Morgantown Magazine August/September 2016 by Morgantown Magazine

USER FEE UPDATE

Morgantown enjoyed unprecedented repaving this summer with user fee funds.

CHASING R1

WVU was recently recognized as a top research university. We break it down.

HIGH HOPES FOR HEMP

Could Cannabis sativa—hemp— become West Virginia’s new cash crop?

From the history of the Mountaineer to where you can spend your Mountie Bounty, check out this guide to all things WVU.

volume 5

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issue 6

PUBLISHED BY

New South Media, Inc.

709 Beechurst Avenue, Suite 14A, Morgantown, WV 26505

EDITORIAL DIRECTOR

Nikki Bowman, nikki@newsouthmediainc.com EDITOR

Katie Griffith, katie@newsouthmediainc.com DESIGNER

Becky Moore, becky@newsouthmediainc.com ASSOCIATE EDITORS

Mary Wade Burnside, marywade@newsouthmediainc.com Zack Harold, zack@newsouthmediainc.com Pam Kasey, pam@newsouthmediainc.com OPERATIONS MANAGER

Sarah Shaffer, sarah@newsouthmediainc.com WEB & SOCIAL MEDIA MANAGER

Kassi Roberts, kassi@newsouthmediainc.com PHOTOGRAPHER

Carla Witt Ford, carla@newsouthmediainc.com INTERNS

Cami Coulter, Johnna Herbig, Alison Kaiser, Cody Roane, Jennifer Skinner ADVERTISING & MARKETING MANAGER

Bekah Call, bekah@newsouthmediainc.com

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MORGA NTOW N is published by New South Media, Inc. Copyright: New South Media, Inc. Reproduction in part or whole is strictly prohibited without the express written permission of the publisher. © N EW SOU T H M EDI A, I NC. A LL R IGH TS R ESERV ED

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

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e usually associate January with new beginnings and life changes. In Morgantown though that time is better typified by busy, bustling August. The eighth month ends vacations, starts new school years, and jump-starts business for many local shops that depend heavily on our university students. In this year’s back-to-school issue, we take a look at some of those changes and more. Writer Zack Harold introduces us to a WVU graduate student’s work to further what might be the state’s next big industry—hemp— on page 46. On page 54, Pam Kasey considers the implications of WVU’s status as a top research university. On page 59, she also looks at a new recovery program that the university hopes will aid students struggling with addiction. Lighter changes include a beloved local winery’s move into distilling whiskey (page 15), PRT upgrades (page 22), and the installation of a new dean at the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences (page 14). For New South Media and Morgantown magazine, too, August 2016 is also a time of change. After two-and-a-half years as a writer and editor for the most prolific (and prettiest) family of magazines around, I’m both excited and saddened to say good-bye. In August I’m packing up my Honda and moving to Seattle

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to start a graduate program at the University of Washington. Picking up the editorial pen to head Morgantown magazine is someone who may be familiar to many readers. Mary Wade Burnside comes to us from NCWV Life magazine in Clarksburg and, before that, Corridor, in Fairmont. She has more than 10 years’ experience heading regional lifestyle publications with active community participation, and I’m confident Morgantown will welcome her with open arms. Here she’ll have ample opportunity to work with a generous and energetic community that supports local business, enjoys the best of city and rural life, and is engaged in government and volunteer efforts to better the town and state. With New South Media, Mary Wade will find support and friendship in a small but talented staff of writers, editors, designers, photographers, and organizersextraordinaire, who also publish WV Living, WV Weddings, and Wonderful West Virginia, among other magazines. In my own time at New South Media I have had the chance to learn from a passionate group of people who lavish time and attention on the championship of communities fighting for a future and the creation of publications that tell those stories for the people who need to see them most. So thanks Morgantown for a wonderful couple of years—and the 20-plus years of townie life before this. August marks good-bye, but just for now.

Meet our Interns Cami Coulter Cami is a native of Charles Town—not to be confused with Charleston—and entered WVU in 2013. After switching majors a few times, she found a passion for English. Cami believes students should consider getting involved with Adventure WV as soon as possible. With the program Cami has spent spring breaks kayaking and snorkeling in Florida and winter breaks backpacking through the mountains and deserts of Texas and New Mexico. Cody Roane Cody hails from Virginia but has called Morgantown home for three years. After bouncing around majors, he settled on English and will graduate in spring. When he isn’t at school or writing for Morgantown, Cody is hiphop director for WVU’s college radio station U92FM. To students entering WVU this fall, Cody recommends checking out as many clubs as possible. As a freshman he tried, among others, Fly Fishing, Secular Student Alliance, Young Democrats, and Young Life. Alison Kaiser Alison grew up in Dunbar outside of Charleston. Although she has not settled on a career, she has a passion for telling stories and reporting on current events, so she is pursuing a degree in journalism with a minor in English. As for advice to new college students, it’s simple: Be friendly and meet as many types of people as possible.

Letters to the Editor K ATIE GR IFFITH,

Editor

Hats off to the Westover Volunteer Fire Department for their feature in the recent Morgantown magazine article, “Answering the Call.” We cannot thank their efforts enough for the night of April 23rd. Thank your local fire departments when you see them. Colasante’s Ristorante & Pub, via Facebook Cool write-up in the latest @MorgantownMag on us and some other great bands! Check it out @rockbassband, via Twitter

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MORGANTOWN â&#x20AC;¢ AUG/SEPT 2016

In This Issue

CARLA WITT FORD

AUGUST/SEPTEMBER2016

Grads to Watch

High Hopes

Chasing R1

Some pretty impressive people have earned diplomas from WVU. Meet seven of them.

Is hemp the all-around useful, go-to product of the future? Area growers, including a WVU student, try to find out.

What does WVUâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s new, top-tier research designation mean for the instution and its students?

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AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2016

In This Issue 59

35 20

63 This Matters

Departments

14 This Matters To... Meet Gregory Dunaway, the new dean of the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences.

22 Taste This Try the Regatta Bar and Grille’s James Beard competition mushroom burger.

15 Try This Eric Deal created a thriving side business with the Forks of Cheat Distillery.

24 Do This Throw a pot, paint a bowl, or craft a mug that you can use for your craft beer at these DIY outlets.

What’s This Did you wait too long to book a hotel room before the first football game? Maybe Airbnb can help.

17 Read This Round out your fall reading list with these titles featuring regional ties. 18 Eat This The pastries at Peace, Love, and Little Donuts are small enough that you can try more than one flavor. 20 Support This The West Virginia Botanic Garden moves forward with a new executive director and master plan update.

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26 Watch This Your tax dollars at work means more paving around Morgantown. 28 Shop This From low-top sneakers to a doll that understands your frustrations, these items are a must for back-to-school.

6 Editor’s Note 5 Outdoors 3 Living in Morgantown, you are a hop, skip, and a jump from great climbing locales. 59 Healthy Living Students will find more resources available at WVU to help them through addiction recovery. 63 The U Get the lowdown on all you need to know about WVU, from where to hang out to important landmarks to visit.

30 Who’s This Suzanne Moore uses acid mine drainage to make her colorful pottery.

68 Calendar For when you need a break from studying, check out these suggestions on events going on in the area.

32 Know This Navigating Morgantown’s rental market may be tough but you might have more rights than you realized.

72 Then & Now (& Soon) Take a look at the site of the former Marple Chevrolet Sales Company, which may be replaced.

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EAT / LOVE / WEAR / SHOP / WATCH / KNOW / HEAR / READ / DO / WHO / WHAT

A Spoonful of Peaches Peaches in a bowl with ice cream—the only way to properly celebrate the dog days of summer is with shorts, sunnies, grills, and peach sundaes. Grab a peck or two, and get down to washing, chopping, and maybe even grilling your way to the perfect late summer treat.

CARLA WITT FORD

West Virginia peaches can usually be found in August at farmers’ markets in and around town.

Labor Day

Labor Day takes place September 5 this year. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, 83,000 West Virginians were members of labor unions in 2015, up from 73,000 in 2014.

Morgantown Marathon If last year’s 26.2-mile race around Morgantown wasn’t enough endorphinfilled, hilly madness for your inner race demon, don’t fret. The Morgantown Marathon returns September 17–18. morgantownmarathon.com

AN APPLE A DAY

Celebrate our apple heritage with a visit to the WVU Horticulture Farm on Route 705 for its annual apple sale, usually in September, for a few bushels of home-grown fruit.

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THIS MATTERS THISMATTERS TO

Gregory Dunaway ➼ GREGORY DUNAWAY came to Morgantown in March 2016 from Mississippi State University to head up WVU’s largest college, the Eberly College of Arts and Sciences, as its dean. As a sociologist, Dunaway has devoted research attention to criminal justice policy and social factors associated with delinquency. We caught up with him to ask why he left one land grant institution for another. interview by PAM KASEY | photographed by CARLA WITT FORD

On his current academic thinking What interests me most as a sociologist these days is the impact of the changing economy: how it’s creating vast economic disparities, and what people are doing to try to garner something along the lines of what we believe is the American dream.

On the bundling of arts and sciences It’s been the source of a lot of debate in higher education. A college like Eberly that has many different disciplines is a sort of unwieldy entity, but what holds it together is this value of a broad-based education, one that encompasses the sciences and the humanities. A college of arts and sciences is really about understanding and celebrating the human condition—who we are, how we live, what we should aspire to be. That education prepares students so well, not for any one job, but for myriad opportunities. On coming to WVU I was not looking to leave Mississippi State. This was a unique opportunity that I was encouraged to look at, and the more I looked the more I got excited. Things are not going well for West Virginia right now, but this university has the leadership and the will and really the necessity to be transformative. To me, it’s really exciting to be in a place that has that kind of impact.

On making a life in Morgantown One of my interests is music, not that I play but I’m excited to look at the music and arts scene. My wife was very involved in community theater and there’s a vibrant program here. And social programs—I know there’s a problem with drug addiction in Morgantown as well as across the state and, because my research has touched on that, it’s something I’d like to learn more about and contribute to.

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

On the land grant mission Higher education means more in places like Mississippi and West Virginia that have been so underresourced—the universities have a huge role to play. In West Virginia, energy continues to be very relevant but the sources of energy are changing, and it’s unlikely that the state can remain so reliant on that. Energy has to be part of a larger portfolio. A college of arts and sciences like Eberly has a great opportunity in terms of research, outreach to communities, and providing educational opportunities in the changing economic landscape.

THIS MATTERS TRYTHIS

Forks of Cheat Distillery This local winery has lifted its spirits. ➼ ERIC DEAL WALKS OVER TO A HIDDEN doorway covered with vines and hanging brush reminiscent of the catacombs in France. The door swings wide, releasing the scents of soil and charred wood. “This is the first time this door has been opened in two weeks,” Deal says. There, behind the door, an old gas tank buried in the hill houses barrel-aged liquors for the Forks of Cheat Distillery. The distillery began as a side project 10 years ago when Deal worked alongside Peyton Fireman, owner of local distillery Mountain Moonshine. Though he claims 16 years’ experience in the winery business, at Mountain Moonshine Deal toiled like an intern. He watched Fireman run the distillery and tagged along through the day-to-day tasks of creating liquors. The winemaking process is similar to distilling liquor, and Deal realized distilling would easily complement his winemaking. He already had the tools, and now with the vision, Forks of Cheat Distillery was created. Today Forks of Cheat Distillery offers an assortment of spirits, including whiskey, scotch, brandy, and moonshine. A small-batch applejack brandy, hand-harvested and barrel-aged for four years, uses West Virginia apples and runs at 80 proof. Using the winery’s grapes, Deal creates grappa, a form of pomace brandy that tastes similar to grape wines. After rehydrating grape pulp and skins, he sends them through the still a second time to create the traditional Italian drink. Deal also creates his own moonshine, which runs at 70 proof. Deal’s products may be purchased directly at the Forks of Cheat Distillery or at two locations across Morgantown: Ashebrooke Liquor Outlet and Giant Eagle. His Big Deal Rye Whiskey also can be found at various restaurants across town, including Tin 202, Mountain State Brewing Company, Morgantown Brewing Company, and Hill & Hollow. 2811 Stewartstown Road, 304.598.2019 written and photographed by CODY ROANE

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THIS MATTERS

WHAT’STHIS

Airbnb Looking to Bust the Hospitality Market Hotel alternative continues to grow in Morgantown.

➼ IT’S GAME DAY WEEKEND here in Morgantown and booking a hotel is the only thing standing between a relaxing few days and a disastrous trip of rock hard pillows and terrible breakfasts. The games aren’t until the fall so it didn’t seem necessary to book the desirable hotel in March. Now it’s August and the only options left are a hike from Fairmont or a room at a seedy motel. There is one alternative, however, that some frequent visitors of Morgantown haven’t yet discovered: Airbnb. The service works like this: Residents of a city offer their properties as rentals for short or extended periods of time. Visitors to the city who are looking for places to stay can create accounts and search for rooms or even homes for rent based on their travel windows, space needs, and price ranges. Airbnb has grown immensely since its inception in San Francisco in 2008. According to the Airbnb website, it has expanded to more than 190 countries across the globe, with housing options in more than 34,000 cities. However, with this expansion comes legal ramifications as well. Some cities have laws that restrict 16

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a person’s ability to host paying guests for short periods, as part of a city’s zoning or administrative codes. In Morgantown, however, there are no restricting zoning codes that would block renters from putting their property on the service. A clerk for the city’s Code Enforcement Department could not answer questions based on Airbnb rental codes because the department was not aware of the service. A property can be put up for rent as long as it has passed the city’s standard rental codes through the Initial Code Council. From there, users don’t have to fill out any special paperwork or create separate leasing agreements with the city for Airbnb renting. All the work is done through the website at Airbnb. Safety can be viewed as an issue, because users aren’t staying at a preapproved hotel and are simply trusting a local resident. Airbnb has no known background checks on users but does use a verification method similar to other social networks, like Twitter. Guests write recommendations and other people in the community, such as friends and family, also verify users. Bios are created for each user as well, with messaging apps so guests

can communicate with their hosts prior to booking their stays. The Airbnb website states, “Trust is what makes it work.” One can choose to stay in a shared bedroom, private room, or an entire house. In the Morgantown area, prices range from $40 to $200 a night. One likely fake account listing is asking for $10,000 to watch a man’s cat. Fake listings are few and far between and usually come across as obvious, and review systems keep renters in check. Residents of cities sometimes rent their properties out through Airbnb to help pay for part of their rental agreements. This was the case with Ricky Hussmann and his girlfriend, Jodi Hollingshead, who ran a photography studio that doubled as an extra area for guests when she wasn’t using the space. They provided simple amenities like towels, washcloths, and a full-service kitchen. From Hussmann’s perspective, renting through Airbnb provides customers the opportunity to live like locals. “You can get recommendations through people that actually live in the city,” Hussmann says, “not just some map that corporate [hotel chains] tell you to visit.” Hussmann’s apartment was above his rental unit so many times his guests would invite them out to dinners and events around town. Many of the rentals in Morgantown can be found in the neighborhoods of Greenmont, downtown, and Star City. This means those looking to travel for football games have a short PRT ride or drive to Milan Puskar Stadium. Some hosts offer to drive their guests around town if timing permits. Simple pleasures like coffee and snacks usually are provided by hosts, and some offer full kitchens. This allows guests to cook their own meals, saving money that would be spent eating out. One aspect of traveling is about becoming immersed in the culture and feeling like you’re a part of the locale. Airbnb allows guests to sense this feeling. Hotels located close to downtown tend to be more costly while less expensive options remain on the outskirts. Airbnb provides that “local” feeling without the expensive shortcomings that come with timeshares and other traveling services. Hosts are accommodating and amenities are provided, which means that booking-induced panic can be eased with hotel alternatives like Airbnb. airbnb.com written by cody roane

THIS MATTERS READTHIS

Feed Your Inner Book Worm Add these recently released and upcoming titles by West Virginia authors to your fall reading list.

