There’s a new push to sell the Itmann coal company store building in Wyoming County. The almost 100-year-old building has a rich history as a former store and business office owned by Issac T. Mann.
There’s a new push to sell the Itmann coal company store building in Wyoming County. The almost 100-year-old building has a rich history as a former store and business office owned by Issac T. Mann.
Randy S. Burdette
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Aaron Parsons, director of the West Virginia State Archives, speaks during the 2022 open house at the Itmann Company Store.
Today, it comes with some memories and a lot of expensive repairs. Current owner and former state Sen. Billy Wayne Bailey is hoping real estate agent and historian David Sibray can find the right buyer.
Foxfire Realty and the Wyoming County Historical Society hosted an open house earlier this month.
David Sibray
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Wooden cabinetry and craftsmanship provide additional ornamentation in a building otherwise build solidly of stone, steel, and concrete.
“Again and again, what occurred to me is just how important this building is to all of that community, not certainly just in the town, but all of the county as well,” Sibray said. “Everyone has some relationship to that building. It turned out that I had a relationship with that building … kids who sat there and ate candy in the breezeway, people who went to get their checks, people who bought all their furniture, people who bought all their food.”
Sibray specializes in historical sales. In a way, he says it’s part preservation.
Yvonne Wilcox
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Courtesy
David Sibray checks the acoustics in the Itmann company store space ahead of an open house sponsored by Foxfire Realty and the Wyoming County Historical Society.
“It’s about knowing a lot more than that building,” Sibray said. “And a lot more than what’s economically going on. Like certainly, in this case, you’ve got the new [Coalfields] Expressway, you’ve got the ATV trails, you’ve got the Guyandotte water trail, you have
David Sibray
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Steel window framing in the classical style is incorporated into the thick stone and concrete walls of the Itmann Company Store.
broadband access, all of those things go into knowing what you’re doing with any sort of property. But when you’re selling something as big as this, you have got to know all of that.”
It cost $25,000 when Bailey bought it. The current listing price is $499,000. Despite the financial jump, Sibray says it’s an appropriate price.
“Whoever buys this building is going to need to have the ability to do a lot of work with the building,” Sibray said. “I mean, it’s going to cost millions of dollars. And my job also for the owner is to leave no money on the table.”
“To some extent, it prevents people from wanting to buy the building and tear it down. There are people who would like to remove the building and move the stone. This building also is being sold on the global market Foxfire Realty, our specialization has always been because we work with properties that are large scale properties, we have to go nationally.”
The building has sparked interest and some interesting conversations.
“As far as buyers’ potentials, we’ve had several people who have come forward who have expressed interest and they seem to be viable owners,” Sibray said. “But the wheels of this train move slowly. So it may take a little time for people to work out how exactly the purchase of this building might be managed.” If the building sells, Sibray is optimistic about the impact it could have in this tiny community.
“I can’t imagine it being anything other than a good outcome,” Sibray said, “as long as it’s repaired.”
Picasa
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The coal company store in Itmann was built around 1923.
The four day festival coincides with daily train rides from Huntington to Hinton on the Autumn Colors Express. The trip offers scenic views of the fall colors of the New River Gorge. All four trips are sold out after two years without making the trips because of the COVID-19 pandemic.
The event also features live music on two stages, food and local vendors. Music acts include Randy Gilkey, the Lincoln County Cloggers, and the Parachute Brigade.
There will also be a public lecture about the settlement of Summers and Monroe Counties at the McCreery Conference and Event Center on Friday afternoon.
The Hinton Railroad Days Festival is Thursday, Oct. 20 – Sunday, Oct. 23, 2022.
The Bluefield Arts and Revitalization Corporation has big plans for a portion of a Bluefield building that’s been vacant for decades. The space on Raleigh Street that previously housed a tire and auto center will soon be used for entertainment and education.
The Bluefield Arts and Revitalization Corporation has big plans for a portion of a Bluefield building that’s been vacant for decades. The space on Raleigh Street that previously housed a tire and auto center will soon be used for entertainment and education.
The Granada Theater was renovated and reopened in 2021. The new project will renovate a former auto center which is located on the lower level of the Granada and accessible in the rear of the historical theater. The level will be remodeled to host New River Community and Technical College teaching labs.
“New River welcomes the opportunity to make its affordable and high-quality workforce training programs accessible to people in the Bluefield area,” said Dr. Bonnie Copenhaven, President of New River Community and Technical College.
