Railroad trestle built by the Virginian Railway over Winding Gulf Creek between Winding Gulf and Hotcoal. This trestle was probably built in the early 1920s to replace a wooden one. The dirt road beneath is actually the old railbed of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway Winding Gulf Subdivsion. (April 2007 photo)
Another ex-Virginian trestle, this one with a tunnel at the end of it. This section of Winding Gulf Creek hollow is called "The Loop," and it was a system of tunnels and trestles as the Virginian climbed out of the Winding Gulf Creek watershed and the C&O descended down into it. (April 2007 photo)
Ruins of the Gulf Bank, closed in 1914 (when it moved to Beckley and became the Beckley National Bank), at the coal town of Hotcoal, WV (originally named Patterson). The historic ruin was removed during abandoned mine reclamation in the area. Hotcoal mine and camp, built in 1911, were owned by Major Tams' Gulf Smokeless Coal Co. The operation played out in 1939, and the town was deserted. Today Hotcoal is only accessable by foot, ATV, or an exceptionally sturdy 4X4 truck, although one could ride a N-S coal train and jump off in Hotcoal (not recomended). (October 1998 photo)
Big Stick, WV was a mining community owned by the Pemberton Coal and Coke Co. Later Lillybrook Coal Co. operated the mine. There were schools for white and black kids. The mines closed in 1951, and the community was gradually abandoned throughout the 1950s, with the last familiy moving out in 1960. Around this time photographer Earl Palmer took this picture of the few company houses remaining in the abandoned coal camp of Big Stick. (courtesy of Virginia Tech Imagebase)
Today these tipple foundations are some of the only evidence of the mining camp named Big Stick. (January 2002 photo)
Headhouse foundations at Woodbay. This was a mining camp built by the Bailey-Wood Coal Co. in 1911, and was later a concern of the C.H. Mead Coal Co. The mine closed in the 1940s and the town was abandoned and torn down. Today Woodbay has one resident living in a single wide mobile home next to the refuse pile. (January 2002 photo)
The Norfolk-Southern track looking toward Woodbay. (November 1997 photo)
Ury, WV a.k.a. "Cooktown." This wasn't a coal camp so much as a town with a few stores for the miners and their families. (November 1997 photo)
When I was waiting for this N-S coal train to pass at the foot of Tams Mountain in December 1997, it never occured to me that this would be the last coal train I would ever see in the Main Gulf. But it was, and the day is coming when the last coal train will take the last load of smokeless coal out from the Winding Gulf Field. (December 1997 photo)