Allegheny Front Matthew Neill Null, May 2016, $15.95 Following the success of his first novel, 2015â&#x20AC;&#x2122;s Honey from the Lion, Matthew Neill Null unveils another side of his beloved home state through a collection of short stories. Nature and wildlife sit front and center in each story as the author weaves tales of hardship, woe, and hope, his characters spanning decades and backgrounds, to tell the story of West Virginia. Believe What You Can Marc Harshman, September 2016, $16.99 West Virginia Poet Laureate Marc Harshman feels the difficulty of knowing all living things die. While exploring this theme through four sections, each detailing potential coping mechanisms, Harshman paints a clear, unsentimental image of long-lost worlds in the Midwest and Appalachia. Fracture: Essays, Poems, and Stories on Fracking in America Taylor Brorby and Stefanie Brook Trout, eds., February 2016, $24.95 In this collection of investigative journalism, storytelling, and verse, established writers and newcomers alike consider the complex industry of hydraulic fracturing in the U.S. Along with nearly 50 other authors, Preston County native Susan Truxell Sauter gives voice to her concerns. The Rope Swing Jonathan Corcoran, April 2016, $12.65 In his debut collection of stories, Jonathan Corcoran takes a look at a once-booming West Virginia rail town where the tracks no longer rumble and the mountains no longer echo the whistle of locomotives. His stories consider the lives of those who fight the regimental rules of smalltown life: A young boy pushing to explore his sexuality, a New York City transplant struggling to make itâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;these characters yearn for a world beyond a dying town. written by katie griffith

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EATTHIS

Peace, Love, and Little Donuts A Pittsburgh shop opens its doors in Morgantown. ➼ THESE DAYS, LOCALLY OWNED doughnut shops are, sadly, scarce in Morgantown, but Peace, Love, and Little Donuts is here to change that—sort of. The company’s first doughnut and coffee shop opened in Pittsburgh in 2009, and since then locations have popped up across Pennsylvania and Ohio. The Morgantown store, nestled in the ever-expanding Suncrest Towne Centre, is the first in West Virginia. Peace, Love, and Little Donuts offers endless trays of doughnuts and walls covered with psychedelic rock posters. And don’t worry if you can’t find any regular18

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sized doughnuts. Your eyes aren’t playing tricks on you. Peace, Love, and Little Donuts specializes in tinier treats. Starting at just 85 cents apiece, these doughnuts don’t break the bank. Peace, Love, and Little Donuts offers traditional flavors, like glazed and plain doughnuts, coupled with more festive flavors, like maple bacon, s’mores, and Samoa doughnuts. The doughnuts are all hand-dipped in front of customers, guaranteeing freshness. Neon orange walls, couches, and tables—not to mention a wave of olfactory

sensation— Peace, Love, greet customers and Little Donuts as they step 1078 Suncrest Towne into the shop. Centre Drive, 304.212.5765 Chalkboard peaceloveandlittledonuts.com menus feature store specials that, with multiple categories, number in the dozens. As staff craft orders, The Doors and the Bee Gees serenade customers choosing to dine in. For those on the run, the shop has halfdozen- and dozen-count boxes that can be mixed and matched with doughnut creations of the customer’s choosing. Coffee carafes along the back wall offer the perfect savory complement to the store’s baby doughnuts, the sizes of which allow shoppers to satisfy daily sugar cravings without guilt—at least that’s what we told ourselves when we ordered a dozen to go. written by CODY ROANE photographed by CARLA WITT FORD

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State, Meet Your Garden

The West Virginia Botanic Garden is just about ready to go big-time. ➼ WHEN A GROUP OF MORGANTOWN plant enthusiasts got together in the 1980s to create a lush and educational outdoor public space, they set an ambitious vision for themselves right in their name: the West Virginia Botanic Garden. A new leader believes the garden is ready 20

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to fulfill that ambition. “A lot of people across the state would really like to support the programs this botanic garden has to offer,” says Executive Director Bill Mills, who started April 1. “We need to carry the voice of the garden beyond Morgantown to West Virginia.”

A professor emeritus in WVU’s landscape architecture school, longtime Executive Director George Longenecker was a driving force behind the genesis of the WVBG. Many, while acknowledging an active board and volunteer base, would say “the” driving force. “There would not be a West Virginia Botanic Garden today without George Longenecker’s vision, leadership, and devotion,” says board President Bill Johnson. Longenecker was part of the original task force that formed without a site yet in mind, and he eventually helped lease the 80-acre Tyrone Road property just east of town that formerly held the city’s Tibbs Run tap water reservoir. “He has personally managed most of the major infrastructure projects, including installation of roads, boardwalks, trails, and utilities,” Johnson says. “He designed and installed most of the existing gardens, including the entrance, shade, butterfly, and rhododendron gardens. These projects form the foundation on which future garden elements will be built.” Under Longenecker’s abiding leadership, the WVBG has in recent years undertaken projects that raise the garden’s profile. Seeing an opportunity in 2014 to gain Tyrone Road frontage, for example, the organization bought just under 2 acres adjacent to the garden’s narrow entrance. The flat roadside property is more convenient than the garden interior for events like the annual spring plant sale fundraiser. The property also opens the possibility of grander signage and gateway plantings, Johnson says—important visibility for an organization with big plans. And 2015 saw the installation of a welcome center, nearly complete this spring. The two-story building expands on the donated one-story, energy-efficient house WVU students built for the U.S. Department of Energy’s Solar Decathlon in 2013. “We designed a lower level, a walk-out basement with the same footprint as the house. Part of that is going to be an education center, a large meeting facility with good audio-visual facilities and a nice view out over the garden,” Johnson says. “We’re going to use the upper level to welcome visitors, so there’ll be space for interpretation and displays as well as offices for staff.” He notes the advantage, for the first time, of permanent public bathrooms with running water. “I think the welcome center is going to transform the garden.” In less than two decades, the WVBG has reshaped a wild, unmanaged tract

BILL JOHNSON

Preparing the Ground

CARLA WITT FORD; COURTESY OF WEST VIRGINIA BOTANIC GARDEN; GEORGE LONGENECKER

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP LEFT: A boardwalk gives visitors access to the botanic garden's wetland. George Longenecker and a chainsaw sculpture that resembles him. The new welcome center offers educational, meeting, and office space.

into an inviting landscape where colorful horticultural displays bloom from early spring through late fall and miles of trails through mature hardwood forest are enjoyed by thousands each year. Operating now on an annual budget of about $100,000, it employs four part-time staff, coordinates the activities of hundreds of volunteers, and offers a busy schedule of educational walks and workshops that are becoming local traditions. “LeJay Graffious, who’s a great birder, led a walk looking for American woodcocks,” Johnson said in early April of recent garden events. “We have nesting woodcocks in the reservoir basin and the males make a display flight in the spring around dusk. I think this was the third year

of the walk, and we had 99 people show up.” Longenecker’s legacy also lives on through the contributions of his former landscape architecture students, Johnson says. Scott Scarfone, for example, principal at award-winning Oasis Design Group of Baltimore, is now overseeing a major update of the garden’s master plan.

Raising it Up To the task of taking that steady momentum to the next level, Mills brings the total package. For one thing, he recently left a 25-year career in commercial horticulture and high-end landscape design and installation with TerraSalis in Charleston. “When we

THIS MATTERS

started, there were no big box stores, so there was somewhat of a plant desert in our state,” he says. “We brought interesting, unusual plants to West Virginia and many, many people traveled to purchase from us. As more and more places sold plants, we stuck to design and planting.” Mills understands nonprofit operations and knows the state’s horticultural community, having served at one time as president of the West Virginia Nursery and Landscape Association. Time volunteered with the Charleston Land Trust and the Huntington Museum of Art has given him experience in community development and connections across the state. Most importantly, he loves the garden grounds. “It’s such an extraordinarily beautiful place,” he says. “Every time I drive down into the (reservoir) basin it kind of blows my mind. Tibbs Run is one of the cleanest-running streams in West Virginia, and the woods is pristine.” The community’s love for the garden makes him excited about its potential. “The educational value of this property is immense. People can learn about gardening and about the living world. But also, I talk to a lot of people out on the trails. They come here for a feeling of transcendence and a sense of personal spirituality. When you drive in traffic in Morgantown and then come out here, it’s a profound change. It’s a real quality-oflife opportunity, this piece of property and what the organization has to offer.” The master plan update will guide the garden’s future, Mills says. “If there’s future development, where does it go? How does the basin get developed so we could possibly impound more water? Where would specific gardens go, and how do paths move people through the spaces?” That planning, he says, will likely lead to a major statewide capital campaign to bring it all to life. 1061 Tyrone Road, 304.376.2717, wvbg.org written by pam kasey MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

THIS MATTERS WHAT’STHIS

Better Safety Through Mapping ➼ AN ONLINE MAP LAUNCHED in June by Monongalia County offers emergency services, other agencies, and the general public a better view of county data for the first time. Titled the Monongalia Parcel Viewer, the site does in fact plot parcels, with links to data that has long been available on the county assessor’s website but in a much less convenient form, including property ownership, last sales, and land and building specifications. But the map offers far more. In addition to roads and waterways, users can show or hide features like floodplains, tax districts, topographic contour, and transmission lines. Users also have the option to display high-resolution aerial imaging from 2010 and 2015. “This is so valuable for public safety,” says Monongalia County Commission President Eldon Callen. “911 can identify locations more accurately, and there will be an overlay that shows the location of fire hydrants and other emergency access points.” The site will be updated regularly and additional features are in planning. –pk monwv.agdmaps.com/mon

LOCAL BEEF + MOREL AND WILD MUSHROOM DUXELLES + SMOKED RICOTTA CHEESE + CURED EGG YOLK + WATERCRESS + PICKLED ONIONS AND RAMPS + SWEET HEIRLOOM TOMATO JAM

WOWZA!

RIDETHIS

PRT: “Give Me Another Chance” sure you trusted anymore in the spring did a lot of personal work over the summer. When WVU’s Personal Rapid Transit system opened in 1975, it was the first large-scale Automated Guideway Transit system in the country—a people mover that combined the direct-to-destination convenience of the automobile with the efficiency of mass transit. Today the PRT serves an average 15,000 riders a day during the school year and is studied by visitors from around the world. But 40 years later, vendor support has suffered and, with that, reliability. This summer, WVU carried out Phase II of a three-phase modernization plan. It’s mainly a technical upgrade—redesign and replacement of the Automatic Train Control system and replacement of substation and electrical gear—that is expected to greatly improve reliability. Later this fall, look for Phase III: replacement of the entire PRT fleet of 71 cars. It might be time to give the PRT another chance. –pk 22

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TASTETHIS

Burgerlicious! ➼ THIS SUMMER, the Waterfront Place Hotel’s Regatta Bar and Grille, soon to be known as Bourbon Prime Steakhouse, entered The James Beard Foundation’s Blended Burger Project, a competition aimed at transforming the quintessential American comfort food by blending ground meat with chopped mushrooms to create a healthier and more sustainable option. This gourmet burger patty uses a combination of local beef from Gardner Farms in Waverly and morel and wild mushroom duxelles. It is topped with house-made smoked ricotta cheese, cured egg yolks, pickled onions and ramps, watercress, and sweet heirloom tomato jam. Although it did not win the online voting competition, we think this flavorful burger takes home the prize. The pickled onions and ramps are a nice complement to the sweet tomato compote and give it that extra special Appalachian touch. Stop by and cast your vote! –nb

NIKKI BOWMAN; CARLA WITT FORD

➼ THAT PRT YOU WEREN’T

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DOTHIS

Do-It-Yourself Haven When you need a creative outlet to keep yourself happy and productive, check out a few of these DIY options in and around Morgantown. ➼ GLASSES CLINK, laughter grows louder, and chatter fills the room as a dozen people follow the brushstrokes of the artist directing them. At the end of the night, each student will take home canvas paintings of whatever image the instructor chose, but each will be slightly different—students use their own imaginations to personalize their paintings. 24

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DIY art studios are a fulfilling way to spend a free evening and more productive than sitting at a bar or going for a routine night out to dinner and a movie. Morgantown is home to several DIY studios, where guests can engage in a variety of creative activities at their own pace. Some studios host kids’ camps and birthday parties. Others offer more adult-oriented entertainment: Painting over wine, anyone?

Zenclay Pottery Studio Near WVU’s Evansdale campus, Zenclay is in the business of teaching pottery in an inviting, low-key environment. “Pottery is a good way to keep the hands and the mind busy and separate yourself from whatever you do during the day,” says resident artist John Baker. Zenclay offers hand building and pottery wheel classes as well as kids’ classes and private parties. Prices start at $225 for a six-week beginner class. After taking a class at Zenclay, students who feel particularly inspired can rent studio space to work on their own. Student Rachel Moher says Zenclay gave her the opportunity to meet and talk to new people. One of the most rewarding things about throwing clay is that “there’s no right or wrong answer,” she says. “It’s just fun.” Open Tuesday through Saturday. 2862 University Avenue, 304.599.7687, zenclaypottery.com

COURTESY OF THE WOW! FACTORY; COURTESY OF DAVINCI & DESSERT; COURTESY OF JOE N' THROW; COURTESY OF LOCK HOUSE STUDIO

THIS MATTERS

Crafters and creative types have many choices in the area when it comes to throwing a pot or painting on canvas. A good option for kids is the WOW! Factory, while adults might prefer sipping craft beer as they make a mug at Joe N’ Throw Co-op.

THIS MATTERS

you have,” she says. The studio hosts themed kids’ classes throughout the year, including an ornament workshop in winter. Giuliani hopes to expand into adult classes soon and, in the meantime, she invites the public to stop by to view her work. Open by appointment. 56 Morgantown Lock Road, 304.680.6440 lockhousestudio.com

DaVinci & Dessert

COURTESY OF ZEN CLAY

WOW! Factory Located on University Avenue in Star City, the WOW! Factory has a variety of DIY art projects, including paint-your-own pottery, glass fusing, mosaics, a clay studio, and canvas painting. The studio is a hub of activity. Children and adults eagerly choose from shelves of pottery to paint— animal figurines, piggy banks, tiles, wall art, and mugs are just a few. After taking their pieces to tables and choosing from a rainbow array of paints, guests whip up colorful creations. On the other side of the studio, a woman labors diligently over a mosaic votive holder she is designing for her bathroom. The welcoming staff is helpful and kind and encourages even the most skeptical beginners to create something wonderful. The studio offers a monthly calendar full of events such as kids’ camps, Bob Ross-style painting classes, and paintand-sip classes for adults. Walk in and enjoy an afternoon of DIY fun or call ahead to schedule parties and group events. Prices at

the WOW! Factory range from $5 to more than $60. Closed Mondays. 3453 University Avenue, 304.599.2969, wowfactoryonline.com

Lock House Studio The new Lock House Studio beside the Monongahela River is owned by Lisa Giuliani, who studied ceramics at the University of Texas before coming to WVU for graduate school. An airy studio with lots of windows, a color palette of seaside hues, and calming scenery, Lock House is the type of space that fuels creative thought. In her studio, Giuliani crafts whimsical, pastelcolored pottery pieces as well as jewelry. Inspired by her love of pattern design, Giuliani translates patterns and abstract doodles into her work. She also hosts children’s art workshops in the summer with an emphasis on STEAM—science, technology, engineering, art, and math. Giuliani particularly recommends pottery to hopeful artists. “It allows you to explore a creative side you might not have known

With locations in Morgantown and Fairmont, DaVinci & Dessert is easily accessible across the Morgantown area, particularly to Cheat Lake residents. The studios offer two-hour guided painting classes, perfect for a friends’ night out. DaVinci stands out particularly because of its dessert selection: baked goods to enjoy while painting. The studios also encourage guests to bring their own wine or other beverages to sip on. Classes typically start around $35 per event. Customers also can purchase $100 summer paint passes, good for any three summer classes. Hours vary. 1256 Cheat Road, Morgantown; 1228 Country Club Road, Suite 6, Fairmont, 304.365.2370; davincianddessert.com

Joe N’ Throw Co-op Are you the kind of person who prefers a cold beer to wine and doesn’t mind getting a little messy? Once a month, Joe N’ Throw Co-op in Fairmont offers “Pints and Pots” at the neighboring West Fork Pottery studio where, for $30, adults aged 21 and older can take a pottery class and make a beer mug, all while enjoying craft beer. Carol Grimes, a pottery instructor specializing in hand-built pieces at West Fork Pottery, notes that, in addition to “Pints and Pots,” there are other classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays for $25. Grimes says that Joe N’ Throw is a one-ofa-kind spot and that all kinds of people come together at the co-op to enjoy beer or coffee or to just talk and watch the potters work. “Pints and Pots” classes take place on the first Thursday of the month. 32½ Adams Street, Fairmont, 304.816.4390 written by alison kaiser MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

THIS MATTERS

HEY!

