WVU Libraries

By Samatha Wade, WVRHC Graduate Assistant 

In trying to promote pieces of the West Virginia & Regional History Center’s collections, I began curating staff favorites to share. Part 1 of staff favorites included some of the staff’s responses and only a small portion of the WVRHC’s collections. The following is a continuation of histories from the WVRHC’s collections.

Deakins Surveying Compass – Catherine Rakowski, Research & Exhibition Specialist

The WVRHC has an eighteenth-century surveying compass used by Francis Deakins to survey the “Deakins Line,” a north-south line separating eastern Maryland from (West) Virginia in 1787-88.

Colonists began moving westward soon after their arrival on the east coast of North America. With this came boundary disputes between colonies and later states. To clearly define the boundary between Pennsylvania and Virginia, two surveyors were employed to find and mark this boundary. The result was the Mason-Dixon Line, named after the surveyors Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon. Even then, the issue was not completely resolved because Maryland’s boundary was also being disputed.

Francis Deakin was employed to survey the western boundary of Maryland. Unfortunately, it would later be determined that the Deakins line was inaccurate. Maryland’s western borders continued to be an issue with West Virginia after the Civil War and into the early 1900s. The Deakins Family Papers and Surveying Compass collection (A&M 0197) includes deeds, agreements, surveys, plats, surveyors’ field books, court papers, and letters that document the activities of Francis Deakins and his brother William.

Stick from the stretcher used to carry Stonewall Jackson – Jane LaBarbara, Head of Archives and Manuscripts

Another piece in WVRHC’s collections is a stick from the stretcher that was used to carry Thomas “Stonewall” Jackson, a Confederate general, when he was mortally wounded by his own men in 1863 (A&M 1561).

Jackson had taken a group of men to scout out a wooded area when they were mistaken as the enemy by a North Carolina regiment. The regiment opened fire, and Jackson was shot in an area around his left shoulder. He was carried from the field to a nearby plantation where he had his arm amputated. While recovering, Jackson came down with pneumonia and died on May 10, 1863. The stick is part of the Roy Bird Cook Collection (A&M 1561).

Cook was a pharmacist and local historian with a great interest in the Civil War. His collection includes correspondence and other materials relating to Jackson.

The Metropolitan Theatre, Morgantown, Records Cat Melillo, Archives Processing Assistant

The Metropolitan Theatre, Morgantown, Records (A&M 3254) contains ninety years of records documenting the history of the Metropolitan Theatre and other respected local arts institutions, including the Strand Theatre, Morgan Theatre, Morgantown Theatre Company, Morgantown Amusement Company, and the Westover Drive-In. Maybe the most interesting items from this collection are the early 20th century stage manager logbooks containing lists of which touring vaudeville acts performed there on each date. The titles and descriptions of the acts become less vaudeville and more burlesque sounding into the 1920s.

In the last Staff Favorites blog, one of the histories shared was about Russell L. Long, who had an interest and involvement in local vaudeville acts. He even got his start at the Dixy Theatre in Morgantown on High Street. The Dixy Theater seems to have been where Reiner & Core was located in the 1960s and what is now Almost Heaven Bar and Grill. The collection also has cool movie posters, such as one for a musical comedy Duck Soup from 1933, and 1970s 3-D glasses!