A private collection that features over 650 items focusing on African American history and culture including photographs, records and news clippings was on display in WVU’s student union building Tuesday. It highlighted the role of African Americans in the nation’s armed forces from the post-Civil War Buffalo Soldiers to today.
Students and visitors to West Virginia University’s Morgantown campus Tuesday had an opportunity to reflect on Black history with a unique exhibit.
The Homage Exhibit is a private collection that features over 650 items focusing on African American history and culture including photographs, records and news clippings. The display in WVU’s student union building highlighted the role of African Americans in the nation’s armed forces from the post-Civil War Buffalo Soldiers to today.
Morris McAdoo, one of the curators of the collection, says the exhibit’s primary sources and photographs help visitors who may not have prior exposure to form their own perspective and viewpoint on Black history.
“Many of the students that I’ve spoken with here, they’re from smaller towns. It is so beneficial that institutions are allowing this,” he said. “To be in places where some of the students don’t have access to actually see the articles that come directly from that period and frame their own position or understanding of what happened in that area, seeing the actual pictures and seeing the servicemen and the different billboards and advertisement when they came to try to recruit African Americans, it’s important to actually see it up front.”
One of McAdoo’s personal favorite pieces in the display is a grouping of portraits and a biography of Benjamin O. Davis, Sr. the Army’s first African American general officer.
“It shares just a little bit of light and glory that, yeah, this is a time where these young African American males were not treated equal. They didn’t have rights. There was nothing from a legislature that would support them to have equal rights,” he said. “But you do see beacons of hope, such as General Davis, where he rose to the point of representing, you know, his country, and representing at such a large field, and be the first to do it.”
According to McAdoo, the Homage Exhibit started from the personal collections of his and his wife Nia’s relatives in the 50s, 60s and 70s. He said older and more contemporary pieces are often contributed by the public after having viewed the collection on one of its stops.
“A lot of the things that you see here, we either obtain them privately or we have them on loan from other museums who maybe have too much of an inventory, so they become donations, or become loans,” McAdoo said.
McAdoo said one of the most important parts of the exhibit as it travels across the country is to make connections to local history and tradition. That includes Earl Muse of Princeton, West Virginia who in 1974 made history as the first Black State Commander of the Veterans of Foreign Wars in the country.
“What we’ve tried to do is recognize that this is not just Black history, but this is your regional history, and so that’s why it’s important,” he said.
Images of servicemen and women from the 1970s as part of the Homage Exhibit at WVU Feb. 4, 2025. In the bopttom left is a portrait of Earl Muse of Princeton, West Virginia who in 1974 made history as the first Black State Commander of the Veterans of Foreign Wars in the country.
The West Virginia University Division of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion will be replaced by the Division of Campus Engagement and Compliance. The new division’s goals include compliance with Title IX and the Americans with Disabilities Act.
According to a statement released by the university, the change is being made to comply with Gov. Patrick Morrisey’s Executive Order No. 3-25 as well as Pres. Donald Trump’s Executive Order 14151. Both orders block organizations from using government funds to support diversity, equity and inclusion efforts.
Popularly known as DEI, the term has become shorthand for efforts from organizations like universities and companies to promote the fair treatment and full participation of all people.
In an email to WVPB, WVU officials said the university “remains a welcoming community open to all.”
“The new Division of Campus Engagement and Compliance, led by Vice President Meshea Poore, is positioned to carry out its core mission and to serve all within our University community,” the email reads. “We continue to work internally with units campus wide as we evaluate the specifics and potential effects (of) the federal and state orders. Once our review is complete, we will have a better understanding of the impact and will provide more specific, unit-level guidance to members of our campus community at that time.”
Other public universities in the state similarly say they are reviewing policies, and will release updates in the near future.
Marshall University, whose efforts are distributed across various areas within the institution including the President’s Commission on DEI, said in an email they anticipate “having an update next week regarding the university’s progress on the Executive Orders, particularly as they pertain to DEI.”
Marshall officials also confirmed several pages related to the Commission on DEI have since been unpublished as part of the university’s review.
An official with Shepherd University told WVPB via email that the university’s vice president for diversity, equity, and inclusivity position had not been filled for close to a year.