WE’RE PAVING HERE!

WATCHTHIS

Smooth Road Ahead

Our user fee dollars work at finally improving the daily commute. ➼ IF YOU WORK INSIDE Morgantown city limits, you’ve been paying the $3-a-week user fee since January 1—about $100 worth through the end of August. Recently, you’ve probably started to see some of the benefits in the form of an unusually ambitious 2016 paving schedule. “In a normal year we do $300,000, $400,000, $500,000 worth of paving, so we’re doing about a million dollars more this year,” says City Engineer and Public 26

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

Works Director Damien Davis of the $1.5 million paving budget for 2016. Last fall, following much public dialogue, city council approved the Safe Streets and Safe Community Service Fee with the goal of improving public safety by repaving roads on a shorter cycle and by increasing the city’s law enforcement staffing and equipment. The $156 a year collected from each of the estimated 30,000 residents and non-residents who

earn paychecks within city limits will bring in about $4.7 million. Ideally, the city would be on a 10-to15-year resurfacing schedule for the 106 miles of streets it maintains, but funding has had it on a 100-plus-year schedule. Pothole frustration led in 2008 to a user fee proposal, but that crashed spectacularly. When a 2015 state-level initiative spearheaded by Morgantown and Monongalia County leaders—the Letting Our Counties Act Locally Act to allow county commissions to levy sales taxes for road improvements—failed in that year’s legislative session, council felt the need to act. A 2015 online survey showed that residents and non-residents overwhelmingly want more paving and police protection, and the user fee targets those needs. The city allocated close to $2.5 million to paving this year. Davis created a priority list of road stretches to pave based on volume of traffic and condition of the pavement. “I wanted to get the biggest bang for the city’s buck,” he says, “so I looked at major routes in and out that are the city’s, not the state’s, responsibility, like Dorsey, Darst, and Hampton. And we also took complaints and put those in the mix.” In a twist, bids came in lower than expected because the state Legislature’s 2016 repeal of prevailing wage allows contractors to pay workers less than they paid previously. So ultimately, the city will pave the top 28 roads on the priority list this year—a few more stretches than expected, though not quite as many as the cost difference would allow. “We added three streets but didn’t add more because we’re going to have a hard time doing that many streets in the season,” Davis says. “If we’re going to do more streets next year, we may have to look at starting a little earlier, maybe even while students are still here, and ending a little later. Or we might talk to bidders about putting two crews on this, paving in two locations at once.” Paving crews aimed to get the streets most used by college students done by August 2. The rest of the paving should be done by October 10, Davis says. New fees are always controversial, but Davis believes the results will change minds. “Fairmont’s been doing this for maybe four years now,” he says. “I’ve heard a lot of people say they’ve paved a lot of streets and that people have come around now that they’ve seen the fruits of that.” written by PAM KASEY

priority

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from

Dorsey Ave.

Ross St.

S. High St.

Darst St.

Richwood Ave.

Hampton Ave.

Darst St.

Willey St.

Richwood Ave.

Sabraton Ave.

Vernon St.

8th St.

University Ave.

Beechurst Ave.

Aspen St.

Collins Ferry Rd.

Anderson Ave.

Falling Run Rd.

University Ave.

Protzman St.

Fayette St.

University Ave.

dead end

Grand St.

Grandview St.

Maple Ave.

Protzman St.

Falling Run Rd.

Stewart St.

University Ave.

College Ave.

Stewart St.

Christy St.

Van Voorhis Ave.

Windsor Ave.

Chestnut St.

Pleasant St.

Willey St.

Highland Ave.

Jones Ave.

Stewart St.

Hite St.

Dorsey Ave.

Hayes St.

Price St.

Willey St.

Newton Ave.

Snider St.

Richwood Ave.

Monongalia Ave.

Clark St.

Cobun Ave.

Overdale St.

Brockway Ave.

Wilson Ave.

Park St.

Wilson Ave.

Cobun Ave.

6th St.

Beverly Ave.

Beechurst Ave.

Colmar St.

Sabraton Ave.

Ashland Ave.

Dallas St.

Forest St.

Locust Ave.

Cobun Ave.

Clark St.

S. Walnut St.

James St.

Richwood Ave.

Monongalia Ave.

Kingwood St.

Brockway Ave.

Harner St.

Mississippi St.

Callen Ave.

White Park

Wilson Ave.

Grand St.

Simpson St.

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1 MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

SHOPTHIS

Be Cool Going Back to School Your friends will want to know where you stocked up on all of these must-haves. written by JOHNNA HERBIG | photographed by CARLA WITT FORD

Backpack, $375 and $281

This locally made leather backpack will stand out on campus.

Messenger bag, $225 and $168

An easy-to-wear bag can dress up any look and carry your books to class.

iPad and tablet case, $90

Protect your tablet in a stylish and sturdy case. Tanner’s Alley, 416 High Street, 304.292.0707 tannersalleyleather.com

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

THIS MATTERS

Hometown love, $20 DAMMIT! Dolls, $12.95

When your schoolwork piles up, de-stress yourself by throwing this doll against the wall. It was made for it. Elegant Alley Cat, 358 High Street, 304.292.4433 elegantalleycat.com

These new CoCo & June designs allow you to show off your hometown pride. Elegant Alley Cat, 358 High Street 304.292.4433, elegantalleycat.com

Charm bracelet $32

Wear your Greek letters with pride on this Alex and Ani bracelet. Elegant Alley Cat 358 High Street 304.292.4433 elegantalleycat.com

SKICKS West Virginia Low-Tops, $59.99

COURTESY OF SKICKS

Add some pep in your step with these festive sneakers featuring the Flying WV logo. The Book Exchange, 152 Willey Street 304.292.7354, bookexchangewv.com or at skicks.com

Wall hanging, $75, $125, $175 Made out of dilapidated structures from around the state, these wooden signs come in three color options and three sizes. From the WV Living Collection, wvlivingcollection.com

WVU pillow, $158

This catstudio pillow will take Morgantownâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s vibe wherever the country roads may lead you. Elegant Alley Cat, 358 High Street 304.292.4433, elegantalleycat.com MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

THIS MATTERS WHO’STHIS

Turning Pollution into Art Potter Suzanne Moore draws attention to acid mine drainage.

Suzanne Moore uses acid mine drainage in a unique way to make her pottery.

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

THIS MATTERS

➼ THE ORANGE COLOR you might have seen in Deckers Creek and along the Cheat River comes from acid mine drainage from coal mines. Acid mine drainage primarily consists of iron sulfide and is dangerous to West Virginia’s wildlife. However, there are organizations and individuals who are passionate about cleaning up the waterways affected by the pollution. Friends of Deckers Creek and Friends of the Cheat have been working on clearing out the pollution for animals and humans alike. One of these people, Suzanne Moore, has found a unique way to bring attention to the issue—her pottery. She uses the iron sludge from reclaiming sites of the nonprofit organizations Friends of Deckers Creek and Friends of the Cheat to make her own glazes for her ceramics. “I’ve been artistic ever since I was a little kid,” she says. “I love that I can make something I can use every day.” But pottery takes her art to another level. She has worked with ceramics for more than a decade and mixes her own glazes. When Moore moved to West Virginia in 2005 she knew she wanted to give back to her community. She joined Friends of

Deckers Creek (FODC), a local nonprofit with the goal of restoring, preserving, and promoting Deckers Creek, where acid mine drainage from coal mines is hurting aquatic life. According to the FODC website, deckerscreek.org, the act of mining can disturb the natural hydrology of the mined area, leading to the exposure of iron and sulfur, which then make their way into nearby waterways. Moore quickly rose to serve as executive director of the organization for a time, in that role she saw an opportunity to combine two loves: art and reclamation. Iron is a key ingredient in her ceramic glazes, so Moore came up with the idea of reclaiming the iron from FODC project sites. She says, “What’s a better way to turn pollution into art than by using it with my own glazes?” She took several samples of iron sludge from the sites and started to dabble and experiment. “Some turned out OK while others did not,” she says. Her process for making the glazes can be time-consuming and particular. In a repetitive process, she squeezes

iron sludge through small filter screens several times to remove twigs, leaves, and plastic debris. After she thinks it has been filtered enough she weighs and tests it with her base glazes—a clear matte and a clear glossy glaze. Moore makes many trial-and-error glazes before she fine-tunes a glaze that she likes. “Developing glazes is very scientific,” she says. “You need a percentage of clay, a percentage of silica, and a percentage of a colorant, which is oxide, and that’s what I use the iron for.” Different materials create the wide variety of glaze colors visible in pottery. “If I wanted a light green I could use chrome or a green stain,” she says. Each batch of glaze fires a little differently because not all iron sludge is the same. Each has a different mineral composition, including traces of iron and aluminum as well as calcium added during the stream pollution remediation process. The normal color range for her projects is a matte brown, but Moore prefers bright, fun colors. She is more of a contemporary potter, she says, because she doesn’t stick with neutral colors and veers more to brighter hues such as green, pinks, and yellows. She adds oxides like cobalt, chrome, and even copper to make the type of color she wants her glaze to turn out. It is difficult for her to tell what her ultimate color may be because she does not know what minerals are in the sludge to begin with. “I can’t guarantee that I can make the same color every time,” she says. “It’s a one-of-a-kind thing.” Friends of the Cheat’s reclamation sites provide the iron she is using now for her work. She uses the same process she developed with sludge from Deckers Creek but also mixes in other minerals to vary the colors. Because the iron is from a different location, her outcomes will change. “I thought, ‘What better way to use the iron that is collected from these remediation sites, that is essentially pollution, than to make it into something that is actually beautiful?’” Moore says. “When giving my artwork to people I tell them, ‘Hey, you have a piece of the Cheat watershed.’” Her work previously has been sold at Appalachian Gallery in Morgantown. You can find her ceramics in Reedsville at the Modern Homestead at Tathams and online. suzannemooreceramics.com written by cami coulter photographed by carla witt ford MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

THIS MATTERS KNOW THIS

A Charge Against ‘Redecorating Fees’

Look closely at your leases before you sign. Common redecorating fees may not be legal.

➼ YOU READ IT AND SIGNED IT— or, more likely, you skimmed it and signed it—and now you’re stuck. You never thought you’d have a reason to be upset if your landlord walked into your apartment unannounced. And then he changed the locks. You also didn’t think twice about the nonrefundable “redecorating fee” outlined in the lease. It makes sense a landlord would need to pay for your wear and tear on an apartment. Anyway, you signed it and now there’s nothing you can do. Right? Wrong. “You can’t sign away your rights,” says Carrie Showalter, managing attorney at WVU’s Student Legal Services office, and tenant rights in West Virginia are numerous. Under West Virginia law a landlord must, among other things: • make sure that rental housing measures up to all health, safety, fire, and housing code standards at all times; • not seize or impound a tenant’s property as a way of collecting rent owed; • not evict a tenant without going through the courts; • return damage deposits in full or send written notice itemizing any alleged damages within 60 days after the tenant moves out. 32

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

A current point of contention between Morgantown tenants, landlords, and lawyers, including the West Virginia Attorney General’s Office, is the charging of nonrefundable security deposits, sometimes termed “redecorating fees” in leases. Attorney General Patrick Morrisey in 2015 filed a complaint against Copper Beech Townhomes, a student housing company headquartered in Pennsylvania, alleging the company violated West Virginia law by requiring tenants to sign written leases that contained such fees and charges. “Under West Virginia law, a residential rental property landlord is responsible for 100 percent of all property maintenance costs, outside of actual, direct damages caused by tenants that go beyond what can be considered normal wear and tear,” the attorney general said in a press release at the time. “Our state’s consumer protection laws prohibit these kinds of fees, and our state Supreme Court has said tenants cannot be held responsible for them even if they are written into a lease.” But these types of fees—sometimes charged for things like painting that are typically the responsibility of landlords—are written into many leases in Morgantown, Showalter says. And for renters in town, especially young student renters, these fees have just become the norm. “For a long time landlords in Morgantown have gotten away with the idea that deposits aren’t returned, and that’s just not challenged,” Showalter says. The costs of challenging the charges in court, often a couple thousand in attorney’s fees, usually outweigh the benefits of reclaiming a couple of hundred dollars for painting. That could all change, however, when, in 2017, the attorney general’s complaint is set for trial. A judge denied a Copper Beech motion to dismiss the case, the first major landlord/tenant case in West Virginia since the 1970s and one that has the potential to set a precedent. “A lot of our student cases

RENTERS’ RIGHTS Adapted from West Virginia Attorney General’s Office information. Housing standards It is a landlord’s responsibility to make sure housing meets all health, safety, fire, and housing code standards at all times. This includes things like smoke alarms, structural issues, and mold damage, among others. Rental repairs Only landlords are responsible for repairs necessary to ensure their properties meet standards set by law. Landlords may, however, require tenants to pay for damages caused by renters’ negligence. Tenant privacy Landlords must give notice to tenants before entering rental properties, as required by state law. An exception is given when a landlord must perform emergency repairs. Eviction and past-due rents Landlords may not lock out tenants, shut off utilities, refuse repairs, or take other steps to evict tenants without going through court. Landlords also may not seize or impound a tenant’s property as a way of collecting rent owed. Security deposits Since 2011 state law has required landlords to return damage deposits in full or send written notice itemizing any alleged damages within 60 days after tenants move out. Failing to do so could incur penalties of 1.5 times the amount withheld.

end up in magistrate court, and it’s not on court record,” Showalter says. “Now, with Copper Beech in circuit court, there will be a ruling and a signing of law we can cite.” written by KATIE GRIFFITH illustrated by BECKY MOORE

Thinking of signing a lease but not sure of its stipulations? WVU’s Student Legal Services office encourages students to go in for a read-through before signing anything. Services are free to WVU students. campuslife.wvu.edu/student_legal_services

ADVERTISE WITH US!