The project will also provide two more theaters, each with fifty seats and new amenities. The space will also be available for community events, film festivals, and more.
“The project’s creative use of underutilized space will create opportunities for entertainment, employment, and education in downtown Bluefield, benefiting residents throughout the city and across the region,” Executive Director of the Bluefield Arts and Revitalization Corporation Brian Tracey, said.
Courtesy
Raleigh Street space before construction.
The project comes with a $1.65 million price tag. The Bluefield Arts and Revitalization Corporation secured a portion of the funds through a program called New Markets tax credits and the U.S. Department of the Treasury.
“The use of New Markets tax credits to finance this project will act as a catalyst for economic development in Bluefield, contributing to the positive momentum already present downtown and demonstrating the value of tax credit programs for the revitalization of the city,” said Ron Martin, Mayor of Bluefield.
The Bluefield Economic Development Authority, Community Ventures, and Hugh I. Shott, Jr. Foundation, are also financial supporters of the project.
Judges and attorneys heard arguments at the Woodrow Wilson High School Auditorium in Beckley. The LAWS program is meant to educate students on court systems.
The Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia heard arguments at a different location on Tuesday as part of a program called LAWS (Legal Advancement for West Virginia Students).
Judges and attorneys heard arguments at the Woodrow Wilson High School Auditorium in Beckley. The LAWS program is meant to educate students on court systems.
High school students studied the real cases before argument day and met with the attorneys in the cases. Judges also visited the schools to help explain the cases.
Four cases were presented as part of the project.
Wyoming East and Oak Hill students heard arguments from the State of West Virginia v. Micah A. McClain, No. 21-0873.
Shady Spring, Midland Trail, and Westside High Schools heard arguments from Harlee Beasley v. Mark A. Sorsaia, No. 21-0475.
Students from Liberty and Woodrow Wilson High Schools listened in on arguments from Joey J. Butner v. High Lawn Memorial Park Company and High Lawn Funeral Chapel, Inc., No. 21-0387.
Liberty High School students heard arguments in the case Adam Goodman and Paul Underwood v. Blake Auton, No. 21-0578.
Students from Fayette, Raleigh and Wyoming counties participated in the Beckley event.
Students across the state can watch the recorded docket on the West Virginia Judiciary YouTube channel.
The hope for the Great Eastern Trail is to relieve some of the foot traffic on the iconic Appalachian Trail which hosts about three million visitors each year.
In 1948, a hiker named Earl Shaffer came up with the idea of an alternative to the Appalachian Trail (AT). It would be a trail that stretches from the deep south to New England, just west of the AT. It wasn’t until 2007 that the Great Eastern Trail Association was created and parts of the trail started to open up to hikers. But when hikers get to southern West Virginia, they find a trail that is incomplete.
“A new trail system like this just doesn’t pop up every year,” Houck said before attempting the hike. “To actually try to be one of the first to hike this trail and to showcase it and to bring it into light is actually a very humbling experience.”
The hope for this trail was that it would relieve some of the foot traffic on the iconic Appalachian Trail which hosts about three million visitors each year.
“It also is going to be an economic boost for this area that needs a boost other than coal,” Houck said. “I’m not against coal. Actually, I have a lot of friends that are in the coal industry. But this is a way to showcase southern West Virginia in a different light.”
Nearly a decade later, what is the impact of the Great Eastern Trail in southern West Virginia?
Back Out On The Trail
Tim McGraw is president of the TuGuNu Hiking Club, which maintains and promotes the Great Eastern trail in southern West Virginia. McGraw got involved with the project because of his love for the experience of being outdoors in southern West Virginia.
Jessica Lilly
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Tim McGraw along the Great Eastern Trail in Mercer County.
“I like to be out in nature, particularly I like to be up on the ridges in southern West Virginia,” McGraw said. “For me, it’s kind of a spiritual experience. To be in the woods, I just want to share what I feel when I’m in nature. I want to share that with other people.”
The GET runs from Alabama to New York west of the Appalachian Trail, but portions of it are incomplete, especially in southern West Virginia. McGraw says the biggest challenge to completing the trail here is private land ownership. Trailblazers tried to keep the trail on accessible land by mapping it to connect public lands. Those lands include R.D. Bailey Lake Wildlife Management Area, Bluestone State Park and Twin Falls Resort State Park.
Scott Durham worked as superintendent of Twin Falls State Park in Wyoming County for 42 years.
