Transcript Ancestry and Traditions of Clintwood, VA

Ancestry, Traditions,
and Occupations
of Clintwood, VA
By: Emili Blevins
Fall 2006 Appalachian History
© 2007 A. Linwood Holton Governor’s School
The first known permanent settlers…
• In 1829, John Mullins, a man from North Carolina, found
a home near the present day Main Street of Clintwood,
where the former Dickenson County Hospital was
located. A cabin, which had been built earlier and
abandoned, was discovered by Mullins, so he made it
his home. Leaving his three children at the cabin,
Mullins went back to North Carolina to get the rest of his
family and items, along with his father John Mullins, Sr.
• John Mullins stayed in Clintwood, where he raised a
large family. His children got married and settled around
the same area. He, along with many of his sons-in-law
owned most of the area of Clintwood and its surrounding
areas.
• The Mullins family remains one of the largest families of
the Clintwood area.
This is a historical marker that stands in Clintwood
telling about John Mullins settling here and his
father, John Mullins, Sr.
This is a monument that is mounted on the front of the
Dickenson County Court House. It tells about John
Mullins settling here and his father being the only
Revolutionary War Soldier buried in Dickenson County.
Clintwood gets its name…
•
•
•
•
Dickenson County was established in
1880.
The county seat was located on McClure
River, in a place called Ervinton. People
on the other end of the county weren’t
pleased with the location of their county
seat.
In 1882, the General Assembly voted to
relocate the county seat to Holly Creek,
the former name for Clintwood.
Henry Clinton Wood, a man from Scott
County, Virginia, was an acting member
on the Virginia Senate. He was often
called “Clint Wood”. Since the
honorable Wood helped the county seat
to be relocated, John P. Chase, the
chosen representative of Dickenson
County, decided to name the town
Clintwood.
This is a historical marker that tells about the
county seat being moved from Ervinton (which
is spelled Ervington) to Clintwood, which was
originally named Holly Creek. This marker can
be seen when first entering Clintwood.
Traditions of Clintwood
• Attending church
• Growing tobacco
• Quilting
• Farming
• Working in hay fields
• Attending school
Attending Church…
• Going to church has always been a tradition of people
living in the Clintwood area.
• No other county in Virginia has a deeper religious feeling
and belief in God than Dickenson County.
• Baptist was the most common type of religion for many
years, but other types of religion started emerging later.
• There were many churches built in the area to hold
church sermons for all of the different kinds of religions
of people.
• If a church hadn’t been built, preachers went around to
homes and preached to the people.
Example of a Freewill Baptist Church
-Valley View Freewill Baptist Church• I, personally, have attended this church for almost 18
years. My parents have taken me there ever since I was
born.
• The church was founded on July 14, 1914 near Yates
Gap in Clintwood, Virginia. It is located on the western
part of the town.
• The church always has and continues to serve the
spiritual needs of the community.
• It was established by Reverend S.M. McFall, Reverend
J.G. Kenady, Reverend A.J. Honeycutt, and L.M.
Vanover.
• The present day preacher is Lynn Vanover.
This is the present-day
Valley View Freewill Baptist Church.
Here is a picture of the former Dickenson
County Memorial and Industrial High School
located in Clintwood. It serves today as the
annex section of Clintwood High School. It
was built in 1921-1922.
Major Occupations
of Clintwood
• Banking
• Lumbering
• Coal Mining
• Drilling for Natural
Gas
• Owning General
Stores
Owning Stores
• Mining and lumbering companies started to come into
the Clintwood area. A type of “company store” was the
first type of building built to sell merchandise to the
employees of these mining and lumbering companies.
• Improvement in transportation helped to bring more
merchandise to the stores.
• Groceries and related items are examples of the first few
things that were brought into these stores. As
transportation started to progress, hardware and
furniture were easier to get to the stores for them to sell.
Some of the stores had clothing and other notions.
• Drugstores, or pharmacies, handled all of the medicine,
but most of the stores around the county carried a stock
of patent medicines.
Here is a picture of a store that still looks the same as it did in 1955. It is
located on Darwin, about 8 miles from the town of Clintwood. It was one of
the first “company stores” to be built to provide items to the people
surrounding the area. Stanley’s General Store is still operating today.
This is the
present court
house located
in Clintwood,
VA. It is the
third court
house that has
been built to
represent the
Dickenson
County area. It
is the
remodeled
version of the
second court
house. It was
remodeled in
1953 and still
serves the
county today.
Works Cited
Documenting the American South. 25 November 2006. University Library, The
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. 25 November 2006
<http://docsouth.unc.edu/fpn/wood/illustr6.html>.
Meet Virginia’s Baby, A Pictorial History of Dickenson County, VA. Clintwood:
Diamond Jubilee, 1955.
Valley View Freewill Baptist Church. Currently working 2006. Valley View
Freewill Baptist Church Homepage. 25 November 2006
<http://www.valleyviewfwbchurch.com/>.