Challenge participants pledge a certain dollar figure per touchdown the Mountaineers score during the 2012 season and in the New Era Pinstripe Bowl. Funds raised will support library resources.

Last year, the 63 touchdowns resulted in numerous donations for the Libraries.

“I’m pleased that our alumni and fans made the initial Touchdown Challenge a success,” Athletic Director Oliver Luck said. “As excitement about West Virginia University continues to build during our inaugural Big 12 season, I encourage Mountaineers everywhere to express their enthusiasm by stepping up to support the Libraries through the Touchdown Challenge this season.”

Mountaineer head coach Dana Holgorsen finds it gratifying that his players’ hard work on the field benefited the Libraries. He believes the partnership sends a good message about the importance of academics.

“We all need to remember that those young men executing plays on the field are student-athletes,” Holgorsen said. “Just like every student here, our guys have to focus on their classes, study, and earn good grades. Students with busy schedules know the WVU Libraries can help them excel in their academic pursuits.”

If you’re up for the Challenge, click here www.mountaineerconnection.com/touchdownchallenge. For more information about supporting the WVU Libraries, contact Monte Maxwell, Libraries development representative at 304-293-0306 or monte.maxwell@mail.wvu.edu.

The Dominion Post

TO COMMEMORATE the 150th anniversary of West Virginia, The Dominion Post will be publishing weekly columns by Robert O’Connor, a historian, scholar and author of six Civil War books. The first column will appear Jan. 2.

A state is born.

The Dec. 9, 1862, edition of the Wheeling Daily Intelligencer features various reports about the possibility of a West Virginia.

A headline on Page 3 states “The New State in Congress to-day.”

“To day the bill for the admission of the new State comes up in the United States House of Representatives. It is possible, but hardly to be expected, that we shall know before another issue the fate of the measure,” the article reads.

It continues, “We the shining pillar of a prosperous future before us and the sweet hope of deliverance in our hearts, we of West Virginia have followed on, till this morning we stand, as the children of Israel stood up on the Red Sea beach, and look across the only tide that rolls between us and the friendly shore which our feet are eager to press, and whose beauties our longing eyes already faintly discern. Here we stand and yonder is the land of promise, the tide be tween and the dark hosts of a worse than Pharaoh following on our track. Pray God that some Moses this day in Congress smite the turbulent waves and roll them back till we pass through in safety.”

The Dec. 10, 1862, edition continues with a late-night cable from Dec. 9 that the issue of statehood was taken up by the House.

The next day the headline, again on Page 3, details the results.

“NEW STATE ADMITTED: Vote 96 to 55!”

Monday marks the 150th anniversary of the U.S. House of Representatives approving the creation of the state of West Virginia. West Virginia wouldn’t officially be admitted to the union until June 20, 1863.

The stories and headlines from the Daily Intelligencer are among other artifacts detailing West Virginia’s statehood movement found in the archives of the West Virginia and Regional History Collection located in WVU’s Downtown Library.

West Virginia’s effort for statehood started in 1861, with a constitutional convention in Wheeling. On Dec. 10, 1862, the U.S. House of Representatives approved the new state and in March 1863 a majority of citizens approved the West Virginia statehood bill.

Creating the new state wasn’t without a bit of “fuzzy math.”

West Virginia and Regional History Collection Curator John Cuthbert said the Civil War was fought over the Confederacy seceding from the Union without its permission . That created an interesting dilemma for West Virginia, as it was trying to secede from Virginia to become a state — and would need Virginia’s permission’s to do so, Cuthbert said.

That is when forefathers, such as Francis Pierpont, came up with the idea to create a new government with the idea that the Confederacy government of Virginia basically abdicated its role in state government. The new government then gave permission for Western Virginia to leave and create its own state.

Secession was hardly the first difference of opinion between the people of western Virginia and Virginia. Cuthbert said western Virginia had an economy and geography that was different from other parts of the state. There were no plantations in the state’s western portion.

Those who lived in western Virginia also supported public education, because unlike their eastern counterparts, they could not afford to hire private tutors.

“The West Virginia people felt their needs were not taken care of in Richmond,” Cuthbert said.

The Civil War was just the event that broke all the tension between the different parts of the state, Cuthbert said.

Newspapers aren’t the only items that provide a glimpse into the mood and mindsets from the period of statehood creation at the collection.

Pierpont along with Waitman T. Wiley, of Morgantown, were the two key figures from the statehood movement, Cuthbert said. Wiley served as a U.S. senator for “loyal” Virginia and then West Virginia.

The collection has Pierpont’s telegrams from 1861-’65. It also has Wiley’s diary, which is about 6 inches thick. The diary consists of newspaper clippings about statehood and thoughts from Wiley as he detailed the events.

In showing off the diary, Cuthbert opened to one page where Wiley discussed West Virginia and creating the new Virginia government.

“West Virginia is a known fact,” wrote Wiley, who introduced the West Virginia statehood bill in the U.S. Senate.

The words, “West Virginia,” stand out from the rest of the passage as they are written in a larger size and placed on its own line.

