f Mountaineers
Always Free, of West Virginians always Mountaineers--for a better
understanding by the country at large ... of this land of heroic past,
exhilarating present, and promising future."

A journey through the Mountain State convinces the traveler that on her
side of the Blue Ridge West Virginia offers as many wonders under the
earth as above it, if one is not a claustrophobe. There's Gandy Sinks
where my friends of the Speleological Society were trapped by a
cloudburst on August 1, 1940; and Seneca Caverns, in Monongahela
National Forest, once the refuge of Seneca Indians about twenty miles
west of Franklin on U. S. Route 33, and six miles from Spruce Knob.
Caves as unbelievably beautiful as the Luray Caverns of Virginia, where
the great council room of the Seneca tribe remains as it was in the day
of the redskins. There is even a legend about Snow Bird, the only
daughter of Bald Eagle and White Rock, his wife. Inside the cavern, if
you look carefully, there is to be seen the outline of the lovely face
of Snow Bird on the great stone wall. There are a Wigwam, and an
Iceberg, an Alligator, and the Golden Horseshoe and Balcony of the
Metropolitan, all in natural stone formation.

West Virginia has developed 84,186 acres in its state-park and forest
system. Sparkling rivers flow throughout the state. At the junction of
the Ohio and Kanawha Rivers where Daniel Boone once roamed there is a
monument commemorating the battle of the Revolution between colonial
troops and Indians. Here too are the graves of a woman scout, "Mad Anne"
Bailey, and a Shawnee chieftain, Cornstalk. There are hundreds of miles
of trails, safe underfoot, but flanked by as wild and rugged lands as
ever infested by the Indian.

VALLEY OF PARKS

If Dr. Walker, the English explorer, should return to the earth today
and visit the Big Sandy country near the point where he first entered
the state of Kentucky, he'd be amazed at the sight which would greet his
eyes. Cities have sprung up where once was wilderness. Yet one natural
beauty of the country remains unchanged: the great gorge made by Russell
Fork of Levisa Fork of the Big Sandy, breaking through the mountain at
an elevation of 2800 feet--The Breaks of Big Sandy. Here in the days of
the Civil War many thrilling episodes took place and through The Breaks
a Confederate regiment trekked back to Virginia leaving behind a string
of Democratic counties in its wake.