CALL 304.413.0104 OR EMAIL season@newsouthmediainc.com FOR MORE INFORMATION MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

MORGANTOWN â&#x20AC;¢ AUG/SEPT 2016

A Rocky, Mountain Playground OUTDOORS

CARLA WITT FORD

Rock climbers young and old challenge themselves among Morgantown’s famed climbing destinations. ➼

MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

ifty feet in the air, you dangle from inch-wide finger grips, a rope tied into your harness. Someone at the other end of that rope has your life in their hands as you make your next move up the rock face. The summit is only a couple handholds away. In rock climbing, there’s little room for backing out, pausing to collect yourself, or contemplating the consequences of gravity; you have to rise to the occasion. Adam Polinski, a local climbing legend who has been climbing in West Virginia for more than half his life, knows that all too well. “There’s a level of achievement and satisfaction you get because you do it yourself,” he says. “You’re not driving a motor vehicle or steering a horse or getting to the top of the mountain by a chairlift or riding a bike—it’s all mental.” Polinski, like many in Morgantown’s climbing community, got his start when

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

he moved here to attend college. Already interested in fitness and the outdoors, he met friends who took him climbing at Coopers Rock State Forest and quickly found his passion. “I certainly have found a home. The proximity of Coopers Rock is one big reason,” he says. Like Polinski, more and more people, natives and transplants alike, are finding their niche in climbing here. The Appalachian Mountains, one of the oldest mountain ranges on Earth, give West Virginia the rugged terrain and exposed rocks that have become such renowned climbing venues. Pendleton County is home to nationally recognized Seneca Rocks and Nelson Rocks, which has one of the few true via ferratas— climbing with permanently attached features like cables and ladders—in the United States. Summersville Lake offers picturesque cliffs above the water, and the New River Gorge near Fayetteville

Whether climbers prefer is known as the bouldering, top roping Grand Canyon of or rapelling, the area the East. But most has options for them. of Morgantown’s Coopers Rock State Forest is a very popular climbers get their destination. local climbing fix at Coopers Rock, where you’ll find first-timers attempting the shortest and easiest rocks alongside pros navigating their ways up, down, and all around the most difficult crags. There’s top roping, where a climber is belayed—or secured—by a person on the ground and is attached by rope and harness to the top of the wall. There’s lead climbing, where a climber is belayed but also clips the rope from the harness into carabiners on his or her way up the wall. And then there’s bouldering, climbing to a low height without harnesses and ropes, one of Coopers Rock’s most popular activities. The lush forest is decked with rock outcrops that allow hundreds of visitors to boulder

COURTESY OF JOSH ARMSTRONG

OUTDOORS

COURTESY OF JOSH ARMSTRONG

OUTDOORS

at one time without congestion. “All these years later, I’m still finding new areas in Coopers Rock to climb,” Polinski says. “Morgantown is heads and tails a great place to live if you’re a boulderer. We’ve got it pretty good.” While Coopers Rock might not have the iconic look of Seneca Rocks or the New River Gorge, the fact that climbers can hike five minutes into the woods from a parking lot and find their climbing sites is a large plus. The quality, variety, and accessibility of Coopers Rock keeps climbers coming back, according to Josh Armstrong, lead guide at Coopers Rock Climbing Guides. “You have great rock with great holds, it’s usually dry, and people have been climbing it for years. You have everything from slab climbing that’s not totally vertical to steep overhanging stuff. There’s so much of it and it’s really diverse,” Armstrong says. The western Maryland native learned to climb, rappel, and set up ropes as a teenager before going on to teach his college friends how to climb. What started as a hobby eventually turned into a career when he took over Coopers Rock Climbing Guides from Andy Hershey in 2015. “When I first climbed in West Virginia, I immediately realized how much better it was than where I was climbing,” Armstrong says. “It’s just hard enough, but not so hard that it’s not attainable by most people.” When weather conditions aren’t optimal, climbers also can find highly technical climbing routes at the indoor WVU Climbing Wall, located in the Student Recreation Center. With 17

years of climbing experience, program coordinator Kevin Shon runs the wall, where students and other Rec Center members of all ages have access to rental gear, certified belayers, and bouldering and top rope routes that range in difficulty. “This is the only climbing gym in town. That’s special,” Shon says. The wall is special, indeed: The centerpiece of the Rec Center was built to look like real rock so climbers can train indoors on the most realistic replica of what they’ll encounter outdoors. “It has a mission to empower people to get outside so people can walk away with skills to make them comfortable with climbing outside,” Shon says. “It’s a common space where it doesn’t matter if you’re a freshman, a senior, a professor, a carpenter in town. People come here to learn.” The indoor climbing wall serves as the clearing house for all climbers, from the curious student to the seasoned belayer, to interact and form relationships around learning the sport. Take Jordan Kincaid, for example. From Michigan, he had never attempted an outdoor rock climb until he came to WVU for school. “As school started and I hung out around the Rec Center, before I knew it I was spending every day in the bouldering cave and planning trips to the New River Gorge,” he says. “There’s a community that I hopped right into that really helped me discover how much there is to do around here.” Now, the 2016 grad has recently finished his tenure as president of the WVU Climbing Club and has a post-graduation job lined up in outdoor education. “When

Morgantown is heads and tails a great place to live if you’re a boulderer. We’ve got it pretty good.” ADAM POLINSKI

you talk to somebody who climbs, you automatically have something in common. To share that excitement about it is pretty special,” Kinkaid says. All it takes is a little curiosity to get plugged into the climbing community. You might start out top-roping at the climbing wall or bouldering at Coopers Rock, but before you know it, you’ll find local gems all across town—from Snake Hill Wildlife Management Area to remote access areas along the Cheat River Canyon. Knowing the right people can help, too. “Climbing in West Virginia is special because it’s open to anyone who’s willing to try it. There are so many people with knowledge around here and access to rock, someone will teach you no matter your current fitness level,” Armstrong says. But be warned: once you reach the peak of your first climb, you might not be able to stop. Today, Polinski’s favorite climbing memories happen when he takes his family to the same spots where he learned to climb when he was in college. He’s not going to stop trying new climbs anytime soon, though. “I’m almost 53. I can’t do all the stuff I used to do, but sometimes I do go back and repeat something, like a boulder problem I did 20 years ago. When I can do that again at this age, that’s a neat thing.” written by jennifer skinner MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

West Virginia University graduates have a long history of excelling in their careers. You already know of Jerry West, Don Knotts, and Jon McBride, but we think it's time to meet a few othersâ&#x20AC;&#x2022; Pulitzer prize winners, operatic tenors, rural health advocates, and more.

written by KATIE GRIFFITH, ZACK HAROLD, ALISON KAISER, PAM KASEY

WVU ATHLETIC COMMUNICATIONS

hen Ross Vance threw his first ball as a starter in 2014, few were expecting much from WVU’s oft-penned pitcher. Certainly not the play-by-play announcer whose tone only became more incredulous each time Vance struck out a batter: “In an unbelievable outing for the redshirt sophomore, Vance spins a gem!” It was the winning pitch. By the end of that game in 2014, Ross had struck out 14 Ohio State University players for a 4 to 1 victory for WVU at Hawley Field. It’s the game, he says, that changed his career. Ross Vance isn’t flashy. The Texas native came to WVU on a scholarship after an injury in junior college ball grounded him for two seasons. He recovered enough in 2013 that his pitching impressed staff at WVU, yet during his first year in Morgantown even Vance admits he wasn’t impressive. “I was doing pretty poorly, and the team was on a rough stretch,” he says. “I hadn’t shown anything to give coaches a reason to think I’d be a leader on that pitching staff.” Yet, when WVU Baseball Coach Randy

Mazey needed to jump-start his flagging 2014 team in that game against Ohio State, he decided to take a chance. Vance surprised everyone—perhaps even himself a little. The academic honoree, an exercise physiology major whose backup plan is med school, graduated in May and has just signed with the Johnson City Cardinals. The contract could soon have him throwing opening pitches for St. Louis, if all goes well. And well it should go. After that 2014 game against Ohio State pulled him from obscurity, Vance went on to earn the nickname “Magic Man.” He’s known for flummoxing batters with a wild, high-leg pitch. “Everything goes every which way,” he says, “but somehow the ball ends up going to the plate.” It rarely goes farther. In 2014 and 2015 he earned Big 12 Honorable mentions. Throughout his career he’s created and broken numerous team records. “I’m running with baseball as much as I can,” Vance says. “This is something I’ve dreamt about since my first years at T-ball, when I was 4 and 5 years old. I’m excited to see my dream finally come true.” – kg

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MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

people of McDowell County and the struggles they face just to stay in the place they call home. Hollow launched in 2013 and won a slate of kudos, including a Peabody Award. In 2015, Sheldon moved into podcasting with collaborator Sara Ginsburg. The pair co-host SheDoes, a show focused on women media makers and the things that inspire them. “We wanted to get beyond the process and learn about the philosophy,” she says. The show’s 30-plus episodes so far feature notable writers, filmmakers, artists, and more. Sheldon and husband-collaborator Kerrin now are working on a new documentary about West Virginia’s heroin epidemic. “It’s not so much about use as it is about recovery,” she says. They’re following the first five patients in MedExpress cofounder Kevin Blankenship’s new holistic drug rehabilitation center in Aurora. The film will likely be released in 2017. Sheldon hopes to continue to tell stories about Appalachia and eventually to use those efforts to improve the home she loves. “Making films is my way of becoming a better teacher and leader in the future,” she says. “I think of film and storytelling as the first step.” – zh

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he has traveled all over the country telling stories with words, images, and sounds. But filmmaker Elaine Sheldon keeps coming back to the hills of Appalachia. “There are nuances you can capture in an area you have a personal relationship with—I don’t have that anywhere else. I care about this place,” she says. “People need to know about this place.” It’s important, she says, for the world at large to realize the stories of the mountains are universal. Sheldon grew up outside Charleston and attended WVU for journalism school, where she discovered her talent for filmmaking. After graduating in 2009, she interned with the Washington Post and Charleston Daily Mail before heading to Emerson College in Boston for a master’s degree in visual and media art. Then she came home. In 2012, Elaine began work on what became Hollow, an interactive documentary featuring the

ELIZABETH ROTH

t 29 years old, Eric Watkins already has made strides as an entrepreneur. The Morgantown native and 2014 graduate of West Virginia University is the brain behind Dub V Safe Ride, an alternative to cabs that prevents people from driving drunk. Watkins graduated from West Virginia University with a multidisciplinary studies degree, combining strength and conditioning, business, and entrepreneurship. Although he didn’t always know what he wanted to be, he has known one thing for certain—that he never wanted to depend on people. Since Safe Ride’s start in 2013, Watkins says the business is growing exponentially. The concept of Safe Ride is to get people and their cars safely home after a night of drinking. Safe Ride customers simply schedule a ride and wait for an employee to drive up on a scooter. The Safe Ride driver puts the scooter in the customer’s trunk and drives the customer safely back home. “I was sick and tired of not getting a cab and I didn’t want a DUI. Instead of complaining about the problem, I made a solution.” Watkins says that so far, Safe Ride has been most

popular among graduate students and young professionals. He is in the process of developing an app for Safe Ride, which customers can use to schedule rides with greater ease and efficiency. Watkins says that he wants to make Safe Ride a normal form of transportation across America. “Where do I see myself and my business five years from now? In every major city. I know this is far-fetched, but Safe Ride was far-fetched before it happened, too.” While certainly Watkins’s most successful project to date, Safe Ride is not the only project he has in the works. Currently, he is busy getting his latest venture, High St. Media LLC, up and running. High St. Media is a multimedia company that specializes in recording, mixing, and mastering music of all genres. Watkins likes to quote the old adage, “If you aren’t part of the solution, you’re part of the problem,” and explained that his motive behind everything he does is inventing services that he and his friends would use. While he does hope to expand his businesses throughout the country, Watkins has a distinctive pride for his hometown. “Morgantown will always be my base. I will always have love for Morgantown and I will always come back here.”–ak

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again,” she says. When a position opened up this year at Riverlife, the move from a private consulting firm to an urbanspace-advocacy nonprofit came at the right time in Chase’s career. “I wanted to be a landscape architect further upstream in development processes—to be at the table early on, while the placement of parks and streets is being discussed, as opposed to coming in after the big decisions are made.” With several prestigious teaching appointments and national awards already under her belt, Chase likes being a public face for her profession. “In general, landscape architects are, as we say, a shade-seeking species. We don’t like to be in the spotlight. I have different feelings about that,” she says. “Our profession is often an afterthought but, when you think of a city, what comes to mind are the parks, streets, plazas, riverfronts—these are the building blocks of landscape architecture and of cities.” Everyone benefits from great urban spaces, she says. “For me, it’s about advocating for the landscape architect’s role in this process—showing city governments, developers, people who build cities the value of investment in quality public spaces. I’m doing that in Pittsburgh now and hopefully I can have a more regional impact in the future.” – pk

COURTESY OF NINA CHASE

ore inspiring, life-sustaining urban spaces: That’s what we could expect if people had a better understanding of the value of landscape architecture, says Nina Chase. A 2010 graduate of WVU, Nina moved to Pittsburgh in May 2016 after graduate school and several years’ work in Boston. She’s now a senior project manager at the riverfront redevelopment nonprofit Riverlife. Chase says she got a great grounding in the fundamentals of landscape architecture at WVU—its program was ranked in the top 10 nationally her senior year. Harvard’s Graduate School of Design rounded out her education through multidisciplinary experiences with urban designers, urban planners, architects, and other landscape architects. Then, working at Sasaki Associates near Boston, Chase contributed to high-profile projects like Climate Ready Boston and Washington, D.C.’s Pennsylvania Avenue Initiative. Another project, a vision plan for Pittsburgh’s Strip District Riverfront Park, got Chase involved with Sasaki client Riverlife. “I’ve always loved Pittsburgh but I fell in love with it all over

COURTESY OF MARGIE MASON

n West Virginia’s best storytellers Margie Mason found the inspiration that has sent her across the globe as a correspondent for the Associated Press, but it’s her dedication to the world’s most downtrodden populations that earned this 1997 WVU grad a Pulitzer Prize. Growing up in rural Monongalia County, Mason knew early on she wanted to be a globetrotting journalist. “I was fascinated with storytelling from a very young age,” she says from a hotel in Bangkok, where she was recently called for a story. “My family is a bunch of storytellers—everyone gathers around on weekends to sit and talk.” Mason combined this background in storytelling with an early interest in the Vietnam and Gulf wars. When, as a student, she learned the legendary Vietnam war correspondent George Esper would be speaking at WVU, she jumped at the chance to interview him for the local paper. “I remember being completely starstruck by him,” she says. After the interview, Mason told him of her dreams and

he offered his mentorship. “From that day on he became my guiding light.” Mason soon went on to a career of various AP and newspaper assignments, earning prestigious fellowships at Harvard and the University of Hawaii along the way. In 2005 she was named Asia medical correspondent for the AP. She was based in Vietnam until 2012, when she moved to Jakarta to head the AP’s Indonesia bureau. In April, Mason and three colleagues were recognized with a Pulitzer Prize Gold Medal for Public Service for their efforts to uncover a slavery and labor abuse ring tied to American seafood supplies. After an 18-month investigation, Mason’s work contributed to the freeing of more than 2,000 slaves, numerous arrests, and the writing of new legislation barring U.S. imports of goods produced through slave labor. And this is just one of the many stories she’s covered during her career, which has spanned natural disasters, epidemics, and civil strife. “I try to focus on people who are forgotten—who just don’t have a voice,” she says. Her job is to help give them one. – kg

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A Lunch Walk program was adopted by a clinic in California, and a monthly 5K that at first drew 20 people soon attracted hundreds. Persistently high unemployment makes it hard for people to commit to a healthy lifestyle. To address that underlying problem, Beckett’s WHWC works with the Mingo County Redevelopment Authority, where he serves on the board, and other agencies and organizations to turn reclaimed mine sites into productive farmlands, establish commercial kitchens, and create jobs growing and processing agricultural products. The deeply collaborative vision behind these efforts connects schools, restaurants, farmers, veterans, entrepreneurs, nonprofits, and the local food distribution network in a health-producing, selfdetermined Appalachian food economy. In 2016, Beckett is working on measuring health improvements and helping coal miners left jobless by a shrinking industry find new skills and create and grow new businesses. And as successes take root, he and other community leaders are spreading their vision. “We’re really creating the regional model now. We help other communities create a culture of health as well.” – pk

COURTESY OF WILLIAMSON HEALTH & WELLNESS CENTER

hen Williamson native C. Donovan “Dino” Beckett returned home in 2004, he bought a downtown building that had gone vacant while he was away—one more sign of Mingo County’s long decline. The 1993 WVU grad had just earned his osteopathic medical degree in Lewisburg and was ready to make a change. He opened Righteous Brew Coffee House in one of the storefronts and rented a second out. In the third, he set up his medical practice, and then a free clinic that grew quickly in response to need. Today the Williamson Health & Wellness Center (WHWC), with Beckett as CEO, offers primary care, optometry, and dental and behavioral health services to nearly 100 patients a day. It also has become a hub for solutions to the area’s entrenched health and economic problems. Mingo County is a food desert where one-third of adults are obese and more than 10 percent have diabetes. “We started identifying stakeholders and assets in the county and ways to work together,” Beckett says. WHWC and partners created a weekly farmers’ market with cooking classes and a mobile market that travels the county. Their large community garden has a waiting list.

