The following events happened on these dates in West Virginia history. To read more, go toe-WV: The West Virginia Encyclopedia at www.wvencyclopedia.org.
Nov. 22, 1910: Fire destroyed the academic building at Concord College. By the next morning, community leaders had arranged to teach the 300 students in rooms throughout the town of Athens.
Nov. 22, 1926: Selva Lewis “Lew” Burdette Jr. was born in Nitro. Burdette was an outstanding major league baseball player who spent most of his career with the Milwaukee Braves.
Nov. 23, 1962: Roman Catholic Bishop John Joseph Swint died. He was a great builder of religious institutions in the Diocese of Wheeling.
Nov. 24, 2008: Former Governor Cecil Underwood died in Charleston. Underwood, West Virginia’s 25th and 32nd governor, had the distinction of being the state’s youngest and oldest chief executive.
Nov. 24, 2015: For her accomplishments in the field of mathematics and science, Katherine Johnson received the Presidential Medal of Freedom from President Barack Obama. Johnson worked for NASA calculating trajectories for manned space flights.
Nov. 25, 1896: Athlete Clinton Cyrus Thomas was born in Greenup, Kentucky. He starred in the Negro Leagues in the days when major league baseball was segregated. Thomas settled in Charleston after his playing days and made a long career in West Virginia state government.
Nov. 26, 1952: A fire on the evening before Thanksgiving at the Huntington State Hospital killed 14 patients, with three more patients later dying from their injuries. Huntington State Hospital is known today as the Mildred Mitchell-Bateman Hospital.
Nov. 26, 1861: The Constitutional Convention of 1861–63 was convened in Wheeling. The convention provided the foundation for state government in preparation for statehood.
Nov. 27, 1848: African-American educator William H. Davis was born. As a teacher for Black children in Malden, his most famous student was Booker T. Washington. In 1888, Davis was nominated as an independent candidate for the gubernatorial election – to date, the only Black person so honored in West Virginia history.
Nov. 27, 1933: Daniel Boardman Purinton, a faculty member and president of West Virginia University, died. He was an early and strong supporter of co-education.
Nov. 28, 1864: In a local skirmish north of Moorefield, Rosser’s Confederate cavalry and McNeill’s Rangers rebuffed a raid by Union Col. R. E. Fleming and spared the South Branch Valley from destruction. The battlefields are part of the Middle South Branch Valley rural historic district.
