Why The United States Has Two Virginias: Virginia and West Virginia 

Get 10% off 6” and 8.5” MOVA Globes with code GEOFF at movaglobes.com: bit.ly/movageoff

9:09 "Virginia has far larger and more metropolitan cities than Virginia"

When I moved from West Virginia to Los Angeles I was SHOCKED by how few people knew West Virginia was it's own state. Most people would respond to where I was from with, " Ive got a friend that lives in Richmond."

One thing i’ve always thought was weird about the Virginias is that theres a big part of Virginia that is completely west of the entire state of West Virginia

What's really impressive is how creative they were in naming the new state.

As a proud Mountaineer, I am very glad that the shape of West Virginia gives Virginia "the bird".

Really appreciate your videos. I was a geography major in University and switched to Urban Planning. Now retired, I still love looking at the "landscape", both urban & rural, and wonder how "things’ developed.

We West Virginians have always been proud of how and why we split from Virginia. Yet we've always gotten a bad rap

Geoff, this particular part of American History has been fascinating to me for many years. I was already very much aware that The Civil War is what made the split possible. But I had never gotten much deeper into it than that. Thank You so much! You have taught me more about these two states in this episode than I have learned in the last several years!

Happy 160th birthday West Virginia! June 20th 1863 - June 20th 2023!

I used to go to the post office a lot to mail packages. One day I was in line and a woman was mailing a package to West Virginia. The clerk told her she shouldn't put what part of Virginia it was going to. She didn't understand and he said she have just put "Virginia". She replied that West Virginia was a separate state. The clerk looked at another clerk who confirmed this, but for some reason he looked at me questioningly and when I nodded, he apologized to her. I don't know why he trusted me more than the other people.

A video on WV’s state lines would be very interesting or a state line video series for each state.

You should get a sponsorship from the video game Cities: Skylines 2. It'd be cool to see you make a city with the knowledge that you have with history and urban development

There have been multiple Supreme Court cases afterwards on various topics on VA/WV such as whether WV is a legal state (to which the SC said to VA you rebelled you don't get a say) to WV repaying debt owed to VA. Another interesting fact is that even though the border between the states was largely settled upon after the conclusion of the Civil War, there was still a dispute on where the border lay between Jefferson County, WV and Loudoun County, VA which wasn't resolved until I think the 1990's.

One suggestion for the future topic, are Virginia political geographic oddities. The nubbin that is the Virginia Eastern Shore for one. And how Virginia's northern border extends to the low water line of the Potomac, effectively ceding control to Maryland. However Kentucky, once a part of Virginia, has control of the Ohio River up to the shores of Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois.

...so we could have that John Denver song.

I took a bus tour of West Virginia years ago. West Virginia had wanted to break away from the rest of the state for a long time, and the US Civil War finally gave them an excuse to do so.

Good info! 😊

Perfect timing with this video as today, June 20th is West Virginia's 160th birthday as a state.

In a similar (if not identical) vein, how ‘bout a piece on how the state of Washington got its name, even though the national capital already had that name. Believe me, it causes no end of annoyance to those of us in the state.

You can still see the animosity between these states today. The West Virgina Mountaineers used to play Virgina Tech in football. The halftime shows got so insulting that TV broadcasters would cut away. West Virgina left and joined the Big 12.

As someone who was born and raised, and still lives in the Hampton Roads area, thanks for the quick refresher and informative video for people who aren't too familiar.

I live in MD but commute to Winchester, VA once a week. Which means I have to drive through WV's Eastern Panhandle to get to work. My opinion is that those Shenandoah Valley counties of VA are pretty much WV if not for a border. The people are the same. The culture is the same. The beliefs are the same.

*

“Almost heaven West Virginia…” 🎶 ❤

Can you make a video about that first Newfoundland colony that parishes after leaving. Cheers from Newfoundland! 😃

I love this series. Hopefully you do one on why there are three Californias and why the US decided not to annex Baja.

