BGuthrie Photos: WV -- Charleston -- State Capitol -- Interior

WV -- Charleston -- State Capitol -- Interior:

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Description of Pictures: Thanks to Patrick for an evening tour! The last time I had been in Charleston (back in 1999), a worker had let me take pictures from above the capitol cupola. This time, a guard saw me taking pictures at night and invited me in to see the interior.

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Copyrights: All pictures were taken by amateur photographer Bruce Guthrie (me!) who retains copyright on them. Free for non-commercial use with attribution. See the [Creative Commons] definition of what this means. "Photos (c) Bruce Guthrie" is fine for attribution. (Commercial use folks can of course contact me.) Feel free to use in publications and pages with attribution but you don't have permission to sell the photos themselves. A free copy of any printed publication using any photographs is requested. Descriptive text, if any, is from a mixture of sources, quite frequently from signs at the location or from official web sites; copyrights, if any, are retained by their original owners.

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Specific picture descriptions: Photos above with "i" icons next to the bracketed sequence numbers (e.g. "[1] ") are described as follows:
1. SCAIWV_081004_118.JPG: The guide said that an employee had committed suicide at the end of this hallway on a Friday night and the body wasn't found until Monday morning. The floor, at the time, had been carpeted and the blood stained the floor. While they've tried to remove it (if you touch the floor, you'll find the surface is abraded), they couldn't. I searched on Google for any information on this and never found it.
2. SCAIWV_081005_001.JPG: Hall with the Monongah Mining Disaster documentation
3. SCAIWV_081005_006.JPG: A Moment Etched in Our Nation's History: According to some accounts, the explosion was heard eight miles away and was so powerful, it shook town buildings, knocked over pedestrians and horses and left a residue of soot throughout the town. The mine was devastated from the massive explosion which obstructed the main entrance of No. 6. Above ground, the wreckage from two strings of ore cars and two electric dynamo motors blocked the main opening. The morning explosion destroyed the mine's ventilation system and trapped deadly gasses beneath the ground which hindered the rescue recovery and doomed survivors of the initial blast. Without gas masks, the rescuers could work only 15 minutes at a time before resurfacing and many ended up requiring medical treatment. Persistent fires in mines Nos. 6 and 8 stalled rescue attempts and led to the gruesome sight of bodies brought to the surface mangled and burned. A temporary morgue was set up in a bank building that was under construction and caskets lined the city streets. This was devastating to the hundreds of family, friends and onlookers who watched body after body being removed from the mines. Five railroad carloads of coffins arrived in Monongah the day after the explosion. They were not enough. As the retrieval of bodies progressed, a morgue was set up in the new and unfinished bank building. Six undertakers with squads of assistants performed their grim tasks nonstop. Scores upon scores of bodies were then lined up in open coffins on Monongah's Main Street. There are several theories as to the actual cause of the explosion though the predominant belief is that the origin was the ignition of "black damp," commonly known as methane. This in turn ignited highly flammable coal dust that is present in all West Virginia bituminous coal mines. It is not certain what ignited the methane although two possibilities are an open lamp or a bad dynamite blast may have instigated the combustion.
4. SCAIWV_081005_010.JPG: The Monongah Disaster: On the cold morning of December 6, 1907, a huge blast rocked the small mining town of Monongah, West Virginia, heralding the worst mining disaster in American history. It was just after 10 o'clock in the morning and a full work force of men and boys were toiling beneath the earth when that an [sic] underground explosion shook mine Nos. 6 and 8 of the Fairmont Coal Company and changed the town of Monongah forever. Although the General Manager of the two mines reported to the Fairmont Times that 478 men had been checked off entering the mine that day, numerous accounts after the disaster record that 362 men and boys lost their lives. The exact figure is difficult to known because of the common practice of additional workers who were often family or friends accompanying a miner into the mines to load coal using the registered worker's tags to mark the mine cars they loaded. The miner would pay the additional worker out of his pay. According to some records, a study of the Monongah cemetery indicates that more than 500 victims were buried after the disaster.
5. SCAIWV_081005_014.JPG: An Immigrant Workforce: The mine workers of Monongah were symbolic of the melting pot of America which consisted of a diverse group of nationalities. The vast majority were Italians who had migrated from San Giovanni in Fior, San Nicola dell' Alto, Falerna, Gizzeria, Roveto, Duronia, Civita d'Antinio, Canistro, Torella del Santo and other villages in Calabria, Abruzzo and Molise. According to the 1908 Annual Report of the Department of Mines, the list of those who died in the mines was arranged based on ethnicity or country of origin; Americans, Polish, Greek, Slavish, Italians, Livitch, Irish, Negro, Hungarians, Scottish and Lithuanian. The disaster left 250 widows and more than 1,000 children without fathers and primary wage earners. Many of the survivors did not speak English or have relatives in this country except for their immediate families.
6. SCAIWV_081005_017.JPG: From Tragedy, a Safer World is Born: The Monongah mining disaster did bring about a call for reform in the operation of mines and on December 19, the New York Times reported a government document said that mining accidents were primarily due to a lack of proper and enforceable mining regulations. By 1908, coal mine owners were beginning to recognize the need for improvements in mine safety and wanted to head off changes and involvement by the government. It became increasing [sic] obvious that Congress needed to do something and in 1910, it established the US Bureau of Mines. Though it was too late for the miners who died in the Monongah disaster, things did change in the form of new mining safety regulations. The result years later made for a safer environment in an ever-dangerous profession.
7. SCAIWV_081005_020.JPG: Monongah Remembers: Today, the entrances to the mines have been sealed with bricks and are overgrown with weeds. Father Everett Frances Briggs, a Catholic Priest born in Fitchburg, Massachusetts on January 27, 1908, was the head of a local committee which commissioned a statue made of Carrera marble to honor the widows of the Monongah mining disaster and to honor coal miners' widows everywhere. Father Briggs passed away in Monongah on December 20, 2006. The Monongah Heroine statue located beside the Town Hall, will be formally dedicated on October 9, 2007. [I was reading this on October 5, 2008.] A special ceremony will be held on the 100th anniversary of the tragedy.
8. SCAIWV_081005_047.JPG: Anne Jarvis, founder of Mother's Day
9. SCAIWV_081005_078.JPG: Cleveland M. Bailey.
10. SCAIWV_081005_082.JPG: Stonewall Jackson
11. SCAIWV_081005_087.JPG: Construction of this building forming main unit of the group of Capitol buildings was begun in March 1930 and completed October 1931. Capitol Building Commission ...
12. SCAIWV_081005_144.JPG: Robert C. Byrd.
13. SCAIWV_081005_200.JPG: The suicide spot
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Wikipedia Description: West Virginia State Capitol
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The West Virginia State Capitol is the seat of government for the state of West Virginia, and houses the West Virginia Legislature and the office of the Governor of West Virginia. Located in Charleston, West Virginia, the building was dedicated in 1932.

