by Ken Lahmers
Editor
Having worked in St. Clairsville in eastern Ohio from September 1975 to March 1977, I traveled through Wheeling, W.Va. -- 9 miles away -- from time to time.
I watched Jamboree USA performances at the Capitol Music, covered basketball games at Wheeling high schools and attended the Wheeling LPGA Classic a couple of years.
But I never got to know the city very well, and outside of the Capitol Music Hall, I never visited any of its attractions. I didn't even know some of them existed.
Earlier this year, I put Wheeling on my travel list, and on Oct. 17 I spent most of the day there.
Other than a few years ago when I went to Wheeling Jesuit College's NASA Challenger Learning Center with a Harmon School group, I hadn't been back to the city in 31 years.
On my way to the Wheeling LPGA Classic back then, I had passed Oglebay Park -- the event was played on one of its four courses -- but never took time to give it a closer look.
So my first stop on that dreary Saturday morning was the Oglebay mansion.
All about Oglebay Park
Oglebay Park is made up of 1,650 acres. It was owned by Earl W. Oglebay, a native of the Wheeling area and co-founder of the Ogelbay-Norton Co.
In 1926, he donated the massive hilltop/hillside property to the city of Wheeling, and it has been a self-supporting public municipal park ever since.
Oglebay transformed an eight-room farmhouse, built in 1857, into a showplace mansion, which has housed a museum since 1930.
Unfortunately, it was not open when I was there, but it includes restored rooms, local history exhibits and information about the estate and Mr. Oglebay. It's on the National Register of Historic Places.
There are a handful of other old buildings near the mansion, as well as an amphitheater built into a steep hill behind it, a floral clock and fountains.
Elsewhere at the park are Wilson Lodge with its 200-plus rooms, cottages, nature center, planetarium, Good Zoo, fishing/boating lake, trails, outdoor pool, gardens and greenhouse.
I'm sure the gardens are spectacular in the spring and summer, but unfortunately the ones I saw were past their prime for this year.
An annual event which brings thousands of visitors to Oglebay, including many from Northeast Ohio, is the Winter Festival of Lights, a holiday tradition since 1985.
When it started, the displays covered 125 acres over a 3-mile area. It has expanded to 300 acres stretching over 6 miles.
Downtown Wheeling
For nearly three hours, I spent time walking around downtown Wheeling, admiring the architecture and historic structures, and snapping photos.
A fascinating place that I didn't know was there until recently is the Centre Market. The Upper Market House was erected in 1853 and is the oldest of its type in the country, and the Lower Market House went up in 1891.
They originally were open-air buildings, but now sport walls for year-round use. Salons, cafes, an antique store, a bakery, cheese shop, pharmacy and restaurants are among the retailers.
One of the most famous shops is Coleman's Fish Market. In 2001, Gourmet Magazine proclaimed it has "the country's best fish sandwich." Sadly, a long line of customers prevented me from buying one.
Along Market Street I passed a large former B&O Railroad building, which now houses West Virginia Northern Community College, then checked out Independence Hall.
The latter was built in 1863, when West Virginia still was part of Virginia. It houses a museum of Civil War artifacts. I didn't stop in, because there just wasn't enough time in the day to see everything.
On Chapline Street stands the gorgious St. Joseph Cathedral, and a block away are two huge churches with tall steeples across the street from each other.
Behind one of them is W. Va.'s first state capitol.
What's along Main St.
Heading a couple of blocks over to Main Street, I walked around Heritage Port/Veterans Amphitheater, a small park along the river, past the Capitol Music Hall and spent some time photographing the Wheeling Suspension Bridge.
After $500,000 in up-grades, the Capitol has reopened after being shut down because of building code violations. It is home to the Wheeling Orchestra.
Jamboree USA hasn't returned to the 2,500-seat theater, but continues Saturday nights at the Victoria Theater, its original home in the 1930s, a few blocks away.
The suspension bridge was the largest of its kind in the world when built in 1849. The steel-deck span stretches 1,010 feet between its massive stone towers and connects downtown with Wheeling Island.
It is the oldest vehicular suspension bridge in the U.S., and is off-limits to buses, trucks and other heavy vehicles.
Up Main Street, where I-70 enters the Wheeling Tunnel, is the former Marsh tobacco factory, which closed in 2001. On its roof is the famous "Marsh Wheeling Stogies" sign.
Coming from Ohio and just before entering the west end of the tunnel, motorists see the sign, which is lighted at night.
It's a landmark similar to the Clark Bar sign on the old Clark Candy Co. building in Pittsburgh and the Goodyear sign at I-77 and Rockside Road.
Marsh was America's oldest cigar manufacturer, going back to 1840. Its brand is now owned the National Cigar Corp. A stogie, by the way, is longer and thinner than a cigar.
Speaking of tobacco, Mail Pouch has been made in Wheeling since 1897. The former Bloch Brothers plant is now operated by Swisher International, producer of Swisher Sweets.
At the south end of Main Street is WesBanco Arena. It opened in 1977 as the Wheeling Civic Center. I covered Ohio Valley Athletic Conference all-star basketball games there less than a year after it opened.
It is home to the Wheeling Nailers hockey team, a minor league affiliate of the Pittsburgh Peguins.
Couple of river bridges
After my stint in downtown Wheeling, I headed south 12 miles to Moundsville to visit the Marx Toy Museum and old W. Va. Penitentiary, which I wrote about previously.
On the way, I stopped to photograph the now abandoned Bellaire Toll Bridge, which spans the river between Bellaire, Ohio, and Benwood, W.Va.
The 1,200-foot span was opened in 1926 and closed in 1991, when Route 7 on the Ohio side was widened and the ramps leading to the bridge were dismantled.
I crossed the bridge a couple of times back in 1975-76 to cover football games at Bishop Donahue High School in McMecken, W.Va. The toll was 50 cents one way.
After it closed, the bridge was used to film a scene in "Silence of the Lambs," in which actress Jodie Foster drives across it.
A parallel former B&O Railroad bridge, now used by the Wheeling & Lake Erie Railway, also is about to become a movie star.
Scenes from the Denzil Washington movie "Runaway" recently were filmed there. They also were filmed at the W&LE's main yard in Brewster (southwest Stark County).
The movie, which is slated to be released next year, is about a runaway train, and also stars Chris Pine and Rosario Dawson.
Other attractions around Wheeling, which I didn't have time to visit, are Wheeling Island Hotel, Casino and Racetrack and Cabela's outdoor megastore off I-70 about 6 miles east of downtown.
Cabela's is a 175,000-square-foot store, which sells camping, archery, hunting/fishing equipment and guns. It boasts a trophy deer museum, archery range and 55,000-gallon aquarium.
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