The Shack Neighborhood House serves the people of the once-thriving Appalachian coal mining community of Scotts Run, northwest of Morgantown, West Virginia. Founded by Mary E. Behner in the tradition of the settlement house movement, "The Shack" continues to serve their social, educational, recreational, economic, and health needs.
Sponsored by mission the First Presbyterian Church in Morgantown and the church's National Board of Missions, "The Shack" sought to meet the spiritual as well as the social and physical needs of coal miners and their families. During the Great Depression, Eleanor Roosevelt visited "The Shack" and the especially hard hit Scotts Run area. Nearly two-thirds of the area's residents were suffering in terrible poverty. There were 10,000 people and 22 different nationalities clustered on hills and near polluted creeks along the nine miles of eight communities.
Mary Behner, a 1928 College of Wooster graduate, was first given an abandoned schoolhouse in Stumptown and started a Sunday School and recreation there in November 1928. But soon children were coming to her without food and clothes. She expanded into social service. Hundreds attended her programs. She brought nearby West Virginia University students to teach. She started a library, charm school, choruses, sewing club, and the first integrated nursery school.
In 1932, she received from the coal company an abandoned company store which she named The Shack. The Quakers and other agencies handled relief programs from The Shack. She started the Uhyscool Club to encourage the first students to finish high school and college. The area was photographed by Lewis Hine, Ben Shahn and Walker Evans. The Shack was written up in the Christian Science Monitor and other publications. Behner left in 1937 to be married. Her diaries and photos were donated to the West Virginia Division of Culture and History.
A new Shack building was finished in 1938 west of the original site and a third building down the same Route 7 which exists today. On May 6, 2008, an historical marker was placed near the original site, along a now widened Route 7 in Pursglove. [1] Her daughter, Bettijane Christopher Burger, of Charleston, WV, petitioned the state for the marker. Most of the mines are closed and the hills returned to grassy slopes.
In 2006, The Shack received an outreach grant from the Mollohan Foundation for the Appalachian Rags to Rugs Program. [2] As of 2012, The Shack continues to provide "a safe, secure place for families and children to come and play. We attempt to provide services for children throughout their entire school careers, during the entire year," [3] including preschool, after school programs, and swimming lessons. [4]
Even though the religious mission of "The Shack" ended when the church planted there by the Presbyterian Church (USA) had closed, it continued to operate with support from the PC(USA), other denominations, the United Way, and generous donors. Their address is Box 600, Pursglove, WV 26546-0600.
Morgantown is a city in and the county seat of Monongalia County, West Virginia, United States, situated along the Monongahela River. The most populous city in North Central West Virginia and the fourth-most populous city in the state, Morgantown is best known as the home of West Virginia University. The population was 30,347 at the 2020 census. The city serves as the anchor of the Morgantown metropolitan area, which had a population of 138,176 in 2020.
Cecil Harland Underwood was an American Republican Party politician from West Virginia, known for the length of his career.
The University of Pikeville (UPIKE) is a private university affiliated with the Presbyterian Church (USA) and located in Pikeville, Kentucky. It was founded in 1889 by the Presbyterian Church and is located on a 25-acre (10 ha) campus on a hillside overlooking downtown Pikeville.
Nestled in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, Burton is an unincorporated community in Wetzel County, West Virginia, United States, located on a stretch of highway where both WV Route 7 and US Route 250 join for a few short miles between Cottontown and Hundred. These two roads are responsible for the majority of traffic to and from the area and provide important connections to New Martinsville to the west ; Fairmont to the southeast ; Morgantown, to the west ; and Moundsville to the northeast. Other important connections include WV Route 69 North into Pennsylvania, where it becomes PA Route 18 and leads towards Waynesburg and beyond to Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh International Airport, is the nearest intercontinental airport, while Burton is also served by a smaller regional airport, Morgantown Municipal Airport.
Denise Giardina is an American novelist. Her book Storming Heaven was a Discovery Selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club and received the 1987 W. D. Weatherford Award for the best published work about the Appalachian South. The Unquiet Earth received an American Book Award and the Lillian Smith Book Award for fiction. Her 1998 novel Saints and Villains was awarded the Boston Book Review fiction prize and was semifinalist for the International Dublin Literary Award. Giardina is an ordained Episcopal Church deacon, a community activist, and a former candidate for governor of West Virginia.