History:

Prior to the American Civil War, the counties that would ultimately form West Virginia were a part of the state of Virginia; the state capitol was in Richmond, Virginia. After Virginia seceded from the Union in 1861, the northwest counties of Virginia loyal to the United States started the process which would ultimately create the State of West Virginia on June 20, 1863.

Settling on a state capital location, however, proved to be difficult. For several years, the capital of West Virginia intermittently traveled between Wheeling and Charleston. In 1877, however, state citizens voted on the final location of their capital. Charleston was chosen and eight years later, the first capitol building was opened. After a fire in 1921, a hastily built structure was opened but burned down in 1927.

A Capitol Building Commission, created by the Legislature in 1921, authorized construction of the present capitol. Architect Cass Gilbert designed the buff limestone structure that was to have a final cost of just under $10 million. After the three stages of construction were completed, Governor William G. Conley dedicated the capitol on June 20, 1932.

Description of the capitol plaza:

The front of the building faces the Kanawha River, and the entire capitol plaza is bordered by Kanawha Boulevard East (also known as U.S. Route 60 and the Midland Trail), Greenbrier Street (also a part of Route 60 and West Virginia Route 114, where the latter terminates), California Avenue and Piedmont Road. Formerly, Washington Street passed through the plaza, but was closed off for pedestrian use. Beside the main capitol, there are two wings which lie perpe ...More...
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Same Subject: Click on this link to see coverage of items having the same subject: [Capitols] [Government]
2008 photos: Equipment this year: I was using three cameras -- the Fuji S9000 and the Canon Rebel Xti from last year, and a new camera, the Fuji S100fs. The first two cameras had their pluses and minuses and I really didn't have a single camera that I thought I could use for just about everything. But I loved the S100fs and used it almost exclusively this year. Trips this year: (1) Civil War Preservation Trust annual conference in Springfield, Missouri , (2) a week in New York, (3) a week in San Diego for the Comic-Con, (4) a driving trip to St. Louis, and (5) a visit to dad and Dixie's in Asheville, North Carolina. Ego strokes: A picture I'd taken last year during a Friends of the Homeless event was published in USA Today with a photo credit and everything! I became a volunteer photographer with the AFI/Silver theater. Number of photos taken this year: 330,000.
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