COURTESY OF JAMES VALENTI

o James Valenti, opera isn’t just an art—it’s a sport, a way to test the bounds of human ability. The powerful tenor has traveled the world displaying his talents and thrilling crowds. But his journey began at WVU. Valenti started singing in choirs and musicals while attending high school in New Jersey. When it came time to pick a college, he decided to go to WVU because he had a cousin who went there. “I went to visit and really, really loved it,” he says. At the time, the university’s music department featured renowned vocal teacher Augusto Paglialunga, who became Valenti’s mentor. “He heard my potential and opened that world even more to me,” he says. Valenti began studying languages as well as operas and the histories of their composers, all while learning to perform the demanding material. “I just became a big sponge.”

After earning his bachelor’s degree in 2000, Valenti left West Virginia for a young artists program in Minnesota before enrolling in graduate school in Philadelphia. It was during this time that he began traveling around the country to perform and, after graduation, started performing internationally. “I feel so blessed. I’m 38 years old. I’ve seen the world. I’ve made friends all over,” he says. In the last few years he has worked extensively in Europe, including a performance of Madame Butterfly in Buenos Aires and a concert in St. Petersburg. He’s also focused on giving back: Valenti is a celebrity ambassador with Children International, and he’s working to pass on the traditions of his art. He recently spent a few weeks in Italy teaching young opera singers. He says he’d like to devote more time to teaching in the future—he’s beginning work on a master’s degree in vocal pedagogy with that in mind. “I enjoy passing on the traditions and the knowledge,” he says. “Who knows? Maybe I’ll be back to teach at WVU one day.” – zh

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for a New Cash Crop Some say a once-illegal plant is the next big thing in West Virginia agriculture. A WVU graduate student is working hard to find out. written by Zack Harold | photographed by Carla Witt Ford

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usanna Wheeler prefers not to divulge the location of her summer garden. She’ll admit it is planted on WVU property, but that is as much information as she’s comfortable giving out. “We don’t want people to try to come up here and see what’s going on,” says the agronomy graduate student. That’s because her crop, planted in neat rows on a quarter-acre plot, is instantly recognizable from certain dorm room posters, reggae albums, and Willie Nelson T-shirts. If you’ve ever stumbled into a shop that sells “for tobacco use only” items, you’ll instantly recognize its green, serrated leaves. Susanna Wheeler is growing Cannabis sativa. Wheeler’s secrecy has nothing to do with getting in trouble with the law. She’s not worried about that. She just doesn’t want to attract any snooping onlookers who might interrupt her very important work—a research project that could potentially change West Virginia’s agriculture industry forever. While her cannabis plants look identical to marijuana, they contain only trace levels of THC, the psychoactive chemical responsible for the plant’s popularity as a recreational drug. That’s why Wheeler and others who work with the crop usually refer to it as “hemp.” It’s the hard-working, buttoned-down member of the cannabis family, with a long history of industrial use. The ships that brought European settlers to the New World were all outfitted with strong hemp ropes, and hemp was one

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of the first crops grown in the English colonies. But it fell out of use over the last century as it was outlawed alongside its psychedelic cousins. There is hope for a comeback, however. Laws are slowly changing, and farmers around the country are beginning to take an interest in hemp again. West Virginia is beginning its own experiment with hemp this year. If the plant is able to thrive in West Virginia’s soil and growers can find willing markets, proponents believe hemp could be the next big industry our state so desperately needs—to the tune of millions of dollars and dozens of market applications.

ROOM TO GROW

It wasn’t too long ago that growing hemp, for any reason, was downright illegal. Despite hemp’s lack of THC, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) still considers any varietal of cannabis a Schedule 1 drug. It’s on the same list as heroin, LSD, mescaline, and MDMA, also popularly known as Ecstasy. But when Congress passed the 2014 Farm Bill, lawmakers included a provision allowing state agriculture departments and colleges and universities to grow hemp for research purposes, as long as state law allowed for hemp farming. West Virginia’s neighboring state of Kentucky, which was the nation’s largest grower of hemp before it was outlawed, has

Marty Biafora’s company iHemp is cultivating about 5 acres of hemp to test the crop’s viability in West Virginia's growing conditions.

Our goal is to just get seed in the ground, get it up, go through the process of harvesting whatever amount we have, so we can know what to expect next year.” Marty Biafora, director of operations for iHemp

made a large investment in hemp research. After beginning with just about 30 acres of hemp in 2014, this year the Kentucky Department of Agriculture approved more than 160 individual growers, not including university projects, to produce almost 4,500 acres of hemp. Although Kentucky’s program is still focused entirely on research—that’s all federal law allows, after all—several processors have sprung up in the state to purchase growers’ crops. There are companies that process the fiber for textile production, clean the seeds for food use, and extract and refine oil from the seeds. There’s even a distillery in Harrodsburg, Kentucky, that makes hemp grain moonshine. Hemp farming has technically been legal in West Virginia since the 1990s. The law as it was written allowed growers to raise hemp as long as they obtained permits from the West Virginia Department of Agriculture and the DEA. No hemp was ever legally grown since neither agency was issuing hemp permits back then, but the state wanted to be ready in case that day eventually arrived. After Congress revised the Farm Bill, state lawmakers in 2015 removed the requirements for a DEA permit from West Virginia Code and created an application process for the hemp program. Eric Ewing, director of the agriculture department’s Plant Industries Division, says he got many phone calls when that application process began on June 1, 2015. But only a few growers actually decided to take the plunge. Seven West Virginia growers, including Wheeler, now have

full licenses to grow hemp. Morgan Leach, executive director of the West Virginia Hemp Farmers Cooperative, estimates those growers have a combined 10 acres of hemp in the ground. Each operation will receive regular visits by Ewing and his staff as they test THC levels in the plants, because state law requires levels to be below 0.3 percent. “Most of them are starting small, which makes sense,” Ewing says. “Anything new like this, you’ve got to start somewhere. We’re in our infancy.”

ROOTS OF AN INDUSTRY

Marty Biafora, director of operations for Morgantown-based iHemp, says his company is growing about 5 acres of hemp this year and soon will begin growing plants indoors at a 1,000-squarefoot hydroponic facility. When it comes time this fall to harvest those plants, Biafora says there isn’t much use for them. Hemp can’t be transported across state lines—more about that below— and there’s nowhere to process hemp in West Virginia right now. But Biafora isn’t concerned. He fully expects it will be years before the hemp industry turns a profit. “Our goal is to just get seed in the ground, get it up, go through the process of harvesting whatever amount we have, so we can know what to expect next year,” he says. “This is just an exploratory process to get the industry up and rolling.” So what might the hemp industry look like once it’s all grown up? Leach imagines a day when the abandoned warehouses dotting the MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

WVU graduate student Susanna Wheeler and intern Tyler Cannon record plant heights for her hemp research project. Measurements are taken every two weeks to compare plant growth among different test groups.

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Ohio River Valley are filled with hemp or hemp products waiting to be loaded onto river barges, trains, and trucks and shipped to the rest of the world. “There is not another crop on the planet that has the utility of hemp,” Leach says. Its fiber can be used to make paper, textiles, rope, insulation, plastics, concrete substitutes, and fiberboard that’s stronger and lighter than wood. Leach is president of Agri Carb Electric, a company that he hopes will make hyperefficient batteries from hemp fiber. But the uses don’t end there. Hemp seeds are packed with proteins, fatty acids, vitamins, and minerals that proponents claim boost immunity, prevent varicose veins, and lower cholesterol, among other purported health benefits. Hemp seeds also can be pressed to extract oils, which can be turned into biofuels, paint, detergent, and a legion of other products. In 2015, the U.S. retail market sold more than $570 million in products made from hemp fiber, hemp seeds, and hemp oil, the Hemp Industries Association estimates. That includes $280 million in hemp food, food supplements, and body care products, up more than 10 percent over 2014 sales figures. Leach believes sales will continue to grow as the industry develops—28 states now have laws allowing hemp research—and he’s confident hemp could be the big diversifier West Virginia’s fossil fuel-focused economy needs. He’s been in contact with a company that makes mats for mechanics, for which it imports 500 tons of hemp each year from Bangladesh. There’s also a food producer that uses 400 tons of hemp seed per year. Capturing even a fraction of the international hemp market could be an unprecedented boon for the state’s agriculture sector. Most of West Virginia’s farmers do their work on evenings and weekends while relying on day jobs to pay the bills. According to 2007 Census statistics, four out of five West Virginia farms make less than $10,000 a year. Leach says he doesn’t know how large the Department of Agriculture will allow the pilot program to get, but the West Virginia Hemp Farmers Cooperative already has about 40 people interested in growing hemp on their properties next year. “It’s a wide-open space, if you can navigate the legal hurdles to get it done,” he says. “As long as the sun shines, we’re in business.” But, as Ewing at the agriculture department pointed out, the modern hemp industry is still only a seedling. It’s unclear what the fully grown business would look like—how deep its roots would go, how wide its leaves would reach. We don’t even know for sure how well the plant will grow in the state. This is where Susanna Wheeler comes in.

FARMING IN THE DARK

If a West Virginia farmer needs advice for growing tomatoes, watermelons, wheat, asparagus, alfalfa, or any other common agricultural product, experts at the WVU Extension Service can provide most of the information she needs. Extension agents have access to data on the best times to plant crops, the best times to fertilize them, proper soil acidities, the optimal spacing of plants in fields, and many other variables. But, for the most part, hemp growers in West Virginia are flying blind.

There is not another crop on the planet that has the utility of hemp.” Morgan Leach, executive director of the West Virginia Hemp Farmers Cooperative

Wheeler came back to WVU last fall. The Charleston native earned her undergraduate degree in agriculture in 2012, then moved to Nicholas County, where she spent some time growing vegetables for farmers’ markets, growing sorghum for molasses, and tapping maple trees for syrup. When she returned to Morgantown to work on her master’s degree, she planned to spend her first summer researching cover crops, varieties of plants grown during agricultural downtimes to protect and enrich the soil. But then her roommate mentioned the agriculture department’s hemp program. “I started reading about the legislation that was passed and decided I’d like to do a small experiment on the side,” she says. The more she learned about hemp, however, the more she realized a small experiment wouldn’t be enough. “We know almost nothing about how it will grow in the state. We don’t know what varieties to recommend, we don’t know what fertilizer to recommend,” says Louis McDonald, WVU professor of plant and soil sciences and Wheeler’s adviser. Most of the U.S.-based hemp research Wheeler has uncovered dates back to the 1940s. “It’s not really relevant to our modern agricultural practices,” she says. Wheeler discovered some basic information from a French textbook, along with a few journal articles and research papers. She got some advice from growers in Kentucky whose own hemp MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

experiments began a few years back. But there’s nowhere for West Virginia farmers to get state-specific information about hemp. “There’s so much research that needs to be done. I immediately became overwhelmed,” she says. She pitched the idea to McDonald, who agreed to give it a shot. After completing the application process with the state agriculture department—which included state and federal background checks—Wheeler obtained an importer permit from the DEA before tracking down overseas companies to provide her hemp seeds. “They’re not plentiful. It’s not like, let’s go to Southern States and get some varieties or do a quick Google search.” She eventually found a broker based in Kentucky who had relationships with Italian and Polish hemp seed vendors. The seeds mostly arrived without incident, although U.S. Customs in New York held up one order for three weeks. Wheeler finally planted the first of her seeds in late May, in that undisclosed half-acre plot on WVU property. She planted five varieties of hemp to see how well they would grow in West Virginia’s soil and climate conditions under different fertility levels, which she controls by adding compost to the plants. She also began a second, smaller research project in late June to test hemp’s abilities as a “hyperaccumulator.” Other researchers’ findings suggest the plant might be able to extract harmful elements like cadmium, lead, and zinc from the ground. Wheeler has a few dozen plants growing in pots of contaminated soil at a WVU greenhouse. If the results prove promising, hemp eventually could be used to remediate former industrial sites.

GROWING PAINS

For all the excitement surrounding hemp, there are still a lot of hurdles to clear before the plant can become a full-fledged cash crop. Lawmakers earlier this year passed an amendment to the agriculture department’s rules to exclude private growers from the hemp program. “That’s what our attorneys advised us,” says State Senator Bob Williams, a Democrat from Taylor County, who made the amendment. He says West Virginia Code only allows the Department of Agriculture and state colleges and universities to grow hemp, so issuing permits to private growers is beyond the department’s authority. “We were trying to make the rule conform with the code.” The changes disquieted hemp growers, many of whom had already invested money into the project, Governor Earl Ray Tomblin vetoed the bill but Williams still believes the Department of Agriculture is operating the project outside the bounds of state law. “I’m not a lawyer, that’s just my opinion. But I think the law is clear as to what is allowed,” he says. The agriculture department reads the law a little differently. Chris Ferro, the department’s chief of staff, says the Farm Bill clearly allows for cultivation and marketing of hemp. “While there’s no definition of marketing (in the law), a dictionary definition of marketing means to sell,” he says. “Our interpretation was, if Congress wanted us to research and market, that’s what we intended to do.” Federal laws and regulations provide their own challenges to hemp growers and officials. When Eric Ewing had to take hemp 52

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seeds from his office in Charleston to a grower in the Eastern Panhandle, he couldn’t drive his normal route through Virginia and Maryland. “I had to go all back roads, staying in-state, because if I’d crossed state lines I would have been transporting controlled substances across state lines.” That’s a felony. Ewing also made sure to bring lots of identification and paperwork on the off chance he’d be stopped by a curious police officer along the way. “We were very careful not to speed. Not that we aren’t always, but we were extra careful,” he says. And even once the hemp is fully grown, growers cannot transport their crop across state lines—it must first be processed into textiles, paper, seed oil, or other products. But as of right now, there aren’t any producers in West Virginia ready to turn raw hemp into end-use products. One grower does have plans to buy a seed oil press, but his operation is not up and running

yet. “It’s going to lose its novelty unless you can sell it,” Louis McDonald says. Morgan Leach at the hemp farmers’ co-op says these issues likely will not go away until Congress completely legalizes hemp. And until that happens, the hemp industry likely will not get the one thing it needs most to thrive: money. For the time being, Wheeler is doing all her research alone, for no pay. McDonald says the agronomic study of hemp is so new it’s difficult to get funding for research. “Because it’s such a rigmarole to get seed, nobody’s willing to give you money until you can show you’re able to get seed. My hope is we can do this little project now, get the seed, collect data, secure our plots, do the research … (and) next year it will give us leverage,” he says. “Lots of university people are interested, but they don’t have money to do additional research. It’s always the problem: Where’s the money going to come from?”

McDonald says if the industry ever takes off in West Virginia, we’ll have Wheeler to thank. “She has done an enormous amount of work,” he says. “She’s the one who’s worked with these seed companies, worked with the Department of Agriculture, tried to get these additional growers to participate. It would not be here without her.” Despite worries about money and legality, Wheeler is plowing ahead. Her projects will likely run through October, when she will harvest seed from the hemp plants. If she’s able to get enough funding, she’d like to test soil samples to see how hemp changes soil’s chemical makeup. She knows these experiments will only answer a handful of the questions that remain about hemp. But it’s a start. “There’s a lot of speculation,” Wheeler says. “There are prolific pro- and anti-hemp beliefs. But right now, they’re just that. Beliefs.” MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

To support the research goals of WVU’s 2020 Strategic Plan, the new Agricultural Sciences Building has 55,000 square feet of laboratory and research space.

