THURMOND, WV (LOOTPRESS) – Deep in the New River Gorge sits the quiet railroad town of Thurmond. Once home to nearly 400 residents, only five people now live in West Virginia’s smallest municipality. One former resident recently spoke with LOOTPRESS about her time growing up in Thurmond.
Marilyn Kelly-Brown was born in Thurmond in 1951, and she says she would not have wanted to be raised anywhere else. “This was just a good place to grow up in, we entertained ourselves, we enjoyed ourselves down here, we played tag, hide and seek,” Brown said.
She says she grew to love the railroad because of her father James Kelly who worked in the roundhouse for the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway for 33 years in Thurmond. The fondest memory she has of her father’s years on the railroad is when he was one of the men they called to help clean up derailments on New River. “There was a train derailment and they called him to come to help clean it up as cars had gone down in the river not too far from Beury,” Brown stated. “He was the only one in the area that could operate certain pieces of machinery.”
While there were no iPhones or gaming systems around while she was growing up, Brown says she and her friends created their own fun, even if it landed them in some trouble sometimes. Brown says around the early 1960s a passenger train derailed just before Thurmond, and crews brought the derailed passenger cars and parked them in Thurmond.
Brown and her friends could not resist the urge so they all decided to go inside the passenger cars and explore while no one was looking. She says the coaling tower, built in 1922 by Fairbanks Morse that loaded up steam locomotives with coal as they continued their journey along New River, was also another place in Thurmond she would find fun.
Brown would attempt to climb up the stairs, which were in much better shape in the 1950s compared to today, to the top of the tower and play with the large spotlights on top.
Thurmond was once a major railroad town and the most profitable stop along the C&O Railway with regard to freight revenue. Thousands of passengers also rolled through the Thurmond Depot each year. With the increase of people and commerce, it also attracted those up to no good.
When Confederate Captain W.D. Thurmond acquired the land in 1873 for the payment of a surveying job, one of his main goals for a town along this tract of land at New River was one of moral and Christian practices. Thurmond prohibited alcohol, gambling, and prostitution within town limits.
Across the river from Thurmond, a man by the name of Thomas G. McKell sought to capitalize off of the activities Thurmond outlawed. McKell constructed a large hotel just across the river from the depot. It was named the Dun Glen and soon thousands from all over were flocking to the “Little Vegas.” Captain Thurmond was successful in stopping alcohol, gambling, and prostitution at first, but McKell stretched the town limits of Glen Jean six miles away down to the Dun Glen. Thurmond no longer had power on the south side of the New River.
The Dun Glen Hotel, home to the longest-running poker game in history, was completely destroyed in a fire in 1930.
Brown was born after the major hustle and bustle days of Thurmond including all of the mischief that occurred on the south side. She says her time in Thurmond was peaceful. “Nobody bothered us, we just had a great time here, we all had fun and were friends with each other, they were good people [in Thurmond],” Brown explained. “If we were doing something we shouldn’t be doing, the neighbors would come and get us.”
Thurmond was and still is a helping community, according to Brown. She can recall citizens of Thurmond assisting Beury’s last resident, Melcenia Fields, with groceries and other essential items. Beury was a once-booming mining town along New River. Fields made her home in the abandoned Beury mansion which is three miles downriver from Thurmond. Fields would walk to Pugh’s Grocery just across the river from Thurmond to gather groceries and other items she needed.
Thurmond residents even offered to give Fields a ride to her home, but she always chose to walk. She was not a people person and loved her home in Beury and did not want to move. Brown says once the mansion become too dangerous to live in, her neighbors in Thurmond went and built Fields a shack to live in. Fields lived there until her death in the 1980s when she was discovered by railroad workers.
Marilyn and her family moved to the plateau in Oak Hill once the National Park Service began its effort to preserve the town for future generations to explore. Brown says she is happy to have so much of her birthplace preserved. “I’m so happy really, that they got this because I could come back and look at it every time I want to.”
In the photo attached above, Brown is sitting on the porch of the “Marilyn Brown House,” where she lived during some of her time in Thurmond. She says she lived in multiple different homes in the town as the years progressed, but her heart always takes her to the little green and white house along the railroad tracks.
Moving to Oak Hill was not an easy task, and it was a big change, says Brown. “The trains did not bother me in Thurmond, but the cars in Oak Hill did for a while,” Brown said jokingly. She says she was so used to the quietness and she never did hear the sound of a car too much in Thurmond.
When she is able, Brown ventures down to Thurmond and takes a seat on her old porch, and reminisces on the days gone by.
Most of the town is now owned by the NPS and is part of the New River Gorge National Park & Preserve. The Thurmond Depot was restored in the 1990s and serves as a seasonal visitor center in the summer.
