6th grade students and teachers at Midland Trail High School have been exploring the driving question, “How can we showcase the local community to pull the economic benefit of the New River Gorge National Park to Ansted’s area through a marketing campaign?” 

Students are studying the areas of interest that might draw visitors to their part of Fayette County, analyzing traffic data and patterns from the Department of Highways to try to better understand who is traveling and when, investigating the human impacts of tourism and how they might help preserve their town and ecosystem while benefitting from the increase in tourism. They are also researching specific locations, events, or efforts that their teams may choose to highlight in their marketing campaigns. 

One question we encounter is how English teachers can richly incorporate literary reading and narrative writing into students’ real-world problem solving. The role of informative, argumentative, persuasive, and other types of non-fiction reading and writing tend to take a much more prevalent role in the life of a project. 

As students have explored this driving question to ideate solutions and innovations for their community, Kiera Lesher’s students took on the role of Appalachian folklorist. Using their research into specific locations and events that are unique to their county, they wrote tales around the real and rumored history of some of these locations in order to bring life and intrigue to these sites. 

Below is a folk tale written by 6th graders Lucas Young, Jonathan Strunk, Kole Pridemore, Skyler Smith, Annabelle Adams, Brayden Neal, Payton Walkup, and Rebecca Caudill and features the Ansted Train Station, the building of the Hawk’s Nest Tunnel, and the area’s storied history with silicosis with a touch of the supernatural!

The Lost Miner
By Lucas Young, Jonathan Strunk, Kole Pridemore, Skyler Smith, Annabelle Adams, Brayden Neal, Payton Walkup, and Rebecca Caudill

As the story has been told, there was a train leaving Ansted Train Station. Boarded on the train were many miners on their way to work. As the train neared the mine, the story tells that it supposedly fell off the tracks and crashed into the mine wall. One miner was left trapped under the heavy metal also being transported by the train. While there were only minor injuries to the miners aboard, the forgotten miner was left for dead. When he was reported missing, there was no effort in the search to find his body. After succumbing to his injuries, his soul was left to venture along the mine and the surrounding areas. His spirit craved vengeance as he was so easily forgotten. He sought revenge and was yet to find it, until the building of the Hawk’s Nest Tunnel.

It was nearly 50 years that he had built this rage and he was ready to bring forth wrath on those who made him feel so enraged. He looked deep into his resources and found loads of sandstone and began to move it as a ploy to find his revenge. As the building of the tunnel began, he strategically plotted by attacking in groups. He made a mistake by allowing one of the workers to see him in fullness, he knew that he had to act quickly and quietly as the discovery of his existence would soon come forth. His plan had to take an unexpected turn as he watched as his existence became known. He sought the perfect opportunity to take him out, and while doing so, lost his tags in the tunnel.

As the building of the tunnel was at hand, something bad was bound to happen. The disaster with the sandstone was labeled something scientific, but others say it was sinister. The construction began smoothly, as the miners would work, eat, then continue working, but there was an unsettling feeling that there was someone else lurking around while they worked.

It’s been said that after a few days of construction, a new miner came to work on the tunnel. For the first week all went normal until miners started mysteriously dying. The new guy, scared and intrigued, started investigating the tunnel, wandering the sides of the 3-mile-long tunnel, looking through the rocks searching for the cause of death. He then found a filled journal, with drawings upon drawings of a shadowy figure labeled “The silicosis monster”. According to this journal, he had found the source of the mysterious deaths of the miners.

The man became extremely sick, but he continued to investigate the tunnel, even through sickness, until he started seeing movement in the distance of the tunnel. He was known to be curious, but as the expression goes, curiosity killed the cat. The man collapsed and was sent home, but upon arrival, he perished in his driveway.

The records indicate that his death was by silicosis. But only one heard his last words: “Warn them, the darkness comes.” The majority thought it was simply just a warning of the disease, but others thought otherwise. The workers who were there that day eventually discovered the creature but passed while trying to warn the others of the monster’s presence, too. It is known that the Silicosis Monster 
still roams the tunnel area, searching for its next victim. It is said that to make peace with this creature, the tags that were lost must be returned.