In total, the history collection offers the most extensive archive of creation of West Virginia, Cuthbert said. But, other states might have done a better job at preserving their historical records. Cuthbert said when West Virginia left Virginia, it cut itself off from traditional record-keeping bodies. It never had a historical society, until the 1920s, when WVU Professor Charles Ambler began to collect state historical documents. The WVU governing board then set aside space in the new library — the Wise Library — to house the documents.

The state also received Works Progress Administration funds to help with record collection, Cuthbert said. There were probably a few dozen people who worked in the library collecting documents the years those funds were available.

The Wiley diary came to WVU in 1930. Pierpont’s correspondences were added in 1932, Cuthbert said.

Today, the collection is trying to make it easier for anyone, anywhere, to look at documents from the period of West Virginia’s creation. The collection has digitized some of Pierpont’s telegrams and made them available online. It has also received a grant to do the same for newspapers. Cuthbert said they were looking at digitizing Wheeling newspapers from the second half of the 19th century. The digital copies will be searchable so someone can find a word in a matter of seconds instead of having to look at every edition.

The Downtown Campus and Evansdale libraries will open at 9 a.m. Sunday, Dec. 2, and remain open until 10 p.m. Friday, Dec. 7. Both will be open from 9 a.m.-9 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 8.

The libraries will open at 9 a.m. Sunday, Dec. 9 and remain open until 10 p.m. Friday, Dec. 14. They will be open 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday, Dec. 15.

For more information, check out the Libraries’ calendar: www.libraries.wvu.edu/hours

Nominations will be accepted from WVU administration, faculty, and staff and must be submitted on the official nomination form by February 15, 2013.

Nomination forms and more info: www.libraries.wvu.edu/about/awards

The committee will be led by Eberly College of Arts and Sciences Dean Robert Jones. Library faculty will be represented by Beth Royall and Hilary Fredette, while Library staff will be represented by Thea Browne.

Four faculty members were chosen at-large. They are: Lisa Weihman, associate professor in english; Robert Tallaksen, professor and vice chair, radiology; Rebecca Chory, professor, communication studies; and Richard Turton, professor in chemical engineering.

Two students will also serve. They are Paul Garton, an undergraduate student in the Honors College, and Juan Mundel, a graduate student in journalism.

Dr. John Stealey, a member of the Library Visiting Committee and the Capital Campaign Committee, has also agreed to serve.

The West Virginia University Libraries include the Downtown Campus Library; the Charles C. Wise Jr. Library; the Evansdale Library; the Health Sciences Library, located in the Robert C. Byrd Health Sciences Center; and the Law Library, located in the Law School. The WVU Libraries provide access to electronic resources 24 hours a day at www.libraries.wvu.edu.

The WVU Libraries’ onsite collections include more than 2.1 million books and 48,000 current journal subscriptions. WVU Libraries offer students electronic access to more than 246 networked databases, more than 300,000 eBooks, and more than 45,700 online electronic journals.

Myra N. Lowe has been serving as interim dean since January, following the retirement of Frances O’Brien.

Archives like the West Virginia & Regional History Collection exist not just for the use of history scholars doing “serious research,” but also for high school students working on History Day papers, families researching the ownership of their land, and individuals writing their family histories.

Nearly half of the several thousand visitors to the WVRHC each year fall into the latter categories. The WVRHC is open to the public, and admission is free.

To help us celebrate American Archives Month, we invite you to pay us a visit, explore our facility, and examine our current exhibit which marks the 150^th anniversary of the beginning of the Civil War. The display contains a wide range of items, including Stonewall Jackson’s writing set, the diaries of First Lieutenant (later Major) Fabricius A. Cather, and sheet music from the Civil War.

You can also visit us online at www.libraries.wvu.edu/wvcollection to find out more about the materials we have available.

For seasoned visitors, we also have many new collections to share. Included among them are West Virginia land records from 1865-1896 (A&M 3833), records regarding Kirtanananda Bhaktipada Swami who founded the New Vrindaban Hare Krishna community near Moundsville (A&M 3830), and photograph albums of student life at West Virginia University, ca. 1895-1900 (A&M 5164).

Don’t forget that June 20, 2013, will be the 150^th anniversary of West Virginia’s admission to the Union. The WVRHC will unveil a special West Virginia Day Statehood Exhibit and host a speaker or two to celebrate the occasion. Check back in June for more information about our 150^th Statehood Anniversary events.

Tutors for most subjects are here on all five days, except:

Math tutors are on hand Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday.

Geology: Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday.

Psychology: Monday and Wednesday.

Arabic: Monday and Thursday.

Spanish: Sunday, Tuesday, and Thursday.

The Downtown Campus Library is home to an Academic Resource Center, an initiative from the Office of Retention and Research in Student Affairs. For more information on Academic Research Centers, visit this website: http://retention.wvu.edu/academic_resource_centers

Banned Books Week is an annual event, sponsored by the American Library Association to draw attention to the problem of censorship. Each year hundreds of books are challenged by groups that want the books removed from schools and libraries. Books that have been challenged in the past include such classics as The Grapes of Wrath, Catch 22, and Lord of the Flies.

To learn more, visit the Downtown Campus Library to see an exhibit featuring some of the classic titles that have been targeted by would-be censors.