It should be noted that Lincoln was not in favor of WV becoming a state but decided to do so in order to control the entirety of the B & O Railroad. This was pivotal for the war effort. Furthermore, WV was more progressive the VA for most of it's existence. Look towards the history of workers rights and unionization efforts in WV to see this and look towards the fossil fuel companies propaganda like "Friends of Coal" to see how descendants of those who picked up arms against the coal companies now carry water for them, willingly.

Love ur vids…just wanted to let u know Charlesfort wasn’t where Charleston is…but Beaufort

I LOVE West Virginia because of the mountains - some of the best skiing in the east can be found at Snowshoe Resort and the views from the mountain ridges are incomparable. The small towns are a throwback, with lovely quaint main streets, and the larger towns have everything you might need. I’d move there in a minute if I could!

Very interesting.

The US has also 2 Carolinas 2 Dakotas and 2 Washingtons ( DC and State)

I am a proud West Virginian... born and raised here and I will never understand why we get a bad rap but I really don’t care because I feel that we are a hidden gem in this country that not many people know about. Does anyone really know that Mother’s Day started in West Virginia? God Bless America and God Bless West Virginia! ❤

Proud lifelong Virginia resident here, born and raised. I've also visited 47 other states as of this day. I approve of this video.

the natural landscape of both are stunning

I think if you are going to declare yourself a new state you should pick a better name than the old state name with a directional adjective like "West Virginia". Why not Appalachia or something else based off the idea of mountains? They missed a golden opportunity.

Thank you for the video. Since you like doing videos on state splits, you should consider doing one where the Northern part of California almost broke off to become the state of Jefferson. The locals there still talk about it today.

Great stuff as always! Your script would sound a lot better if you stopped using "would" when you could use a simple past tense. Review your script and note how many times you do this. Clean these up, and you'll have a much more professional-sounding style and diction. Keep the great content coming!

I found it interesting that you didn't mention the role played by the rivers. The primary rivers flow north into the Ohio, which naturally led to strong commercial and economic ties between the western counties of Virginia and the new state of Ohio. To this day, WV is closely tied to the Buckeye State, much more than to the Old Dominion. And it's due to geography!

Lovely shirt you are wearing! Is that octopus? Beautiful. I think you should also offer the styles you wear for sale. Not the same shirt obviously, but the same type totally!

2:26 41th parallel… nice

Take a drive through West Virginia, beautiful mountainous scenery, not a lot of open flat areas.

Nice mini magnetic power generators. How much faster would those globes have to be to not just look cool but power your house?

Can you do a video on the history of tacoma and Seattle wa

West Virginia's formation, it should be mentioned, was possible because the territory was controlled by Union forces. The eastern part of Tennessee also tried to form their own mountainous state, with less success.

Did anyone else begin singing "Country Roads" by John Denver while watching this video?

Something can't be 'very unique'

This didn't need an 11 min video, but its good content. Simply: Civil War. The end

Mining was an important part of life in both Virginia's, The railroads like the C&O and B&O were also vital to transporting coal of the area

I think you missed one important thing when talking about the economic differences. The Eastern Continental Divide is roughly the VA/WVA border. The rivers east of it all empty into the Chesapeake Bay or Atlantic Ocean. All the waterways west of it flow into the Ohio, tying WVA to the Ohio Valley.

West Virginia is known for people working and specially coal mines and things of that nature. And Virginia is related to Washington d.c.. and people refer Richmond as Richmond north of Richmond. Meaning the government and Corruption and all the payoffs. And that is my best guess?

I'd like you to do New Mexico and Mexico! 😁

As a person from West Virginia I will forever be piss that we passed on the name Vandalia

How can they claim a land that was already inhabited?

One little correction: It's West "by God' Virginia.

I have a friend from West Virginia who claims to be a Consitiutional Originalist. When I bring up that his state was created by a Constitutional Amendment that would be considered social reforms today(abolition), he just gets a blank look on his face and changes the subject.