On February 1, WVU was recognized among the universities with the highest level of research activity in the nation. The “R1” designation acknowledges an enduring, institution-wide commitment to constructive thinking. It may also boost the land grant mission of economic development.

HOK

written by Pam Kasey

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hat makes a great research university? More than likely, it’s the same things that make a great book publisher or a great circus: creative minds out front but, at least as important, savvy administration backing them up. What’s certain, though, is that a great research university has to do a lot of research. And in February 2016, WVU was classified R1: Highest Research Activity, with just 114 other universities nationwide—rubbing shoulders with the likes of Johns Hopkins, Cornell, and Caltech. It’s a quick realization of an aspiration WVU set in 2010 under then-President James Clements as part of its 10-year strategic plan: “WVU will attain and maintain the highest Carnegie research ranking by 2020.” Students, alumni, and West Virginians everywhere cheered the announcement. Facebook users shared Morgantown magazine’s post on the topic more than 500 times. “Proud of my alma mater,” wrote one Twitter user. “That’s excellent news, and a testament to excellent leadership,” gushed another. “This is a big deal,” a third enthused. It is a big deal. “Carnegie is one of the true classifications,” says WVU President E. Gordon Gee, who noted that this reclassification from R2, calculated from 2013-14 data, reflects things in place before he came on in 2014. “It gives you a real snapshot of where universities stand comparatively.” Here’s the thing. R1 is not a ranking, as the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching has insisted since it established its classification system in the 1970s. WVU’s R1 designation doesn’t mean it’s “better” than R2 universities. The Carnegie Classification system’s 33 categories are meant to be neutrally descriptive—to classify the nation’s 4,600plus institutions of higher education, everything from small liberal arts schools to internet-only colleges to faith-related institutions, so researchers of higher education can compare apples to apples. Carnegie bristles at the use of words like “elite” in reference to R1 and at schools’ attempts to move from one category to another. It wants to characterize the system, not influence it. But let’s be realistic. For those dozen or so universities that find themselves at the margin between R1 and R2 from one fiveyear Carnegie Classification update to the next, it’s inevitable that they would view the respected policy and research center’s formula as prescriptive rather than descriptive—as a recipe for growing a research program.

Tweaking the Formula We might date WVU’s R1 aspiration to February 27, 2006—the day the 2005 update was published, reclassifying WVU from R1 to R2. It didn’t mean WVU had gone downhill. It simply followed from a change in formula, and a quick look at that makes the 2015 reclassification more clear. Before 2000, Carnegie based its classification of doctoral universities on a straightforward number for federal research spending: Universities that got the most federal funding placed in R1, WVU included. It was an approach that privileged large institutions and those that do the kinds of research that cost a lot, an official explained to Inside Higher Ed in 2006, but

The Current Doctoral University Formula While Carnegie tweaks parts of its approach with each fiveyear update, the formula behind the doctoral universities has been stable since the 2005 revision. Here's how it works. Every school that grants at least 20 Ph.D.s, not including professional degrees, is considered a doctoral university. That came to 335 institutions in the 2015 update, the most ever. For each of those institutions, Carnegie gathers numbers in three areas. To oversimplify a little: •research and development expenditures, •science and engineering research staff, and •doctoral degrees. Money, staffing, degrees. Peeking behind the curtain, it’s easy to see why Carnegie doesn’t want its categories seen as ranks—the formula doesn’t evaluate the quality of research or its significance. It’s truly about scale. research

development spending

research staff

per faculty member

total activity

highest research activity

doctoral degrees

high research activity

moderate research activity

So what it means for WVU to be classified as an R1 institution is that, among the 335 U.S. schools that granted at least 20 doctoral degrees in 2013-14, WVU’s research activity was somewhere among the 115 that had the highest amount of spending, staffing, and doctoral degrees granted. Where was WVU among the pack? Carnegie doesn’t publish its calculated indices, but to look at just one component, WVU was above the bottom one-fifth of the 115 R1 schools in research expenditures in 2013-14 (see Figure 2).

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Eric Merriam conducts stream research in Boone County.

undervalued intimate settings and less technical research that might also be very productive. To make the 2000 update more meaningful, but still trying for a simple metric, the organization used numbers of doctoral degrees conferred instead. WVU remained R1. But that approach placed too little emphasis on actual research, the organization decided. So for its 2005 update it came out with a more nuanced, though less transparent, formula (see sidebar on page 55 for details). That’s when WVU fell out of R1. “Of course, I wasn’t here,” says Gee, who was president at Vanderbilt University in Nashville at the time. “But I know it certainly motivated WVU to focus on a very clear research strategy.” The R1 designation WVU has regained is more meaningful than the one it fell from a decade ago. It’s also a far smaller group—we could, at risk of offending Carnegie, say “more exclusive”—down from 151 in 2000 to 115 now.

Scott Rotruck, director of Energy & Transportation Services with Spilman Thomas & Battle, left, talks with Greg Hand, WVU special assistant to the vice president for health sciences, at the Northeast Natural Energy Marcellus Shale Energy and Environment Laboratory near WVU’s Morgantown campus.

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

WVU’s 2020 Strategic Plan set excellence in research as one overarching goal. To get there, the university targeted a small number of specific research areas—places where it would concentrate capital campaign efforts, improve facilities, and increase faculty. “They fall under three areas of emphasis for the university,” says WVU Vice President for Research Fred King. One is improving the health of the state’s residents. “That includes, for example, the National Institutes of Health clinical and translational research award,” he says, referring to a 2012 $20 million grant to speed research results to those suffering from diabetes, cancer, and cardiovascular disease. A second is education, with emphasis on STEM education and science literacy—built, for example, into a competitive 2015 National Science Foundation project WVU is collaborating on with Marshall and West Virginia State universities. And a third is improving quality of life for residents in the state, “including water quality and water stewardship,” King says, “and you see it through the Energy Institute, where we’re looking at how we make the most of our natural resources.” It was a wise approach, Gee says. “Rather than trying to be all things to all people, they identified areas of real opportunity to be very competitive and to leapfrog a number of other institutions.” The university openly aimed to regain R1 status. “Predictive modeling of the achievements necessary to gain the Carnegie ranking (R1: Highest Research Activity) was completed,” reads a report of one 2012 meeting. So it dialed up the research funding effort. “We put in place some mechanisms to help faculty be more successful: grant-writing workshops, for example,” King says. Total research expenditures rose from $155 million in fiscal 2010 to $164 million in 2014—directly boosting the Carnegie “money” metric. It increased the number of graduate students and postdoctoral fellows, from 148 in 2009 to 159 in 2014—that’s “staffing.” And doctoral programs grew, raising completions from 166 in 2010 to 183 in 2014—that’s “degrees.” On the one hand, this is just what Carnegie wants to avoid: universities picking its formula apart and directing efforts to its component parts. On the other, the drive to R1 is embedded in a genuine university-wide commitment to elevating WVU’s

COURTESY OF WEST VIRGINIA UNIVERSITY

Savvy Administration

Fig. 2

Now classified R1: Highest Research Activity, WVU is among just 2.5% of degree-granting institutions nationwide.

R1 Schools’ Total Research Spending, 2013-14 ($000,000)

$2,500

Johns Hopkins

Specialized and Tribal

Associates

$1,500

Doctoral

r’s

$1,200

“I assume it will help us to find ‘better’ institutions to collaborate with because, from their point of view, we are their peer now.”

Fig. 3

Baccala ureate

/ te ea s r au te al ia cc soc a B As

Carnegie doesn’t publish its internal calculations for classifying doctoral institutions. But in one metric, research spending, WVU came in just above the bottom quintile of schools classified R1.

Breakdown of Doctoral Universities MIT $900

Yale

$600

Purdue

Xingbo Liu, professor of materials science and associate chair of research, WVU Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources

Doctoral

Public

Land grant (including WVU)

Caltech Fig. 4

Fig. 1

Carnegie’s Breakdown of U.S. Colleges and Universities, 2015

WVU Total Research Spending ($000,000)

$300

$180 $160 $140 $120 $100 $80 2005

WVU

2006

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$0 MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

productivity and relevance. The university updated infrastructure. “You see over the past decade new facilities at engineering, a new life sciences building, new space for the Department of Physics, soon a new agriculture building,” says King, to name just a few structures. Initiatives like tighter partnerships with the corporate world connect students with internship opportunities and keep faculty research interests grounded in reality. Entrepreneurship is now woven throughout the university, and a more muscular commercialization program stands ready to help faculty and students apply for patents and work through licensing innovations and creating spin-offs. Widespread confidence in WVU’s direction blew the State of Minds capital campaign right past its $750 million goal more than a year ahead of schedule in 2014, allowing the university to reach instead for $1 billion—four times the Building Greatness campaign of 1998 to 2003 and a goal it’s already nearly met.

How Being R1 Helps “This is a reflection of lots of good work by lots of good people,” says Clay Marsh, executive dean of the School of Medicine, when asked about R1. He and other campus leaders emphasize the excellence and dedication behind the designation. “It recognizes academic achievement and research and scholarship across the board,” says Eberly School of Arts and Sciences Dean Gregory Dunaway. Beyond an acknowledgement of past achievements, though, everyone agrees R1 will intensify the university’s momentum. One obvious way it will do that is by attracting the highest-caliber faculty because, as Marsh says, people are attracted to places of high reputation. King agrees, noting that “it raises the awareness of the public outside the state in terms of quality of the institution.” Gee goes further still: “It shows that WVU has entered into the 58

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

front ranks of American institutions and in that it is an enormously important recruiting tool.” That affects the student body. “When you attract the best faculty you attract the best students,” Gee says. “Our applications are up 31 percent, and the entering (2016-17) class will be not only the largest in the history of the university but also the most academically qualified.” It also helps faculty make the case for more research funding. “Name recognition is an important part of the decision-making process by both federal agencies and industry, although it is usually not spelled out,” says Xingbo Liu, a professor of materials science and associate chair of research in the Statler College of Engineering and Mineral Resources. Liu, himself a researcher, sees other subtle possibilities. “I assume it will help us to find ‘better’ institutions to collaborate with because, from their point of view, we are their peer now.” It might even bolster the university’s image of itself. “I often say that I have been president of a number of institutions that are not nearly as good as they think they are and I am now president of an institution that is better than it thinks it is,” Gee says. “This is a remarkable achievement for a public research land grant institution that is meeting all the various expectations that come with that, in a very small state.” Ultimately, the R1 designation may serve the modern land grant mission of solving the state’s problems and increasing its prosperity. “When you think about some of the most prosperous areas of the country—Silicon Valley, Stanford and Berkeley, the Boston area—having a great research university really can be an attractor and a driver of the economy,” King says. Marsh has powerful words for it: “It’s an accelerant to our progress in creating the kind of service to our state that changes everything for people.”

COURTESY OF WEST VIRGINIA UNIVERSITY

Valeriya Gritsenko, assistant professor of physical therapy, wants to learn as much about the brain as possible as a way to further stroke research.

HEALTHY LIVING

SHUTTERSTOCK

Building a Culture of Recovery WVU Collegiate Recovery answers the call to change campus culture. â&#x17E;¼

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HEALTHY LIVING

WVU didn’t start great for Morgantown High School basketball standout Lauren Blackwell. When the high-achieving student gave up athletics to focus on her grades, her test anxiety resurfaced. Rowing for the crew team sophomore year helped. But family insisted she focus on academics, so she gave that up. “I was overwhelmed without structure. I spent the extra free time self-medicating and partying,” she says. A lot of her high school and college friends were addicted to opiates and, by the summer of 2011, she was, too. Her grades plummeted. In the spring of 2012, she quit school. It’s not like Blackwell didn’t try to solve her problem. “I went to the Carruth Center for counseling on many occasions,” she says. “But I never really got the help I needed. There was a lot of talk about all the drug busts on campus but they never gave any resources to students, at least that I can remember.” That’s how it was, not all that long ago: Students had to handle addiction pretty much on their own. “I was an anonymous recovering addict when I was at WVU. I didn’t tell many people,” says 2014 graduate Joey Ferguson, who managed his recovery by attending offcampus 12-step meetings. Students faced stigma, too. “When I first went to the Carruth Center, it was by the bookstore,” says 2016 graduate Emily Birckhead, also a recovering addict. “You didn’t want anybody to see you walking in that door.” WVU was far from alone in that. Higher ed in general has long been known for substance availability but has been slow to create resources for students who struggle in permissive environments. “Just a few years ago, there were only maybe 30 or 35 collegiate recovery programs in total,” says WVU psychologist and recovery specialist Susie Mullens. But times are changing, and fast. That’s due in part to the national nonprofit Transforming Youth Recovery, or TYR, which is granting $10,000 to 100 colleges to create recovery programs— including WVU. In February 2016, building on several years’ groundwork and boosted by the TYR grant, WVU launched its Collegiate Recovery Program (CRP). It’s one of 170 collegiate recovery efforts TYR listed in July 2016 in a nationwide roster it updates regularly. Longtime respected WVU psychologist Cathy Yura heads up WVU’s program. “Being 60

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

I didn't have any examples of students in recovery. The thought of that being someone's reality never crossed my mind.” LAUREN BLACKWELL

“Really Enjoy Life”

When Lauren Blackwell withdrew from WVU in the spring of 2012, she thought her stress, and her opiate addiction, would ease up if she just worked for a while. But shame over feeling she’d failed herself and her family, especially three younger siblings who look up to her, kept her going back to drugs. She entered treatment in November 2013 in Williamsburg, Virginia, and afterward moved to Washington, D.C. “I could have gone back to West Virginia but there weren’t enough support and resources,” she says. Blackwell crafted a patchwork tailored to her needs and goals: Participation in the CRP at George Washington University, which welcomed her even as a non-student, and coursework online to earn her WVU degree in May 2016. She lives in D.C. now in a supportive environment with several other women in recovery. “I want to see students helping other students,” she says of WVU’s new CRP, “not just to stay clean and sober but to be productive and happy and to really enjoy life.”

the state’s land-grant institution, WVU needed to be a leader in this,” Yura says. “Susie and I really hope this will become a program that other campuses across the state can join in.” Students will find a strong schedule of group meetings on campus this fall, with new CRP services in the works.

All Issues, All Paths About one-fifth of people ages 18 to 21 meet the criteria for a substance use disorder,

according to often-cited national statistics. On the Morgantown campus, that would mean thousands of young people are struggling. “I know the problem here at the university and it has increased,” Yura says. “It used to be marijuana and alcohol. Now, with prescription drug abuse and opiates and some of the designer drugs, it’s become far more complex. We all know it’s a concern for the institution.” That’s the need collegiate recovery programs across the nation aim to meet. The

HEALTHY LIVING

You can feel very alone when classmates are talking about how drunk they got last night. Collegiate Recovery is a place to stop in, to fill up on hope again.” JOEY FERGUSON

“Good for the World”

Freshman year at WVU in 2009 was rough for Joey Ferguson. “My addiction was growing,” he recounts, “but I didn’t know I had the problem I had. Where I grew up, it was a learned way to be, using one thing and then something else. I started using heavy. Heroin, pain pills—anything to change the way I felt.” He pretty quickly quit school and moved back home to Wayne, West Virginia, and he eventually entered treatment in Portsmouth, Ohio in the fall of 2011. The following spring, Ferguson took on a light load at Marshall University. “I probably wasn’t ready,” he says. “I still had a lot of early recovery issues: sleep, self-confidence, responsibility.” The 12-step meetings in Huntington helped him through. In the fall of 2012 he made it back to WVU and, with reliance on off-campus 12-step meetings, he graduated in December 2014. Today, Ferguson is a recovery coordinator at Jacob’s Ladder addiction treatment community in Aurora, West Virginia. “I’d like to see a cultural shift on campus, a recognition of the people that are making these huge changes in their lives and to do good for the world.”