“The University does not have any procedures, policies, or programs in place that provide special benefits or treatment to any person or group based on race, color, sex, ethnicity, or nation of origin,” the official said in an email. “We are proud to offer our diverse community of students high-quality and innovative programs that position them for success as global citizens and leaders. We are reviewing and evaluating our policies in light of the Executive Order. We are anticipating some further guidance through the WV Higher Education Policy Commission for understanding the scope of the directives and the manner in which our report for the Governor will be assimilated.”
Governor Patrick Morrisey's statement on West Virginia University ending the WVU Division of DEI pic.twitter.com/rcIMZmp7JP
In a recorded statement released Thursday night, Gov. Patrick Morrisey reaffirmed his commitment to rooting out what he called “preferences unlawfully benefitting one group over another.”
“I’m a believer, like many of you, that God looks at us, the rule of law looks at us, as equals,” Morrisey said. “We have an equal protection clause. We care about the rule of law. We care about freedom. We don’t want special preferences unlawfully benefitting one group over another – race, color, age, ethnicity. We have to make sure we’re taking steps to treat everyone the same under the law.”
The governor said this is just the beginning of efforts to “root out DEI” in the weeks and months ahead.
Javier McCoy, interim director of the West Virginia University Center for Black Culture, talked with Chris Schulz about Kwanzaa festivities, which call on observers to reflect on seven principles.
For the past 60 years, Kwanzaa has celebrated African American culture for the week between Christmas and the New Year. January 1 was the final day of Kwanzaa festivities, which call on observers to reflect on seven principles, including Umoja, or unity, and Ujima, or collective work.
Chris Schulz sat down with Javier McCoy, interim director of the West Virginia University Center for Black Culture to talk about the holiday.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
Schulz: Before we get into Kwanzaa and the specifics around that, can you tell me a little bit about the Center for Black Culture and the work that you do here on campus?
McCoy: The Center for Black Culture is a hub for black students away from home, whatever they need – social engagement wise, community wise, academic wise. We try to be that resource for them, help them find the other resources on campus, but also be a community, like a home away from home.
Schulz: Can you tell me a little bit about what Kwanzaa is and its history?
McCoy: My family used to celebrate Kwanzaa many, many years ago. It was another gathering of us to be in community with one another and celebrate some uplifting principles. But it’s very much a community based holiday, typically around food, around just being with one another in fellowship. And so I think Kwanzaa is an awesome celebration if you celebrate it, some people do, some people don’t. I think some people are still learning about Kwanzaa, and then they’re starting to celebrate it. And some people have been celebrating Kwanzaa for a very long time.
Schulz: What exactly goes into the week of Kwanzaa?
McCoy: So I think it’s really how you choose to celebrate it. Kwanzaa is a seven-day celebration. You can celebrate each principle of Kwanzaa every day. There is a principle that goes with each day. But some people just celebrate one day and kind of talk about all the principles in its entirety, and celebrate them together instead of going the whole seven days. There are some candles that you light for each principle. It’s a black candle, and then some red candles, and then some green candles. And then each day you light a candle depending on the principle.
One of the principles is nia, which means purpose and to make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness. So when we talk about, what is your purpose in life? What are you called on this earth here to do? What do you think your purpose is here? Mine, I work in higher education. I’m working with students. I want them to be their best selves and get across the finish line. So that’s what I consider my purpose. And so when we talk about nia, specifically, it’s, how are you contributing to the community? How are you impacting the community? Are you serving your purpose in the community as well?
Schulz: Do you have an understanding of why your family chose to start celebrating Kwanzaa at some point?
McCoy: One of my aunts worked at the Smithsonian, so she was always involved in African culture. And working there, we got to experience a variety of just historic things that would happen at the Smithsonian. So we would go to the annual Kwanzaa celebration. It was African choirs, big choirs, a lot of singing, a lot of proclamations, a lot of affirmations. And to see all these people gathered was amazing.
I lived overseas for about eight-to-nine years, and my mom planned a big Kwanzaa celebration when we were in England with all of the people that was on the Menwith Hill base. It was an amazing time to bring people together. Again, we are overseas, away from our families, not able to come home. We were able to find community where we were in England, and we had an amazing event for my family in particular.
It was a time for us to really celebrate each other, celebrate the year, and focus on what we wanted to do for the next year, while helping the community, serving our community, and again, being just with each other. I think typically in black culture, anything around community has always been amazing. I think fellowshipping with people, hearing stories. I remember at the Smithsonian, there were people just telling their stories, what they had been through in the past year, how they struggled, but how they also got over.
