Graton WV and Philippi WV

Heading Home

Well, it is almost time to be heading home. But before we leave that section of the country, we had a few stops to make.

Grafton

First, we need to clear up some confusion. We found the sign pictured below in Philadelphia PA near City Hall a few years ago.

Now, as Paul Harvey would say, the rest of the story.

First, Anna Jarvis was not the first American to come up with the idea of Mother's Day. Julia War Howe, of Battle Hymn of the Republic fame, hit upon the idea in 1870. She tried to get the idea of a day to honor Mothers part of the American Scene for a few years, but ultimately gave up.

Anna Jarvis, who was the next, may have been living in Philadelphia when she hit upon the idea of honoring her mother, but she was most defintely NOT FROM Philadelphia. She was born in Taylor County West Virginia, Grafton to be exact. And the first official Mother's Day observance was not in Philadelphia. It was at Andrew's Methodist Episcopal Church in Grafton West Virginia in 1908 (just ask Hillary and Chelsea). Andrew's M.E. Church merged with several other Methodist Churches in Grafton to form Good Shepherd United Methodist Church a number of years ago. The old church building was turned over to a local group that set up an organization to "promote" Mother's Day (Wanamaker is long gone and replaced by "corporate retailing"). And the building is now a "Shrine" for Mother's Day. And as we all know from the Election converage this spring, it holds one service a year, on Mother's Day. The rest of the year it is open for people to come in and visit.

And lastly, Ms Jarvis (she herself never married and never became a mother) protested vigorously the "commercialization" of Mother's Day. Her protests escalated up to actual physical protesting at various Mother's Day activities. Her feeling was that Mother's Day should honor Mothers, and not merely be a means to sell for things. Click here to read an article from Time magazine about her activities.

And of course, any visit to a town by me would not be complete without the obligatory stop at the local station. In this case, this is my third trip to the Grafton Station of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. It has been undergoing major renovation and I had heard they were through. Plus, the only time the light is good for shots of the front is in the evening. So, particularly since it is only a block from the Mother's Day Shrine, we could let one stop do for two shots. Incidentally, the multi-story building behind the station in this shot is the Williard Hotel. The Williard was owned and operated by the B&O Railroad. I suspect, most of its customers were crews on layover.

Philippi

Leaving Grafton, we followed the road down to the now-peaceful town of Philippi WV (we pronounce it Fill-i-pee). On May 14, 1861, Col. George Porterfield of the Virginia militia arrived in Grafton from Harper's Ferry Va. He was under orders from Robert E. Lee to organize the men who were forming units in the Grafton area. Unfortunately, there were few units forming in Graton. So after a few days he left for Philippi using practically the same route we used. When he arrived, he took what forces he had brought and combined them with the companies forming there.

He was followed Col. Benjamin Kelley of the Union forces. And on June 3, 1861 the first land "battle" occurred. It was not much of a fight, but what little there was occurred around this covered bridge (or actually the predecessor to this bridge, the original burned down in 1981). Click here to read more about this action.

And thus the war began.

From Philippi we crossed over towards Buckhannon WV in order to do some research at the library at West Virginia Wesleyan College.

After a few hours there reading old Annual Conference Journals, we finally made our way home.