“No Shame”

Emily Birckhead earned honors at her Charleston high school, even as she battled an eating disorder and a peer culture of drinking. But freshman year at Marshall University ended with her college fund putting her through rehabilitation. “Your body’s not meant to run on alcohol,” she says. “I was having seizures three or four times a week.” AA and enrollment at WVU for a change of environment weren’t enough to keep her sober. “But there wasn’t any eating disorder treatment in the state,” she says. When she called WVU’s Chestnut Ridge Center, suicidal, in October 2014 and was told there was a four-month waiting list for counseling, she tried Cathy Yura at the Carruth Center instead. Birckhead got through a rocky recovery, with Yura’s help. She graduated in May 2016. “I’ve started doing yoga and gardening and making art and taught myself to cook and to have a healthy relationship with food.” She looks forward to the support and accessibility WVU’s CRP will offer students. “And to take the stigma away—because there is no shame in struggling.”

Collegiate Recovery is creating a community where people can come together and not be the one sober person.” EMILY BIRCKHEAD

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HEALTHY LIVING

The CRP can provide students with resources so they don't have to lose years to their disease.” OLIVIA DALE PAPE

“Sense of Purpose”

When Olivia Dale Pape moved to Morgantown from Los Angeles in the summer of 2015, she didn’t find the recovery resources she needed. “My addictive behavior is food—I’m a compulsive overeater and an anorexic,” says the Illinois native in long-term recovery. She was treated for restrictive anorexia in 2010. “I had a heart rate of 23 beats per minute and they thought I was dying.” Insurance coverage kept her alive but didn’t provide ongoing support. She relied on a 12-step group for her disease. “It was amazing to hear people saying my story, things I was totally embarrassed about.” A series of life-shaking events after she and her boyfriend moved to Morgantown—a break-up, a car break-down, a hospitalization—led to a revelation: “I realized I had to start a meeting here.” Pape now runs a weekly Overeaters Anonymous meeting under the umbrella of WVU’s CRP. She will begin earning a master’s degree in social and behavioral sciences this fall. “What I want to do is a lot of the volunteer work I’ve been doing with Collegiate Recovery,” she says. “Providing resources for young people really fuels me and gives me a sense of purpose.”

movement got its start in the 1970s with group meetings and individual counseling at a small number of colleges. As studies showed the value—students supported on-campus in recovery had lower relapse rates than the general population and higher GPAs and graduation rates than their peers—new programs built on the successes of the early models. Collegiate recovery programs today 62

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

vary widely. Some focus on substance addictions like alcohol and drugs, while others encompass process addictions— activities like gambling, spending, or eating—and behavioral health conditions. They might promote one approach, like a 12-step framework or abstinence, or they might support multiple paths to recovery. They range from informal student organizations to staffed programs with

dedicated space. “Regardless of these differences, all programs aim to provide support to students, prevent relapse, and promote academic success,” Mullens says. WVU’s CRP is taking an all-issues approach, “because we know that when people have any addiction, there’s often some underlying issue,” Yura says. It also embraces all paths. “Our issues may look similar,” says Olivia Dale Pape, who runs a weekly Overeaters Anonymous meeting on campus, “but our personalities are different and it’s all so unique to the individual.”

WVU’s CRP So Far It’s just getting started, but it’s starting from a good place. Now located in the new Health and Education building on the Evansdale campus, the Carruth Center has a totally different feel from just a few years ago. “You go in and there are so many people in there,” Birckhead says. “People smile at each other.” This fall, six 12-step meetings weekly— including Alcoholics, Narcotics, and Overeaters Anonymous as well as an All Recovery meeting—will be available in a dedicated space with a kitchen on the Evansdale campus. The Carruth Center’s core service of individual counseling is also available for those in or considering recovery, Yura says. That’s all part of the larger WELLWVU programming, which includes stress-reducers like yoga and meditation. And counselors can help students connect with wellness resources like the student recreation center, Adventure West Virginia, and meaningful volunteer opportunities. “West Virginia needs programming that provides help to its citizens earlier, rather than later, so their drug problems don’t get to the point of overdose and death,” says Joseph McGuire of the WVU Student Government Association. “The CRP will allow students to get the help they need without sacrificing their education in the meantime.” Look for much more as the program ramps up. Possibilities include a dedicated space for meetings, sober housing, scholarships, and alumni mentors. It’s all part of changing the culture. “WVU has been called the ‘number one party school’ in the past,” Mullens says. “We’d like it to be the number one recovery school.” recovery.wvu.edu; well. wvu.edu/ccpps/student_assistance_program written by pam kasey photographed by carla witt ford

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Intro to College

Welcome students, faculty, and Morgantown residents to WVU's annual spectacle of moving in, matriculating, and making merry. Grab your pens and notepads. Our WVU 101 course guides you through (almost) everything you need to know as you head back to school. â&#x17E;ź MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

THE U

28,000+ students in town

BY THE

DON’T MISS

WEEKEND PICKS

tuition

NUMBERS oo

& supp ks li

Cost to Average Student

$12,494

& boa om rd ro

Evansdale Crossing Introduced in the fall of 2015, this Mountainlair 2.0 offers specialized dining, from barbeque to pizza to coffee and snacks. Student meal plans are accepted all day.

Thousands of students come to town each year. Here’s a breakdown of their costs.

TK’s Fruit, Produce & Bubble Tea For those looking for quick, healthy alternatives downtown, TK’s has an assortment of house and custom smoothie options to go with its fresh produce.

$1,100

sportati

Cost to Average Student

$1,450

Cost to Average Student

$7,624 other

Cost to Average Student

$945

BIG MAJORS ON CAMPUS Business management & marketing, Engineering, Multi/Interdisciplinary Studies, Social Sciences

BEST OF

MORGANTOWN

New to town and not sure about anything? Check out the 2016 Best of Morgantown results at morgantownmag.com. 64

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

Mountain People’s Co-op Mountaineers in the know love the Mountain People’s Co-op, which specializes in natural, organic, fair trade, bulk, and local items. The co-op is also downtown’s only local grocer. Mainstage Morgantown One of Morgantown’s newer music venues, Mainstage has brought in many acts, from up-and-comers to certified performers like Waka Flocka Flame and George Clinton. Enjoy the two bars adjacent to the stage before and during the show. 123 Pleasant Street A local music staple since the ’80s, 123 provides concert space for local acts, underground artists, and, every once in a while, that awesome touring band you’ve been dying to see. The venue also offers two full-service bars, so drink lines are rarely long. Park & Madison With two shops in Morgantown, this high-end boutique will satisfy fashionistas with back-to-school looks for men and women. The locally owned Park & Madison offers designer brands including 7 For All Mankind, BCBG, Citizens of Humanity, and more. Art Museum of WVU Having a a big-city art craving but don’t want to drive to Pittsburgh? Recently opened, this art museum houses everything from nineteenth century landscapes to contemporary sculptures. Black Bear Burritos When Chipotle and Qdoba won’t cut it, dine at one of Black Bear’s two locations in Morgantown. Utilizing local products and beer, Black Bear provides a fun atmosphere for a relaxing night away from High Street. Unique menu combinations are sure to please. Coopers Rock State Forest After a long week of classes and studying, nothing beats heading outside for a quick jaunt or a long hike along the forest’s famed Rock City, Ravens Rock, and other outcroppings. Morgantown Brewing Company Offering local beer crafted in-house, this bar and restaurant provides excellent brew deals as well as a lighted back patio, perfect for sipping and relaxing as the night unwinds. —cr

CARLA WITT FORD; ELIZABETH ROTH

Cost to Average Student

THE U

THE MOUNTAINEER

A gunshot rings through the warm, autumn air. Wispy, gray smoke lightly clouds the sky, then is swiftly swept away by the breeze. A man, clad in leather buckskins and a coonskin cap, runs onto Mountaineer Field, with the entire WVU football team trailing behind him. He hoists his gun high and cups a hand to his mouth, shouting, “Let’s go!” Thousands of fans in the football stadium above him bellow back, “Mountaineers!” This person—a different man or woman every year— who rallies cheers from the sea of blue and gold at every WVU football game is the university’s treasured mascot: the Mountaineer. The tradition of a WVU student mascot began in 1927 when Clay Crouse volunteered for the position. The Mountaineers who followed him were all volunteers, until 1934 when The Mountain Honorary was created as the Mountaineer selection committee and chose Lawson Hill as the mascot that year. The first Mountaineers wore uniforms of overalls, flannel shirts, coonskin caps, and bearskin capes. In 1937 Boyd “Slim” Armstrong, a physical education student from Grant County, became the first Mountaineer to wear the now-famous buckskin uniform. Being the Mountaineer is an esteemed and coveted position. Mascot hopefuls go through a rigorous selection process overseen by the Mountain Honorary. Out of all the applications, only about 10 Mountaineer-wannabes are selected to interview, and of those 10, only four get to audition at a basketball game. The candidate with the highest scores from an application, interview, and audition is chosen by the Honorary to be the Mountaineer. Troy Clemons, from Greenbrier County, has been named the Mountaineer for the 2016-17 school year and is the 64th person to hold the official title. —ak

THROUGH THE YEARS

1927 Clay Crouse volunteers as the first Mountaineer. 1934 Lawson Hill is the first Mountaineer to be selected by the Mountain Honorary. 1937 Boyd “Slim” Armstrong is the first Mountaineer to wear the traditional buckskin uniform. 1963 William “Buck” Rogers is Mountaineer during WVU’s centennial year celebrations. 1990 Natalie Tennant becomes the first female Mountaineer. Tennant has served as West Virginia Secretary of State since 2009. 1991-93 Rock Wilson is the only official Mountaineer to serve as mascot for three years. 2009 Rebecca Durst becomes the second woman to wear the buckskins. 2016 Troy Clemons named Mountaineer for 2016-17.

mountaineer sports by the season soccer volleyball football cross country golf tennis rowing swimming/diving rifle basketball

WVU PHOTOS

wrestling track & field gymnastics baseball aug

sept

oct

nov

dec

jan

feb

mar

apr

may

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MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

THE U

YOUR WVU

BUCKET LIST

WVU students have many traditions and a university full of opportunities, and all are worth experiencing. Here is a checklist of things all Mountaineers should do before they graduate: You will probably have to ride the PRT at least once during your time on campus. Enjoy the recent updates and appreciate the free transportation device for its scenic rides across campus. Climbing the Life Science Building steps is a challenge, but nothing makes a student a true Mountaineer like a little hard work walking up more than 80 stairs. Take a selfie with WVU’s beloved mascot, the Mountaineer Troy Clemons! Put your arms around your fellow Mountaineers and sing “Take Me Home, Country Roads” after a winning football game at Mountaineer Field. There are plenty of photo-worthy spots on campus, but none quite as famous as Woodburn Hall. Whether the landmark is set before blue skies, sunsets, or blankets of snow in winter, Woodburn Hall is worthy of an Instagram post. Take a hike! Enjoy West Virginia’s natural beauty through the incredible scenery at Coopers Rock State Forest or the wildlife at the WVU Core Arboretum. Who wears bow ties and large round glasses and loves to talk with students? University President E. Gordon Gee. Take time to meet the president and have a quick chat. There is something for everyone on High Street, Morgantown’s downtown hub. Make sure to explore High Street’s shops, restaurants, and bars with friends. FallFest is a free concert with popular artists on the first weekend of the new school year. It’s an experience like no other, so make sure to attend FallFest at least once during your time at WVU. Cheat Lake has a number of popular swimming spots. Find a car and grab some friends for a trip to the water on warm weekends. Exams and papers can drive any student crazy, but WVU’s libraries are the perfect place to pull at least one, if not several, all-nighters. Make sure to take advantage of the many educational resources they offer.

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

HIDDEN BO UNTY

Mountie Bounty can be used at more than just dining halls and the Mountainlair or Evansdale Crossing— Morgantown businesses have begun accepting Mountie Bounty for a variety of services (but mostly restaurants). Here are a few of our top picks. High Street Canteen 514 North High Street Cold Stone Creamery 356 High Street The Cupcakerie 194 Willey Street CVS Pharmacy locations across town Dickey’s Barbeque Pit 1111 Van Voorhis Road The Greeks 331 Beechurst Avenue Morgan’s High Street Diner 250 High Street Panera Bread locations in Suncrest and downtown Peace, Love, and Little Donuts 1078 Suncrest Towne Centre Drive Pizza Hut 74 Patteson Drive —ak

GYM CLASS HEROES

College isn't just calculus. When numbers are getting you down, try one of these classes—the things you should have learned at summer camp.

THE U

GETTING TO THE

POLLS ON TIME

This year is a big year for a lot of Americans—it’s time to choose our 45th U.S. president. Many students also will head to the polls for the first time, a humbling yet empowering experience. But as you get ready to vote on November 8, make sure you have all your democratic ducks in a row: Deadline to register for West Virginia residents The state’s voter registration deadline is 21 days before Election Day. This year, the deadline is October 18, 2016.

WORK HARD, PARTY SAFELY

ELIZABETH ROTH; COURTESY OF WEST VIRGINIA UNIVERSITY

Lately WVU students have been scolded for partying too hard. The leaders of WVU have worked to curb the party culture, from kicking countless organizations off campus due to unacceptable party habits to pushing the annual back-to-school party FallFest to earlier in the day. But not all changes are punitive: The university’s 2016 Medical Amnesty Policy allows students to call for help without fear of punishment for being intoxicated. The policy was created in hopes of bringing an end to the attitudes that contribute to tragedies like the 2014 death of WVU student Nolan Burch, who died of heart failure caused by extreme intoxication after a night of partying. Safety is a call away, this time without the police charges. —cr

Where to register Students can register using their permanent addresses in West Virginia or outside the state (check out your state’s voting laws!), but may need to vote by absentee ballot if they are unable to be in their hometown for Election Day. To register in West Virginia visit www.govotewv.com. Taking ID You do not need an ID to vote early or on Election Day in West Virginia. Where to vote Voters must cast their ballots in specific precincts, and there may be multiple precincts voting at one polling place. Find your polling place by visiting www.govotewv.com. Absentee voting Students attending colleges away from their permanent residences are allowed to vote via absentee mail-in ballot. Absentee ballots must be turned in to your town or city several days before Election Day. Check with your state’s laws. —cc

GETTING INVOLVED

When floods devastated southern West Virginia in June, WVU students, faculty, and staff members lent a hand. Those wanting to pitch in with the clean-up signed up for one-day trips to affected areas. Fundraising also took place through the WVU Foundation and the WVU Extension Service.

CATCH A RIDE

The taxi alternative Uber has finally arrived in West Virginia and Morgantown. The ever-growing transport service provides users rides throughout the city at the swipe of a mobile app. As of July, Uber has offered residents of Morgantown a quick transportation alternative and nights out are just a little sweeter knowing a safe ride home is a click away. —cr

MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

August

KATIE WILLARD

Your local guide to life, art, culture, & more AUG/SEPT 2016

AUGUST 1 The Pink Party Bartini, 350 Suncrest Towne Centre Drive Mon., 6 to 9 p.m., 304.293.2370, wvucancer.org Don your brightest pink outfit and attend this fundraiser to benefit the Bonnie’s Bus mobile mammography unit, featuring entertainment, live and silent auctions, food, and fun. Advance tickets $75 online only, at the door $85, VIP $100 advance online only. AUGUST 1–6 Monongalia County Fair Mylan Park, Mon.-Sat., 304.291.7201 moncountyfair.org Take a whirl on the carnival rides, take in some livestock events and see live entertainment including 3 Nuts and a Woody, NOMAD, Subway, and Bon Journey. $10 gate fee includes rides, bounce houses, entertainment, exhibits, motor sports, and more. AUGUST 2–6 NEARBY Pickin’ in Parsons Bluegrass Festival Five River Campground, 750 Walnut Street Parsons, Tues.-Sat., 11 a.m. with last concerts at 8 p.m., 304.478.3515, fiverivercampground.com See five days of bluegrass bands, including Doyle Lawson & Quicksilver, The Grascals, Blue Mafia, IIIrd Tyme Out, and the Hillbilly Gypsies. Five-day pass $95; Thursday, Friday, Saturday $80; single day $40.