Schulz: If there’s anything that I haven’t given you a chance to discuss with me, or anything that we have touched on that you’d like to highlight.
McCoy: I think Kwanzaa is a great learning opportunity. I think it allows us to see different cultures celebrate different things. I’m a big culture person. I like to explore and see what other cultures do and learn. So I think this is the opportunity for us to bring Kwanzaa to the front light. Hopefully we’re able to do something next year. It is on my list for sure to do something that we can educate, bring the community together and showcase Kwanzaa. It might not be during the traditional time just because of the academic calendar. Typically, this is celebrated right after Christmas into the new year. The university is closed. Students are away from break. If we want this to be a very student-led kind of community event, we don’t have any students. But that doesn’t mean that we might can’t do something before we go on break, then we run into finals week, we run into the last week of classes. So I think we have to be kind of strategic of how we bring this celebration to campus and educate on what the celebration is, but we will make sure that our focus is to have an event that not just students can come to, but also our community members can come to as well, and we can have a group celebration.
West Virginia University commemorated the anniversary of Pearl Harbor a day early this year. Each December, the bell of the USS West Virginia rings out in remembrance.
West Virginia University commemorated the anniversary of Pearl Harbor a day early this year.
Each December, the bell of the USS West Virginia rings out in remembrance of those who died during the attack 83 years ago. WVU ROTC members are on hand as an honor guard, as are local veterans, and ROTC members have the honor to toll the bell.
The bell, along with the ship’s mast, are now fixtures of WVU’s downtown Morgantown campus and the focal point of an annual ceremony which includes a 21 gun salute, wreath layings from the Daughters of the American Revolution, and comments from local veterans.
Retired Army Maj. George Davis gave this year’s keynote speech. He recounted the ship’s life, from its sponsorship by the Mann mining family to its damage during the 1941 attack. Davis said the ship serves as a symbol of perseverance.
“USS West Virginia, although heavily damaged at Pearl Harbor and missing much of the war, nevertheless gained Five battle stars,” he said. “Her 16 inch guns played a major role in the effort to take Iwo Jima. The war ended on August 15, 1945. USS West Virginia drilled her landing force for preparation for the oncoming occupation of Japan.”
Veterans stand as part of an honor guard during the Dec. 6, 2024 Pearl Harbor remembrance at WVU. Chris Schulz/West Virginia Public Broadcasting
Davis said the ceremony should serve as a reminder not just of the sacrifice made by the USS West Virginia’s crew, but by all service members down the years.
“It’s critical that we don’t forget our history,” he said. “If you don’t remember your history, you’re liable to repeat the same mistakes over and over again. History is what this nation is founded on. It’s so important that people remember the hundreds of thousands and millions that have lost their lives in wars since this nation was founded.”
Ret. Maj. George Davis stands in front of the bell of the USS West Virginia Dec. 6, 2024. Chris Schulz/West Virginia Public Broadcasting
The West Virginia University system saw a decline of more than 2,000 students, or roughly 7 percent of its student population, between fall 2023 and fall 2024.
Colleges nationwide are struggling with decliningenrollment, and West Virginia’s flagship higher education institution is no exception.
Between its Beckley, Keyser and Morgantown campuses, West Virginia University’s student population declined by roughly 7 percent between the fall 2023 and fall 2024 semesters.
That is a decline of more than 2,000 students, with the university system’s current enrollment now sitting at 24,788, WVU Vice Provost Mark Gavin announced Monday during a meeting of the WVU Faculty Senate.
Gavin said national trends — including difficulties surrounding the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, known more commonly as FAFSA — played a part in declining numbers this year.
“Certainly FAFSA didn’t do anybody any favors,” he said.
Gavin said university administrators are developing new strategies to bolster numbers, including an easier transfer process for students at community or technical colleges.
“We recognize that we had a drop in first-time freshmen relative to our projected budget,” he said. “We are actively developing strategies to counter that.”
An exhibit at the West Virginia and Regional History Center (WVRHC) at WVU invites the public to explore influential traditions for today and tomorrow.
The term “folklife” can evoke the sounds of fiddles and banjoes, or black and white images of grandparents on the old family farm. And those can both be true.
But an exhibit at West Virginia University invites the public to explore how the traditional still influences us today — and how new traditions might influence tomorrow.
