Our traveling exhibit, Robert C. Byrd: Senator, Statesman, West Virginian, has made stops across the state over the past few months, from Ripley's Independence Day Festival in Jackson County to the Eastern West Virginia Community and Technical College in Moorefield. Now, the exhibit is featured at a site closer to home in the Eastern Panhandle. Opening yesterday, the Byrd exhibit is now on display at Blue Ridge Community and Technical College's main campus in Martinsburg. 

By Jay Wyatt

Last week, the Byrd traveling exhibit, Robert C. Byrd: Senator, Statesman, West Virginian made its third appearance in West Virginia’s Potomac Highlands at Eastern West Virginia Community and Technical College.  The College is located in Moorefield, the county seat of Hardy County, along the beautiful Corridor H Highway on a bluff overlooking the South Branch Valley.  Eastern WV Community and Tech serves the educational needs of students from across Grant, Hampshire, Hardy, Mineral, Pendleton, and Tucker Counties and offers numerous Associate Degrees in Applied Sciences, Sciences, and the Arts.   We thank Dr. Chuck Terrell, Eastern’s President, and Michael O’Leary, President’s Office Coordinator, for their eager support of the exhibit.​

Recently, the Byrd Center was honored to have our traveling exhibit, Robert C. Byrd: Senator, Statesman, West Virginian featured in the City of Ripley, West Virginia's Independence Day Celebration. The exhibit was hosted by the I-77 Auto Group and sponsored by the city. We thank Ripley Mayor Carolyn Rader for coordinating our trip and for hosting a great reception to open the exhibit at the beginning of the town's festival. Ripley's Independence Day Celebration is renowned as the "Largest Small Town Independence Celebration" in the United States and has in the past welcomed prominent speakers including President George W. Bush in 2001. The grand parade which takes place during the festival is the oldest Independence Day parade in the state of West Virginia.

​Since its debut one year ago this month at Shepherd University, the traveling exhibit Robert C. Byrd: Senator, Statesman, West Virginian has been on display at fifteen different locations across West Virginia and Washington DC. Around the state, we've visited thirteen towns and cities in eleven different counties. The most recent stop on this tour is West Virginia University Medicine’s United Hospital Center, located in the north-central region of the state at Bridgeport in Harrison County. 

​On Monday, April 10, 2017, the Byrd Center opened its traveling exhibit Robert C. Byrd: Senator, Statesman, West Virginian in the atrium of the John Deaver Drinko Library at Marshall University. Located in Huntington, West Virginia’s second-largest city, the modern facilities at the Drinko Library provided an exceptional setting for the exhibit. From the windows in the atrium, passersby can spot the exhibit as they walk across the campus.

The trip to Marshall University marked our fourteenth stop on the tour of the exhibit. As with so many of the places we've visited over the past year, there were many ties to Senator Byrd's life and career at our destination. As Chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, Senator Byrd secured federal dollars that helped to build the university's biotechnology science center and advanced flexible manufacturing institute as well as other programs and campus improvements.

The Byrd Center staff traveled to Elkins, West Virginia last week to setup our traveling exhibit Robert C. Byrd: Senator, Statesman, West Virginian at its next venue, the Randolph County Community Arts Center. This venue is the tenth stop for the exhibit on its tour across West Virginia and our first stop in the Potomac Highlands region of the state.

Founded in 2000 and located in the historic St. Brendan's Roman Catholic Church, the Randolph County Community Arts Center supports arts programs that education and enhance the cultural and economic life of the Elkins and Randolph County region. The center is a wonderful venue that should draw numerous visitors to the exhibit through Friday, March 17, 2017. The Byrd Center thanks executive director Kurt Barkley and board chairman Charlie Friddle, III for their support and help in bringing the exhibit to Elkins.

​On January 24, the traveling exhibit Robert C. Byrd: Senator, Statesman, West Virginian opened at a reception hosted by Wheeling Jesuit University. This venue marks the first stop for the traveling exhibit in West Virginia’s Northern Panhandle. As we celebrate the centennial of Senator Byrd’s birthday in 2017, it is fitting to make a stop in the political birthplace of West Virginia.

​Wheeling is a historic industrial city and transportation hub, the site of the western terminus of the National Road and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. The city was also the site of the Wheeling Convention of 1861, establishing the Restored Government of Virginia (1861-1863) which ultimately became the state of West Virginia in 1863. The convention and subsequent constitutional convention took place in the city’s customs house (today designated the West Virginia Independence Hall) and Wheeling served as the first capital for the new state.

A new year brings new stops on the journey across West Virginia for our traveling exhibit, Robert C. Byrd: Senator, Statesman, West Virginian. You can view these upcoming exhibit venues on our website here >> We hope that you are able to join us as the exhibit makes its way across West Virginia!

​Our first stop for 2017 is Pierpont Community and Technical College’s Advanced Technology Center in Fairmont, located in the north-central region of the state. 

From the late-summer through the fall of 2016, the traveling exhibit was featured at venues across southeastern West Virginia, including Bluefield State College, the Greenbrier Valley Convention and Visitor's Bureau, and Concord University. As the year drew to a close, we moved the exhibit to its final venue for 2016, visiting the north-central region of the state for the first time.

By Ray Smock
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The Byrd Center was proud to have the traveling exhibit on the life of Senator Byrd on display in the Rotunda of the Russell Senate Office Building on Capitol Hill during the week of Sept. 19-23. The highlight of this week was a reception for former staff members of Senator Byrd, members of the House and Senate and current staff of West Virginia’s congressional delegation and other friends and colleagues of the Byrd Center.