Charleston WV – The following events happened on these dates in West Virginia history.
To read more, go to e-WV: The West Virginia Encyclopedia at www.wvencyclopedia.org.
Feb. 20, 1875: The legislature approved a bill to move the state capital back to Wheeling.
Feb. 20, 1995: The legislature voted to make the Golden Delicious apple the official state
fruit.
Feb. 21, 1895: Bluefield Colored Institute was established by the legislature to prepare
Black West Virginians for the teaching profession. After several name changes, the school
became Bluefield State College in 1943 and achieved university status in 2022.
Feb. 21, 1913: Workers’ compensation passed the legislature, modeled on the German
system Governor Hatfield had studied in the Ruhr Valley coalfields.
Feb. 21, 1940: Former Governor Gaston Caperton was born in Charleston. Caperton
defeated incumbent Arch Moore to become the state’s 31 st governor.
Feb. 22, 1927: Longtime Agriculture Commissioner Gus R. Douglass was born in Mason
County. Douglass, a Democrat, was first elected commissioner in 1964. Reelected nine times,
Douglass was the longest serving agricultural commissioner in the country.
Feb. 22, 2018: 33,000 schoolteachers and service personnel from all 55 counties walked
off the job over wages and health benefits. The strike drew national attention, and teachers in
five other states organized work stoppages.
Feb. 23, 1867: Lincoln County was formed from Boone, Cabell, Kanawha and Putnam
counties. The county was named for Abraham Lincoln.
Feb. 23, 1905: The first USS West Virginia was commissioned. The armored cruiser was
renamed the USS Huntington in 1916 to allow the transfer of the original name to a newly
authorized battleship.
Feb. 23, 1945: Harrison County native “Woody” Williams distinguished himself during
the Battle of Iwo Jima by neutralizing seven concrete pillboxes. This act of heroism earned
Williams the Medal of Honor.
Feb. 24, 1918: Judge Kenneth Keller “K. K.” Hall was born at Greenview, Boone
County. Hall spent 47 years on the state and federal benches.
Feb. 24, 1928: Doctor Donald L. Rasmussen was born in Colorado. After coming to
work at Miners Memorial Hospital in Beckley, he became a driving force in the passage of state
and federal black lung legislation.
Feb. 25, 1903: An armed posse ambushed striking miners in their homes in the village of
Stanaford near Beckley. Six miners were killed; federal judge B. F. Keller exonerated the posse.
Feb. 25, 1911: Newspaperman Jim Comstock was born in Richwood. In 1957, he
founded the West Virginia Hillbilly, a weekly newspaper that circulated inside and outside the
state.
Feb. 26, 1869: The legislature approved a bill moving the state capital to Charleston.
Feb. 26, 1972: One of the country’s worst mining-related disasters occurred on Buffalo
Creek in Logan County. A coal waste dam collapsed, sending 132 million gallons of water, coal
refuse and silt into the valley. In the end, 125 people, including entire families, were killed, and
1,000 people were injured.
Feb. 26, 2022: Fire destroyed the historic administration building of the West Virginia
Schools for the Deaf and the Blind in Romney.