Railroads: Prelude Prelude to Prosperity

Railroads: Prelude Prelude to Prosperity. National Coal Heritage Area. , It is difficult to imagine any place in the country that changed as quickly and dramatically as Bluefield, West Virginia, in the late 1880s. Before the Norfolk and Western (N&W) Railway arrived, the area in and around Bluefield consisted of sprawling farmlands known commonly as the John Higginbotham Farm., For a century, most of the land had been owned by a handful of families. Many were descended from the first Scots-Irish settlers in the area, the Davidson and Bailey families. Everything changed in 1887, when N&W officials selected Bluefield as the home for its division headquarters. The "blue fields of chicory" were hastily transformed into a city built upon a foundation of railroads and coal., A Twist of Fate , Bluefield's fate could have been quite different. The N&W originally had planned to route its line through nearby Bluefield, Virginia, the first mine in the region had been opened in 1883 at Pocahontas, Virginia. The turning point was actually a subtle slope, a naturally occurring gradual incline known as the Gravity Hump, located along the N&W line near North Mercer in Bluefield, West Virginia., The N&W turned the region into the bituminous coal capital of the world. Trains transported one million tons of coal in 1887. After a branch line was extended into coal-rich McDowell County, the production expanded rapidly, tripling by 1894. By 1900, coal production was five times the rate of 13 years earlier. The N&W also acquired vast acreage from descendants of the earliest settlers. Through its Philadelphia-based Flat Top Land Company, the N&W built a railroad and coal empire in the Flat Top-Pocahontas Coalfield., The N&W revised its original plans and ran the line through what would become downtown Bluefield, and the hump became the highest point anywehere on the N&W mainline, allowing engineers to take advantage of a switching system based on gravity., Bramwell , The N&W also sparked the growth of another nearby town. Bramwell, founded in 1888 along the N&W line, reportedly was the wealthiest town per capita in the nation by the early 20th century. Passenger trains stopped 14 times each day in the quaint Victorian town, which was home to some of West Virginia's leading coal magnates. Although the Great Depression wiped out much of Bramwell's wealth, the town remains remarkably well preserved, a tribute to the glory days of the West Virginia coal industry., [Sidebar:] , Bluefield's rapid growth generated a wave of building construction and produced several distinct communities. Today, Bluefield has five districts listed in the National Register of Historic Places: Downtown Bluefield, Country Club Hill, Jefferson Street, South Bluefield, and Upper Oakhurst.