Morgantown High School is a public high school in Morgantown, West Virginia, United States. It is one of three secondary schools in the Monongalia County School District. Athletic teams compete as the Morgantown Mohigans in the West Virginia Secondary School Activities Commission as a member of the Ohio Valley Athletic Conference.
Irene McKinney was an American poet and editor, and served as the Poet Laureate of the state of West Virginia from her appointment by Governor Gaston Caperton in January 1994 until her death.
Charlotte Jean Pritt is an American educator, businesswoman, and politician in the U.S. state of West Virginia. From 1984 to 1988, she served in the West Virginia House of Delegates, representing Kanawha County. From 1988 to 1992, she served in the West Virginia State Senate. She ran unsuccessfully for West Virginia governor in 1992, 1996 and 2016 and for West Virginia Secretary of State in 2000.
The Mountain Parkway Byway and Mountain Parkway Backway are two routes in northern Webster County, West Virginia. The Byway is a state-designated scenic byway which follows West Virginia Route 20 for 9.8 miles (15.8 km), traversing the headwaters of several mountain streams including the Right Fork Little Kanawha River, Jerry Run, and the Left and Laurel Forks of Holly River. The Backway explores backroads in the same area, is 32 miles (51 km) long, and follows stretches of the Right Fork Little Kanawha River and Left Fork Holly River for portions of its route.
Pursglove is an unincorporated community in Monongalia County, West Virginia, United States and one of the communities that make up the Scotts Run region. Pursglove is located on U.S. Route 19, 4.5 miles (7.2 km) northwest of downtown Morgantown. Pursglove has a post office with ZIP code 26546.
The Downtown Morgantown Historic District is a federally designated historic district in Morgantown, Monongalia County, West Virginia. The district, encompassing approximately 75 acres, has 122 contributing buildings and 2 contributing sites including commercial and public buildings, residences, and churches. The district has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since May 2, 1996. Ten of the contributing buildings are listed separately on the National Register of Historic Places. Significant structures located within the historic district are the Monongalia County Courthouse, the Metropolitan Theater, and the Old Morgantown Post Office.
Blanche Lazzell was an American painter, printmaker and designer. Known especially for her white-line woodcuts, she was an early modernist American artist, bringing elements of Cubism and abstraction into her art.
The Appalachian region and its people have historically been stereotyped by observers, with the basic perceptions of Appalachians painting them as backwards, rural, and anti-progressive. These widespread, limiting views of Appalachia and its people began to develop in the post-Civil War; Those who "discovered" Appalachia found it to be a very strange environment, and depicted its "otherness" in their writing. These depictions have persisted and are still present in common understandings of Appalachia today, with a particular increase of stereotypical imagery during the late 1950s and early 1960s in sitcoms. Common Appalachian stereotypes include those concerning economics, appearance, and the caricature of the "hillbilly."
Scotts Run is a geographical division of the Cass District in Monongalia County, West Virginia, United States. Currently, it encompasses thirteen small, unincorporated communities. Located a few miles from Morgantown, this area's predominant industry in the early twentieth century was coal mining and production. Scotts Run became well known nationally during the years of the Great Depression, when photographers and the relief efforts of First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt publicized the impoverished conditions faced by the community. Since the decline in the coal industry in the area, Scotts Run's population has rapidly decreased. However, the current community is active in revitalization efforts to promote new businesses and heritage tourism.
Lee Maynard was an American novelist, short story writer, and journalist born in the small town of Crum, West Virginia.
Milan Puskar Health Right is a free clinic that provides health and dental care to the uninsured and underinsured at no cost in the city of Morgantown, and Marion, Monongalia, Taylor and Preston counties in West Virginia. Founded in 1984, it accommodates nearly 4,000 patients and 22,000 patient visits annually.
Chelsea Jean Malone is an American beauty pageant titleholder from Morgantown, West Virginia, who was crowned Miss West Virginia 2015. She competed for the Miss America 2016 title in September 2015 and placed in the Top 15.
Jamie Darrell Lester is an American artist best known for creating ceramic, bronze, and steel sculptures that “focus on the human figure combined with imagery derived primarily from life in Appalachia, including birds, architecture, and landscape.” Lester also creates paintings, digital art, and music.
Caroline "Carrie" M. Williams was an African-American educator in the U.S. state of West Virginia. Williams fought and won a significant 1898 civil rights case, Williams v. Board of Education of Fairfax District, which upheld West Virginia's law requiring equal school terms, and established equal pay for teachers regardless of their race.
