July 15, 1886: Congressman Cleveland Monroe “Cleve” Bailey was born on a farm in Pleasants County. He represented West Virginia’s third congressional district for eight terms in the U.S. House of Representatives, 1945–47 and 1949–63.
July 15, 1915: The West Virginia Folklore Society was founded in Morgantown by John Harrington Cox, Robert Allen Armstrong and Walter Barnes.
July 15, 1988: Interstate 64 was completed when the final section between Sam Black Church and the West Virginia Turnpike was opened to traffic.
July 16, 1791: Adam Stephen, a physician and Revolutionary War general often credited as the founder of Martinsburg, died at his home in that city.
July 16, 1869: Philanthropist Michael Late Benedum was born in Bridgeport. He made a fortune in the oil and gas business but is best remembered for establishing the Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation.
July 16, 1877: The first nationwide labor strike in U.S. history began in Martinsburg, after the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad cut worker’s wages. Federal troops soon put down the violence in Martinsburg, but the strike continued across the country for another 52 days.
July 17, 1775: Two months after the Revolutionary War started, Hugh Stephenson’s 98-man rifle company left Shepherdstown, marched 600 miles in 24 daysand arrived in Cambridge to help defend Massachusetts.
July 17, 1861: The Battle of Scary Creek took place in Putnam County. It was one of the earliest battles of the war and one of the first Confederate victories.
July 17, 1914: Singer Eleanor Steber was born in Wheeling.She made her debut with the Metropolitan Opera in 1940.
July 17, 1921: Marcenia “Toni” Stone was born in Bluefield. She was the first woman to play professional baseball for a previously all-male team. In 1953, she joined the Indianapolis Clowns of the old Negro American League, replacing the team’s second baseman, Hank Aaron, who had just joined the National League’s Milwaukee Braves.
July 17, 1922: The Cliftonville Mine Battle took place east of Wellsburg, Brooke County. The gun battle between striking miners and sheriff’s forces left at least nine people dead.
July 18, 1776: Methodist bishop Francis Asbury first set foot in present West Virginia outside of Berkeley Springs. He worked extensively in what is now the Eastern Panhandle, preaching and lecturing almost every day, before continuing farther into western Virginia.
July 18, 1865: Samuel Cabell was murdered at his Institute plantation by either pro-Union or pro-Confederate sympathizers, depending on the source. His widow and mother of his children, Mary Barnes Cabell, who he had previously enslaved, inherited all his property, including the land on which today’s West Virginia State University was founded in 1892.
July 18, 1893: Spencer State Hospital opened. With its connected brick buildings, a quarter-mile in length, the hospital was sometimes referred to as the longest continuous brick building in America. It remained in operation until June 1989.
July 19, 1850: Pope Pius IX established the Diocese of Wheeling, naming Richard V. Whelan as its first bishop.
July 19, 1863: A Confederate raid led by Gen. John Morgan came to an end on Buffington Island, near Ravenswood.The Confederates were overtaken by federal troops, local militia and three U.S. Navy gunboats.
July 19, 1946: Author Stephen Coonts was born in Morgantown. After graduating from West Virginia University and serving in the navy during the Vietnam War, Coonts became a best-selling action and adventure novelist with the 1986 publication of Flight of the Intruder.
July 19, 1952: Novelist Jayne Anne Phillips was born in Buckhannon. After graduating from West Virginia University, her short stories and novels began receiving wide recognition. In 2024, she was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction for her 2023 novel Night Watch, about a mother and daughter in West Virginia after the Civil War.
July 20, 2010: Carte Goodwin became the nation’s youngest sitting senator. Goodwin was appointed to fill Robert C. Byrd’s seat in the U.S. Senate following Byrd’s death.
July 21, 1924: Don Knotts was born in Morgantown. The comedy legend will be forever remembered for portraying Barney Fife on The Andy GriffithShow.