Coal River Pix

Many thanks to Bonnie Collins Janney, my old childhood friend, for providing me with nearly a thousand pictures, old newspaper articles and obituaries from many years ago.  Much of ths had been saved by her brother, Larry, who had passed away.  I knew Larry personally and have to say he was one of the kindest and gentlest fellows I ever knew.  He died in his late thirties, I believe, from a completely unexpected heart attack.  His – and Bonnie’s – father, June Collins was a close friend of mine; both he and his wife, Thelma, were devastated by Larry’s death; I don’t believe they ever recovered.

Bonnie graciously allowed me to take this irreplaceable material to my office in Virginia, where it sat for many months before I was able to get started on this daunting task.  There was so much data that I finally gave up and hired an employee to spend the many, many tedious hours to scan and catalogue this priceless material.  The files are now up; I will work on the captions identifying the people.  That may take quite a while and I’m sure there will be many we don’t know; any comments helping us identify them will be gratefully accepted.  Thanks again to Bonnie for allowing me to scan and publish these pictures.

Jim Wills