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West Virginia » Oil Country (Mid-Ohio Valley) » Wirt County » Elizabeth » Kanawha Hotel

Kanawha Hotel

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c. 1800, c. 1870. 111 Court St. (northeast corner of Riverview and Murray sts.)

Two of Elizabeth's oldest structures, the Kanawha Hotel and the Beauchamp-Newman House (see next entry), stand a block north of the courthouse, near the banks of the Little Kanawha River. They flank a continuation of Court Street known as Riverview, which is little more than a euphemism for a grass-covered slope leading to the Little Kanawha. The town wharf and ferry, along with an oil derrick, were located here, but what was once the busiest spot in town is now the quietest.

The hotel is a rambling vernacular structure embellished with front and side porches and containing a two-story log core that is likely Wirt County's oldest building. An early center of activity, it served as a tavern; quilts hanging from rafters partitioned spaces into “bedrooms.” The original rectangular log pen is now completely enveloped in clapboards that were added c. 1870, along with wings and permanent room partitions. The former hotel is now a private home.

Writing Credits

Author: 
S. Allen Chambers Jr.
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Data

What's Nearby

Beauchamp-Newman House
Wirt County Courthouse
Elizabeth Baptist Church
Buffalo Church
Ruble Church

Citation

S. Allen Chambers Jr., "Kanawha Hotel", [Elizabeth, West Virginia], SAH Archipedia, eds. Gabrielle Esperdy and Karen Kingsley, Charlottesville: UVaP, 2012—, http://sah-archipedia.org/buildings/WV-01-WI2.

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