Natural gas and the fracking boom have changed the landscape, politics and economics of West Virginia. Sean O'Leary of the Ohio River Valley Institute addresses the claims of "a veritable rock star proponent of 'the natural gas economy.' And finds all nine of his "irrefutable energy truths,” in fact, quite refutable.
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A WestVirginiaVille.com Reader | aug3.2020
If you have not yet subscribed to WestVirginiaVille's free e-mail newsletter, please do so at this link: westvirginiaville.substack.com. Here is our most recent newsletter of aug3.2020.
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TRAILER: A Peek at “Bye-Bye, Stonewall” mini-doc
Here's a peek from the trailer to WestVirginiaVille's upcoming mini-documentary, "Bye-Bye, Stonewall," on the years-long backstory on how a school in a black neighborhood in West Virginia's capital city finally got free of Confederate general Stonewall Jackson's name and mug.
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READINGS | A Stroll Deep into a West Virginia Marsh
If it’s true we are mother, father, sister, brother, related all to all, maybe that's one way to comprehend and befriend the ten thousand things. The hundreds of voices, cries, and songs rising from this manifold marsh.
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CHARACTERS | The One-Armed Bandit of No. 1 Holler, West Virginia
The life story of the "The One-Armed Bandit" is the stuff of heroes and legends. You may not know Gary Mays' tale, though, as the major league career the West Virginia native might have had may have been blocked by racism. But nothing ever kept Gary Mays down for long.
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READINGS | Ruminations of a Coal Miner’s Ex-wife
"Living here in Southern WV is very much like not being able to see the forest for the trees. So much of what went wrong in my marriage went wrong because my then-husband was being exploited and made to think that he had the good life. No—he was made to think he had the best life. He couldn’t say no."
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POINTS of VIEW: ‘What Is Their Cause, Has to be My Cause’
Suddenly, what is of importance only to people of color is now of utmost of importance to this person of white privilege. ~ Rabbi Victor Urecki
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Prehistoric W.Va. was not an uninhabited hunting ground
You don't have to live long in West Virginia before you hear that the land used to be a "hunting ground" for Native Americans. The actual history is more vibrant and complex, as the region was more likely "an Interaction Zone" or melting pot of native ethnicities, languages, and technology.
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DON WEST | Part 2: “May It Be So”
Long before it became fashionable, Don West fought the passive hillbilly stereotype by pointing to mountain labor’s traditions of struggle and solidarity.
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DON WEST | Part 1: Not An Easy Path
Don West was not a warm and fuzzy person or "a creator of comfort. He was a ceator of action." It could be uncomfortable, but the labor activist and poet left a legacy to be explored in a WVPB documentary that debuts Sunday, June 7, 2020
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HAPPY MOONSHINE DAY |Part 2: “The Plum”
We call it The Plum. It’s the prettiest moonshine we make. The shine is made from my PawPaw’s PawPaw’s recipe in a copper still just like it was a hundred years ago. In each jar, we put 13 sweet plums from the trees my great-aunt planted after the ’37 flood...
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HAPPY MOONSHINE DAY | Part 1: Moonshine Lore
It's National Moonshine Day. No, really. We have a 2-part, full report: 'Fun Facts to Know & Share.' And plum moonshine fiction.
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The West Virginia Musician Who Helped Draw Bob Dylan to Nashville
West Virginia may not immediately come to mind when you think of Bob Dylan's influential 1965 record "Highway 61 Revisited," which one writer says that in an important sense "started" the 1960s. Think again.
