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Robert "Rob" Whetsell will be the speaker for our second Elkins History Talk this coming Wednesday at Kump Education Center. Once again, we will gather and hear what Rob has to say about "The Early History of Elkins" on Oct. 21 at 7 p.m. in the Optimum Learning Lab located near the garage door behind Kump House at 401 S. Randolph Avenue.
Rob Whetsell's book, titled “Elkins, West Virginia: The Metropolis Revisited” (1994) was reminiscent of an earlier (1906) book designed to promote Elkins and attract new businesses to this small city where the Davis/Elkins family built the West Virginia Central and Pittsburgh Railroad. Whetsell's Metropolis Revisited was published four years after the Elkins Centennial in 1990, and I remember it as one of the best ways I could learn about Elkins history when my husband, Joe, and I returned here in 1996.
Rob's book includes a wonderful collection of early photographs and information from personal interviews with members of prominent local families. Rob, himself, is a member of the prominent Whetsell family that has a long and active history in West Virginia. Clay Whetsell's name is the one I remember hearing most in my childhood because he was involved in many philanthropic projects with my parents. Family loyalty and community engagement are important aspects of Elkins culture included in Metropolis Revisited.
The early education of our speaker was local. He was a product of Randolph County Public Schools and a graduate from Elkins High School. He went to Davis & Elkins College where he majored in history and served as an archivist in the college library. He helped to start organizing the Jim Comstock Collection and worked on other historical documents at D&E. After Rob earned a master's degree in history from West Virginia University. He went to Richmond, Virginia and worked in the Richmond Museum of Fine Arts where he learned about the works of many great artists in the collection.
Rob has been an active member of several history organizations working as a volunteer on various preservation projects. He assisted the Elkins Historical Landmarks to put Elkins on the Nation of Register of Historic Places. Don Rice and Rob Whetsell helped the Randolph County Historical Society to learn more about the Elkins '89ers who organized to get Elkins incorporated as a city in West Virginia. Rob worked with Citizens for Historic Opportunities in Preservation to save the Darden Mill and First Ward School building.
Rob served on various interpretive committees for the Appalachian Forest National Heritage Area [AFNHA] helping to craft original planning documents. His work as a researcher and historian made him a valuable resource regarding the history of Elkins, logging, railroads, Civilian Conservation Corps, and WWII Maneuvers at Seneca Rocks. The focus of Rob's talk next Wednesday will be the Elkins fire of 1897 and the ways it changed city ordinances for construction.