. Yes, there was a Number Eleven and a Number Thirteen, but Number Twelve was the one just up the road from Anawalt, WV. When the mine closed sometime after WWII the town literally disappeared from the map.

To get to Anawalt from Bluewell is perhaps ten miles as the crow flies, but if you're diving be prepared for twenty-five miles of twisty narrow road with a wall of rock on one side and a long drop on the other. I should mention here that the weather today was perfect, both sunny and warm. Also the fall colors were out in force, so the drive over Peeled Chestnut Mountain was beautiful and amazingly fun.

There isn't much left of Number Twelve. The name lingers on as 12 Bottom Road (that's how it showed up on my GPS). The old company store my mother remembers roller skating around is now an apartment building. There are some old company houses still in use among the trailer homes, but all of the houses on the hill where Mom was born have long since disappeared. Using landmarks and my Mom's memories we located what was probably the front porch of her house.

We let the Prius direct us back to Princeton and it took us over Elk Horn Mountain this time. Not quite as twisty, but the road was much steeper. The views were also more spectacular and left me wanting more. On the way out this morning we passed by Pinnacle Rock State Park. I'd never seen this place before and my mother hasn't been there since she was a teenager. After some whining, that wasn't really necessary since I was driving, we stopped to check it out.

The highlight of the park is Pinnacle Rock itself. A huge outcropping of bedrock at the top of a mountain, it is one impressive sight. There's a large picnic ground in its shadow and a half a dozen hiking trails begin and end at its base. One of the trails leads up the side of the rock itself to a magnificent outlook. The climb is long and steep and it helps to stop from time to time to pose on a handy boulder.

The climb was worth every huff and puff because the view from the top was spectacular! A fitting end to a gorgeous day in Wild and Wonderful West Virginia.