Van Camp
Wetzel County, West Virginia
A 1930-1960 resident of the old Van Camp area of western Wetzel County, West Virginia, I returned to find the old community had all but vanished.
I asked a senior resident, "Do you know where the old Van Camp school was located?"
"Van Camp school? What school did you say? A school here? No, there are schools in Paden City and New Martinsville." He proceeded to give me directions to both cities assuring me of the absence of schools nearby.
A middle aged resident responded to the same question, "Van Camp? Never heard of it. Are you sure you are in the right place, fellow?" He appeared interested in refocusing my apparent confusion by humouring me asking, "It’s a nice day, isn’t it?"
"Yes," I replied somewhat dazed. "A very nice day."
Hesitantly I pursued my quest for the vanishing Van Camp, its school, post office, church and scores of people who once lived here. At best responses were doubtfully positive, not certain.
"Well, sir, I remember some old man selling property here many years ago. Some of these here folks bought their land from an old Van Camp fellow," replied some residents of the present Van Camp area, not at all confident of their information. To him it was all so long ago and not very important anyway.
"Oh! Yes! I remember an old Van Camp. Crazy he was! Died many years ago. Don’t really know what happened to Van Camp," was a typical response received sadly since I was very fond of these old people now only a part of history of which most present Van Camp residents were unaware.
"Say, could you tell me if an old church stood in this area somewhere?" I wistfully asked a lady gardener.
"Do you mean the Pleasant Valley church up the road toward New Martinsville? That’s the only church out here," was the weed picker’s informative reply.
"Thank you. I’ll be on my way," I responded extremely disappointed that the old church was not fondly remembered by one who lived near where it stood.
"Oh! Mister," she returned as I began to drive away, "Wait a minute. There is an old cemetery over there. Perhaps a church may have stood near the cemetery. Yes, that may be where your Van Camp church was, Mister."
Her reply was somewhat apologetic for not knowing of the Van Camp church in her modern community on Route 180 about three miles from New Martinsville. A garden full of weeds lay before her to which she returned perhaps thinking, "Where is that fellow from? What’s he all about? A Van Camp church! What kind of a church is that? I do declare! Maybe he is in the wrong place. I’ll bet he means the Pleasant Valley church up yonder." Perhaps she stopped, leaning on her hoe handle as she thought, "Do you suppose that old church stood up there on the bank above the highway and below the cemetery? I’ll have to look someday. It’s a hot day and this garden is so blasted weedy."
Trying to engage an adolescent boy in conversation I commented, "You’ve got a nice bike there."
To this compliment there was questioning silence in an effort to ignore a stranger. Apparently his "better self"surfaced and in a friendly manner he reduced his speed, put on his breaks, planted his right foot firmly on the blacktop and stared at me. The bike comment seeming useless in getting a response, I questioned further.
"Do you live near here?" I asked knowing he probably did but hoping this was a question that would engage him in further inquiry.
"Right over there." He pointed to a modern home whose yard was manicured perfectly with a lovely driveway where formerly a Van Camp farm stretched up and down Pleasant Valley.
"Have you seen a freight train go by lately?" I asked totally in jest knowing that many years ago the Clarksburg Northern railroad line crossed his now level yard full of evergreens and lush grass. As he looked at me, his right foot was lifted abruptly, applied to the peddle, and off he went as though he had never stopped.
"What nonsense," he must have thought, "a railroad in my yard out here in the country. Did that old man mean a toy train? I used to play with a toy model train in my front yard."
Had Van Camp vanished? Was a community called Van Camp once located here? Thinking reality had dissolved into a dream, I drove to the comfort of McDonalds just south of Northview Cemetery in New Martinsville where I collected my thoughts and recovered my Van Camp pride.
Back in the world again after a McDonalds coffee, I gathered the courage to return to Van Camp, a return trip of about a mile down the Ohio River then left to the summit of New Martinsville Hill which descended into Pleasant Valley. I determined if no one knew about the former community that I would just sit in the shade of the gigantic hickory tree below the old church of my childhood and remember as much of the community as I could.
It wasn’t there. What happened to the huge hickory tree which shaded the level spot below the church? At least three feet in diameter the tree would always be there! But it had vanished too. In search of the shade of an immense walnut tree which grew between the church and a coal house used for the church fuel storage, I trudged up the steep bank to where the Van Camp church stood. Nearly out of breath I sought the shade of that beautiful, towering walnut. Would you believe it? Not even a stump remained and the coal house hadn’t the slightest remnant. Looking down the bank I had just scaled, I stained to see again the cool deep water hole where we swam skinny-dip style(so close the church) only to see cars moving rapidly on a modern highway, Route 180. The entire stream had been relocated.
Again trying hard to recall what I had once known, my spirit sank. Sadly looking past the imaginary spreading walnut shade, I saw the Van Camp cemetery where many of my forebearers were buried. At last I had found a memorial, a place which was familiar after many years. Someone had erected a lovely white woven wire fence around the sacred ground which was actually better kept than when I was a child. Someone remembered!
After a touring this nostalgic old country cemetery and viewing with respect and pathos the resting places of those I knew many years ago, I came upon the markers of those of whom as a boy I had only heard by way of my many relatives living in this community. There were grave sites of pioneer Van Camps who had claimed land in this area in the early 1800's. According to my memory from childhood, they cleared their thousand acres, raised sheep, and sold some of their land as the need arose. This became Van Camp, Virginia, a part of Tyler County until 1863 when West Virginia became a state and Wetzel County was formed.
A level spot just below the cemetery marked the foundation of the Methodist Episcopal Church built about 1900 on land donated by the Van Camp family. Years before the church building, pioneers had met in a log house to worship. Ministers from nearby Paden City and New Martinsville came to conduct meetings and perform Chrisitian ceremonies in the Van Camp home. Across the highway from the cemetery and church was the Van Camp home built about 1900 on the site of the log house. A raised place behind the present house, now worn by time and neglect, marked the fireplace location of the first structure dating back to the early 1800's. The former log house was doubtless the Post Office for Van Camp, Virginia. This was the community’s center. From here brothers and sisters left to build their own homes, rear their families, and broaden the community up Pleasant Valley to Cider Run and down the valley beyond the Tyler County line.
Long before the church was built, a school was erected on land donated by a Van Camp family midway down Pleasant Valley between Cider Run and the Tyler County line. School was held from the 1870's until nearly 1920. The Clarksburg Northern Railroad on its circumlocutious path from New Martinsville to Clarksburg crossed a trestle spanning Pleasant Valley Creek near the school.
From this mid nineteenth century community valiant men volunteered to fight for the Union during the War Between the States. My great grandfather returned from the Civil War in 1865 to rear a large family at the center of the Van Camp community.
Satisfied that Van Camp was still in existence even if present inhabitants were unaware of it, I returned to my home near Cincinnati. Days later to reinforce the Van Camp story I opened my West Virginia County Maps to Wetzel County. To my pleasant surprise the Van Camp community was identified in Wetzel County. May it always be so.
Hopefully, this once viable Appalachian community will be designated appropriately so that present and future residents will recall with pride their heritage in Van Camp. Before the curtain falls on this rustic, pioneer West Virginia scene, I respectfully suggest that it be marked historically as "Van Camp" on modern Highway 180 where the hickory’s shade and the swimming hole used to be, near where the church once stood, and where the Van Camp cemetery quietly graces the West Virginia hills of Wetzel County.
Submited by:
4864 Tealtown Road
Milford, Ohio 45150