“We let them co-designate some of our existing trails at Twin Falls as pieces of the Great Eastern Trail,” Durham said. “That designation has gone away, not because they’re not welcome, but because they’ve just been inactive.”
The proposed route for the Great Eastern Trail inevitably crosses private property to reach public lands like Twin Falls. According to a study from 2013 Wyoming County has the highest concentration of outside land ownership of any county in the state. In fact, Durham says Twin Falls was donated to the state by a private company,
“All the land around three quarters of the boundary of Twin Falls is corporate land,” Durham said.
Corporate landowners have a reason for not granting access to hikers – liability. For Durham and many residents in southern West Virginia, it’s a familiar story.
“I have worked in southern West Virginia for my whole career,” Durham said. “I’ve been involved in any number of economic development efforts, the real hard part of trying to create economic development in southern West Virginia always comes back to having access to buy land and own land.”
Durham says the Great Eastern trail would mean more than economic development to the region.
Jessica Lilly
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WVPB
Great Eastern Trail in Mercer County
“It brings a stamp of approval too,” Durham said. “If you go to someplace in Virginia, North Carolina, and they say well, ‘the Appalachian Trail runs right through here. That gives you an image of what that place is and the quality of the outdoor experience at that place.”
“It’s gonna bring hikers but it’s gonna bring other people too because it’s part of the package of what people are looking for when they’re going outdoors.”
There is a way around the roadblocks. Private landowners could open their land to hikers and the state could take on the liability. That’s how the nearby Hatfield McCoy ATV trail system was made possible. For now that’s not happening for the Great Eastern Trail.
If somehow hiking clubs found a way to complete the GET in southern West Virginia, what would a completed trail do for the economy in southern West Virginia? Well, there’s a hint at what’s possible further down the trail in Narrows, Virginia.
Welcome To The General Douglas MacArthur Hotel
The General Douglas MacArthur Hotel was purchased by Narrows native Alan Neely in 2008.
Jessica Lilly
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Allen Neely stands at the front door of the General Douglas MacArthur Hotel in Narrows, Va.
He has an award winning mustache and a passion for his hometown.
“Narrows Virginia is a National Trail town, because it’s the only town in the United States where two major hiking drills trails? intersect,” Neely said. “The Great Eastern Trail and the Appalachian Trail intersect on top of that mountain.”
After working as the lead construction contractor at Virginia Tech, he retired and rescued this historic hotel from demolition. Now about a quarter of his business is hikers.
“They’re (hikers) actually from all over the world really,” Neely said. “We had people from Brazil and Britain and Spain. They come through and they go back to their hometowns wherever it might be and tell of the little town that they love. You know, we’ve even had some people that hike through here, and they’ll come back and buy houses to move here. I mean, not one or two. I mean several.”
The vision for many coal and railroad towns in southern West Virginia also includes restoring a historic hotel or building and growing a tourism industry.
Jessica Lilly
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WVPB
Allen Neely in the lobby of the General Douglas MacArthur Hotel.
So what will it take to get the Great Eastern trail completed in West Virginia? Scott Durham says to start, it’ll take initiative.
“There needs to be people who step up,” Durham said. “But there are serious hikers here. It may just take that one person who cares.”
The public is invited to tour the Itmann Company store in Wyoming County this weekend. The historic building has been on the market for years after a former politician and Wyoming County native purchased the structure.
The public is invited to tour the Itmann Company store in Wyoming County this weekend. The historic building has been on the market for years after a former politician and Wyoming County native purchased the structure.
The building was coal mine owner Isaac T. Mann’s office and employee hub about 100 years ago. The building was designed by renowned architect Alex B. Mahood and is known for the striking stonework, and rotunda. The building was built from stones hand carved from locally sourced stones.
Despite a few reports of plans to renovate and restore it the building has been vacant and is slowly becoming more dilapidated.
The Wyoming County Historical Society and Foxfire Realty, the company representing the owner, Billy Wayne Bailey, are hosting the event.
Anyone who has an account of the community and company store’s history, is invited to share their stories during the event.
President of the Historical Society, Jim Cook, will produce portraits of folks who share their stories about the store during the event.
The open house begins Saturday Oct. 15. At 10 am. Historians will speak at 11:00 a.m., 1:00 p.m. and 2:30 pm.
The building is currently on the market for $499,000. Courthouse officials say the deed shows it was last purchased for $25,000.