Catherine Rakowski is the research and exhibition specialist for the West Virginia and Regional History Center (WVRHC) at West Virginia University in Morgantown. The center is currently displaying a piece of folk art she wasn’t sure she would ever get a chance to show off to the public.
“It’s called a friendship quilt,” Rakowski said.
Rakowski said it’s one of her favorites, and with good reason: some 20 hand-embroidered squares, each containing a floral design, and more importantly the name of its maker, are bordered with pink and white fabric borders.
“Somebody, they’re going to be in charge of all this, they send out squares to friends, relatives, square cloth, and ask the person they’re sending it to to embroider their name on the cloth with the design, and send it back to her,” Rakowski said. “This is the result, and she would piece it together. They always came with maps so you knew who did what.”
It’s the kind of thing most people today only get to see as a family heirloom. But the example on display at the WVRHC made by Emily Myers Gump and her friends almost 100 years ago, is on display as part of the “Living the Folklife: Monsters, Music, Medicine, Myths, and More” exhibit.
“It’s the culture of Appalachia, southern Appalachia, particularly, and West Virginia, of course,” Rakowski said. “What we do with our exhibits, we focus on what we have in our holdings, our collections, and that’s how we build our exhibits and to feature in what we have here.”
That includes what you might expect: fiddles and displays highlighting local legends old and new. But visitors to the exhibit can also see portable, luggage-sized recording equipment used in the 1930s to preserve West Virginia folk music, handmade children’s toys and even a pot still once used to make moonshine.
“We went into every area of folklife, folk art, folk medicine, folk speech, folk food, folk festivals, folk tales, that kind of thing,” Rakowski said.
Portable recording equipment used by Louis Watson Chappell in the 1930s and 40s to collect and preserve folk music across West Virginia is displayed at the West Virginia and Regional History Center. Chris Schulz/West Virginia Public Broadcasting
Rakowski said folklife – as the exhibit’s name implies – goes hand in hand with life in the Appalachia and its role as a melting pot for European, Native American and African cultures.
“That’s a culture, and it all blended together because the mountains divided us,” she said. “You couldn’t get anywhere. Infrastructure was a problem. So, like I said, it blended together. That’s how I see it. Anyway, geography had a lot to do with it.”
Rosemary Hathaway recently retired as an English professor at WVU. She helped open the exhibit on West Virginia Day with a presentation on folklife.
“The best definition, I think, of folklore, is sort of the art of everyday life, in the sense that it’s the things that people say or do or create that give their lives meaning and give expression to their values or their communities,” Hathaway said.
According to Hathaway, West Virginia has always been conscious of the importance of its folk traditions and supportive of them. The exhibit highlights the work of folklorists like Louis Watson Chappell and Patrick Gainer, who formalized their work with state support at WVU.
Hathaway pushes back against the idea of an isolated region giving rise to the rich folklife explored in the exhibit. But she does agree that a sense of place has kept many traditions alive.
“This perception of Appalachia as this place of otherness and difference and poverty and kind of the stereotypes about Appalachia, I think, rather than making people feel ashamed of their traditions or replace them with something modern, I think it’s had the exact opposite effect,” she said. “I think it’s really made people appreciate that this is valuable.”
The WVRHC is tucked away on the sixth floor of the university’s Downtown Library. Most come here on a mission, seeking out research material for a dissertation or genealogy info for a family tree.
But Hathaway said it’s worth taking a trip up to the center to learn not only how the old ways live on, but also how new traditions like cryptids – popular creatures like Mothman that lack conclusive evidence of their existence – fit into the folklife mosaic.
“They might think about music, but they might think about that in a really limited way, too.” she said. “You know that, ‘Oh, it’s an old guy sitting on his porch, playing his fiddle.’ I think this exhibit really will open people’s eyes to the breadth of what counts as folklife in West Virginia, and not just in the past. But what are people doing now, right? What are the kinds of traditions that people are engaging in presently, that count as folklife?”
Rakowski said you might even learn something that could come in handy down the road.
“It’s a link. You’re linking yourself to the past,” she said. “And I’ll tell you what, maybe someday we might have to go back to stringing beans again. You never know, but it’s a wonderful tradition to do that, to preserve.”
The folklife exhibit is open to the public during regular library hours through the spring semester.
Feed sack clothing and a fiddle are some of the historic pieces displayed as part of the “Living the Folklife: Monsters, Music, Medicine, Myths, and More” exhibit at the West Virginia and Cultural History Center Nov. 12, 2024.