SEPTEMBER 3 Grill some hot dogs and grab a beer for some tailgating before heading into Mountaineer Field at Milan Puskar Stadium to see the WVU Mountaineers’ season opener against the Missouri Tigers, at noon. 800.WVU.GAME, or online at wvugame.com

AUGUST 6 AUGUST 4 Fourth Annual Best Chef Contest Lakeview Golf Resort & Spa, 1 Lakeview Drive, Thurs., 6–9 p.m., 304.319.1800 morgantownhistorymuseum.org Area chefs will compete in several categories, including a new one, Best Italian Dish, in this event sponsored by the Morgantown History Museum. AUGUST 6 West Virginia Botanic Garden Insect Walk West Virginia Botanic Garden, 1061 Tyrone Road, Sat., 10:30 a.m., 304.322.2093, wvbg.org Join Sue Olcott, West Virginia Division of Natural Resources wildlife diversity biologist, on a walk through West Virginia’s botanical garden in search of winged creatures. Learn to identify butterflies and other insects. All ages welcome.

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

NEARBY Elton John Tribute Artist Lee Alverson Preston Community Arts Center 123 South Price Street, Kingwood, Sat., 7 p.m. 304.376.1435 Saturday night’s alright for hearing Alverson’s interpretation of the great composer and singer, known for hits such as “Goodbye Yellow Brick Road,” “Tiny Dancer,” and, of course, “Saturday Night’s Alright for Fighting.” At the door adults $20, students through high school $15, $5 more at the door.

AUGUST 8–12 Summer Camp: Around The World Wow! Factory, 3453 University Avenue Mon.–Fri., 9:30 a.m.–noon, 304.599.2969 wowfactoryonline.com The Wow! Factory’s camp of the season centers

on pottery painting, glass fusing, and mosaic projects. Registration includes all project materials, instruction, and snacks. Children must have completed one year of elementary school. AUGUST 12–13, 18–19, 20 Stella and Lou MT Pockets Theatre, 203 Parsons Street, 8 p.m., 304.284.0049, mtpocketstheatre.com Is a second chance at love ever possible? Directed by Vickie Trickett, Stella and Lou is a romantic comedy about Lou, a bar owner, and Stella, one of his favorite regulars. $7–$20 AUGUST 13 Morgantown Walk from Obesity 5K ProPerformance, 460 Mylan Park Lane Sat., 11 a.m.–4 p.m. 304-288-2207 fundraise.asmbsfoundation.org

COURTESY MORGANTOWN MARATHON

SEPTEMBER 18 Running 26.2 miles should be no sweat if they are “Almost Heavenly,” as the Morgantown Marathon promises, but just in case, there are other options—including a Half Marathon at the same time and starting place, 7 a.m. September 18 at the WVU Coliseum; a Mountain Mama 8K at 8 a.m. September 17 at the WVU Coliseum; and a Family Fun Run at 6 p.m. September 15 at the Monongalia County Ballpark. 304.826.0311, or online at morgantownmarathon.com

Mylan Park hosts a walk against obesity that consists of a 1-mile course and a 5K course. Participants can choose to run, walk, or bike the courses to support obesity prevention. Early bird tickets cost $10. Tickets after the early bird special are $25 online and $35 at the gate.

cars in the Morgantown area as they pay tribute to Michael Todd May, who was killed in the line of duty. Trophies will be awarded for Best in Show and Committee Choice. Live music, food, and beverages will be available.

NEARBY West Virginia Public Radio’s “Mountain Stage” Harper-McNeeley Auditorium at Davis & Elkins College, 100 Campus Drive, Elkins, Sat. 7:30 p.m., 304.637.1255, mountainstage.org Dori Freeman, Blue Highway, Flatt Lonesome and more will perform in a special show as part of the August 12–14 Augusta Heritage Festival. Advance tickets $20, $10.

AUGUST 19–20

AUGUST 12–21 WORTH THE DRIVE State Fair of West Virginia State Fairgrounds, 947 Maplewood Avenue Fairlea, Thurs.-Sun., 304.645.1090 statefairofwv.com In addition to the rides and exhibits, take in concerts by Jake Owen, Alabama, For King & Country, Collin Raye (free), Kane Brown, Dailey & Vincent (free), Vince Neil of Motley Crue, Travis Tritt & The Charlie Daniels Band, and the Buckin’ B Bull Ride with Tracy Lawrence. Concert tickets range from $19 to $50 depending on show and seat, online or at 800.514.3849. Gate admission $11, or $9 in advance.

NEARBY Brew Skies Festival Timberline Four Seasons Resort, 254 Four Seasons Drive, Davis, Fri.–Sat., 304.866.4801 brewskiesfestival.com Try craft beers from West Virginia breweries and check out the first Brew Skies Homebrew Competition while listening to music by bands including Old 97’s, Patrick Sweany, Kelsey Waldon, The Suitcase Junket, and up-andcoming West Virginia band Ona. Weekend pass $60, Friday $30, Saturday $45, available online.

AUGUST 19–21 4th Annual West Virginia Tattoo Expo Waterfront Place Hotel, 2 Waterfront Place Fri.–Sat., noon–10 p.m., Sun., noon–7 p.m. 304.626.5541, wvtattooexpo.com This event will host more than 160 artists for on-site tattooing and piercing. With vendors, contests, seminars, and more, the West Virginia Tattoo Expo promises to be educational and entertaining. Day pass $15, weekend pass $40, kids under 12 free with paying adult, $5 discount with military or student ID.

AUGUST 14 Sargent Michael Todd May Memorial Car and Bike Show Triple S. Harley-Davidson, 7300 Willie G Avenue, Sun., 10 a.m.–3 p.m., 304.284.8244 triplesharley-davidson.com Bring out your best set of wheels for this annual car and bike show. Survey some of the finest

AUGUST 20 Motown Mac N’ Cheese Cook Off Morgantown Marketplace, 415 Spruce Street, Sat., 1–5 p.m. 304.993.2410, motownmacncheese.com Join the Morgantown community for the annual

Motown Mac N’ Cheese Cook Off. Enjoy mouthwatering recipes from local restaurants to benefit The United Way Volunteer Connection. Tickets $15, children under 6 free. AUGUST 21 WV Women’s Extravaganza Ruby Community Center, Mylan Park, Sun., 11 a.m.–4 p.m., 304.983.3388, wvwomensexpo.com Events include a fashion show, cooking tips, entertainment, arts and crafts, free massages and manicures, and more than 85 vendors. $8 at the door. Being Environmentally Conscious West Virginia Botanic Garden, 1061 Tyrone Road, Sun., 2 p.m., 304.322.2093, wvbg.org Local conservationist Megan Stewart presents ways that humans can change their habits to better protect the environment. From cleaning to grocery shopping, there are many changes people can make to reduce their footprint. AUGUST 27 High Street Cruise-In High Street, Sat., 11 a.m.–3 p.m. 304.292.0168, downtownmorgantown.com The second annual Cruise-In on High Street in downtown Morgantown welcomes anyone who loves cars or loves showing off their cars to come on down. All makes and models are welcome and the proceeds benefit Autism Speaks. Taste of the Mountains Winery Run Triple S. Harley-Davidson, 7300 Willie G Avenue, Sat., 11 a.m.–7 p.m., 304.284-8244 triplesharley-davidson.com Take your Hawg for a spin and visit local wineries, starting out at Triple S. HarleyDavidson and ending up at Lambert’s Vintage Wines in Weston. $20. AUGUST 27–28 WV Pop Culture Con Hazel & J.W. Ruby Community Center 500 Mylan Park Lane., Sat., 10 a.m.–7 p.m. Sun., 11 a.m.–5 p.m., wvpop.com Gamers, comic book enthusiasts, and lovers of all sorts of entertainment can mingle with one another and with the creator and celebrity guests. $10 at the door.

September SEPTEMBER 2–4 NEARBY West Virginia Italian Heritage Festival Downtown Clarksburg, Fri.–Sun., 304.622.7314 wvihf.com Events include the coronation of Queen Regina Maria XXXVIII at noon Friday at the Harrison County Courthouse and a grand parade at 10 a.m. Saturday, with headline entertainment Stayin’ Alive, Frankie Avalon, and These Three Tenors, and plenty of pasta, wine, and frittis.

MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

COURTESY OF COLOR ME RAD

SEPTEMBER 24 Color Me Rad 5K At the start of the race, runners are squeaky clean but by the end, they’re plastered in color. At each color station throughout the 3-mile race, runners have a new dimension of color from the rainbow thrown on them. Runners go home with a T-shirt, a temporary tattoo, and a Goo Guard phone case. Early bird tickets are $29 and prices rise to $55 on the day of the race. Mylan Park, 500 Mylan Park Lane, Sat., 9 a.m., colormerad.com/location/morgantown

SEPTEMBER 2–4

SEPTEMBER 7

SEPTEMBER 16–18

Jackson’s Mill Jubilee WVU Jackson’s Mill, 160 WVU Jackson’s Mill Weston, Fri.–Sun., 304.269.5100 jacksonsmill.ext.wvu.edu Check out Civil War skirmishes plus a Civil War nurses’ station along with arts, crafts, quilts, a needle arts display, bouncy houses, and the Hillbilly Zipline. $5, children 3 and under free.

United Way Campaign Kick-off Monongalia County Ballpark, 2040 Gyorko Drive, Wed., noon–1 p.m., 304.293.7910 unitedwaympc.org The kick-off for the 79th annual fall campaign for the United Way of Monongalia and Preston Counties will be hosted at the Monongalia County Ballpark, home of the West Virginia Black Bears. This event marks the beginning of the community’s goal of raising $1,550,000 for local nonprofits.

NEARBY Mountain State Art & Craft Fair Cedar Lakes Fair Grounds, 82 FFA Drive, Ripley Fri.–Sun., 304.372.FAIR, msacf.com The premier West Virginia arts and crafts fair, formed during the state’s 1963 centennial year, has been moved from mid-July to midSeptember and will feature more than 60 vendors. Adults $7, ages 6-12 $3, ages 5 and under free.

NEARBY

SEPTEMBER 5 Labor Day End of Summer Concert Triple S. Harley-Davidson, 7300 Willie G Avenue Mon., 6:30 p.m., 304.284.8244 triplesharley-davidson.com Bret Michaels and special guests the Davisson Brothers Band will perform a free show on Labor Day. The show is open to all ages.

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016

SEPTEMBER 17 SEPTEMBER 15–18 Deep Roots Mountain Revival Festival Marvin’s Mountaintop, Masontown, Thurs.-Sun. 304.864.5216, mountainrevival.com Musical acts include Marty Stuart, Ricky Skaggs, Leftover Salmon, The David Grisman Sextet, Corey Smith, Shooter Jennings, and more. Tickets $150 or $180 online. NEARBY

Mountain Mama 8K WVU Coliseum, Jerry West Boulevard, Sat., 8 a.m. 304.826.0311, morgantownmarathon.com Part of the second annual Morgantown Marathon festivities, the Mountain Mama 8K is a nice start for intermediate runners looking to go the extra distance without the grueling mileage. Beginning at the WVU Coliseum, this

race when given a chance to defend a white man charged with a crime against a black woman. Adults $22, senior citizens and WVU students $17. SEPTEMBER 24 Home Run and Hopes Craft Beer Festival Monongalia County Ballpark, 2040 Gyorko Drive, Granville, Sat., noon-4 p.m. 304.322.2916, www.tourmorgantown.com Experience regional craft beers and food while watching the Mountaineers’ inaugural face-off against Brigham Young University at FedExField on a big-screen TV. SEPTEMBER 28–30, OCTOBER 1–2 NEARBY 75th Annual Preston County Buckwheat Festival Locations around Kingwood, Wed.-Sun. 304.379.2203, buckwheatfest.com Carnival rides, livestock events, parades, arts and crafts, food vendors, and plenty of buckwheat breakfasts, lunches, and dinners will be held to celebrate the festival’s three-quarters-of-a-century mark. All-day carnival passes $18 except $10 on opening day, Wednesday. Gate admission free.

SEPTEMBER 30

COURTESY OF ART MUSEUM OF WVU

Molded in the Mountains: The Glass Industry in West Virginia Watts Museum, Mineral Resources Building 401 Evansdale Drive, Fri., 5–7 p.m. 304.293.4609, wattsmuseum.wvu.edu An opening reception will be held for this new exhibit, featuring a lecture from 5:30 to 6:15 p.m. Free and open to the public. SEPTEMBER 30, OCTOBER 1–2

SEPTEMBER 16 Native artist Grace Martin Taylor took inspiration from her hometown when creating her woodblock prints, as evidenced by works with titles such as “Elizabeth Moore Hall,” “Morgantown Factories,” and “Monongahela River” (pictured). "Studio Window: The Prints of Grace Martin Taylor," will be exhibited at the Art Museum of WVU, opening with a reception from 7:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. Two Fine Arts Drive, call 304.293.2141 or artmuseum.wvu.edu/

race runs through the Suncrest neighborhood and back to the coliseum.

while listening to great jazz musicians. $20 per person per day includes wine glasses and wine tastings.

SEPTEMBER 17–18 West Virginia Wine & Jazz Festival Camp Muffly, 1477 4-H Camp Road Sat., 11 a.m. –6 p.m., Sun., noon–6 p.m. wvwineandjazz.com For more than 20 years, rain or shine, the West Virginia Wine & Jazz Festival has always been something to look forward to. Head to the picturesque Camp Muffly to drink wine

SEPTEMBER 22–25, 27–30, OCTOBER 1–2 “Race” by David Mamet WVU Theatre of School and Dance, Gladys G. Davis Theatre, Creative Arts Center, One Fine Arts Drive, Thurs.–Sun., Tues.–Sun. 304.203.SHOW, theatre.wvu.edu Mamet's play deals with important issues as three lawyers are forced to confront feelings about

WVU Homecoming Locations around Morgantown, Fri.–Sun. 304.293.4397, homecoming.wvu.edu Events include the Homecoming Parade on High Street in downtown Morgantown on Friday and the football game Saturday against Kansas State at Mountaineer Field at Milan Puskar Stadium, with the crowning of the homecoming king and queen and a special halftime show featuring the Pride of West Virginia and the Alumni Marching Band.

Got a hot date? Send your events to place in our calendar to morgantown@ newsouthmediainc.com with the subject line “Calendar.” MORGANTOWNMAG.COM

THEN & NOW (& SOON)

Marple Chevrolet sported decorative awnings.

CARLA WIT T FOR

Nearly a century later, painted greenery is the best thing about this building.

THE STANDARD AT MORGANTOWN

FOR MORE PHOTOS

We can only hope The Standard will give us some token of charming public art.

of Morgantown’s past, check out wvhistoryonview.org

Goodbye, Potted Plant?

The potted plant painted on the front of McClafferty’s Irish Pub at the northwest corner of Walnut Street and Don Knotts Boulevard has been a friendly landmark for years. Look just a little harder at this building that also houses Vic’s Towing, and it’s easy to imagine it as the automobile showroom it once was. In about 1925, Marple Chevrolet Sales Company advertised “Amazing Price Reductions” and encouraged a customer to “Have your car washed and vacum [sic] cleaned—you’re next.” The three spiffy storefront windows have come to various fates in a building that has seen better days.

The former auto showroom may not occupy that corner for much longer. A Georgia-based developer received approval in June to build on the site. Rising 10 stories above Don Knotts Boulevard, The Standard would house 866 beds in student apartments along with retail and commercial space and indoor parking on much of the two blocks between Walnut and Fayette streets. No firm timeline is yet set for the project. Then & Now is published in partnership with WVU Libraries’ West Virginia & Regional History Center. wvrhc.lib.wvu.edu

written by pam kasey

MORGANTOWN • AUG/SEPT 2016