People flee WV once they grow up assuming they have any economic prospects so of course it’s far smaller. WV is surrounded by states doing well to so there are alot of greener pastures like in MD, VA, DC.

Nice

Hard to farm on hilly,rocky soil of wV. Lots of mouths at the gov’t teat in VA

My grandmother, a history teacher explained this split in so many words and essentially said WV was never supposed to be a state because it split without approval of its parent state.

You should do one on Florida and West Florida. I'm mean Louisiana

The western district of Virginia was under a Federal garrison, at the request of the Virginia legislature, prior to the Civil War because of violence and danger. John Brown raided the Federal station at Harper's Ferry, but the presence of Federal troops helped West Virginia stay in the Union. West Virginia reimbursed Virginia for its share of the pre-war debt from construction of the Kanawa Canal which was a financial failure, its towpath later turned into railroads.

I'm originally from Florida, raised in a military family. When we moved to Connecticut, a friend of mine claimed he was from the South because he was from West Virginia. He actually lived in the Eastern part of West Virginia that mixed in with Maryland for 5 years but, come to find, he was born and raised in Minnesota. Long story short the guy was a clown that liked to rob people behind their backs, so made sense he didn't know West Virginia broke away from the South to become a part of the Union.

Virginia's decision to secede from the Union in April, 1861 cost the state not only 24,000 sq.mi. of land (present day West Virginia), but 33,000 of her citizens killed and tens of thousands more wounded in the war that followed. Add to that the destruction of her cities and farm lands as battle after battle raged across the state for four long years and you have a tragedy of epic proportions.

You totally missed the strategic railroads in what is now West Virginia and the ethnic and religious differences between the early settlers. The current CSX tracks across the Alleghenies, for example, was bitterly fought over particularly around Rowlesburg and Terra Alta. The Tidewater was typically settled by the Episcopalian second sons of wealthy English, while western Virginians were Presbyterian Ulster Scots and Germans. These were two critical factors. The best way to emphasize the differences is the mis-spelled county name, Monongalia County on the Monongahela River, for example. Also a subtlety is that some county names seem mis-placed in West Virginia and western Virginia. For example Pocahontas County West Virginia is far from Pocahontas Virginia while Allegheny County is far from the traditional Allegheny Mountains of Pennsylvania, West Virginia and western Maryland. The Tidewater Virginians that made up the majority of the Virginia government just didn’t care about getting things right out in the hinterlands that they cared little about. I am a fifth generation Virginian/West Virginian and had a four times great uncle in the Virginia Legislature. My background is in geology with an undergrad minor in geography. Geography matters, but so does history! The place where the Civil War really was brother against brother was the South Branch Valley. I have done geologic field work there during two periods and you can encounter earthworks with got away seeded fruit and nut trees in the back trenches in the strangest, but logical places.

5:10 West Virginia was settled by AI according to the symbols on the map?

Can you do a FL population analysis where the vast majority live off the panhandle?

Whats hilarious is the amount of southern flags flying in WV.

Kentucky was also Part of Virgina, Many moons ago.

Good grief! 3:13 New Netherlands went all the way past Albany, it wasn't just one city!

The confusion so many people have about the name "West Virginia" could have been avoided if some other name had been adopted for the new State. Originally the Second Wheeling Convention was using the name Kanawha which would have been perfect, but Kanawha was later rejected and various other names were considered. My favourite was Vandalia (which is used for various things within West Virginia to this day). Was Appalachia considered? That best of all. No-one could confuse Appalachia, Kanawha, or Vandalia with Virginia! (The main problem with Kanawha is that outsiders would probably mispronounce it.)

its like that movie, the front virginia and the back virginia.

Oof, I knew that pronunciation of Norfolk was coming 😂

Yep! I was confused as a child growing up in Virginia that there was a West Virginia. Lol

Because John Denver singing “Country roads, take me home, to the place I was born…Virginia!” wouldn’t sound right! 😂

Though not native...grew up in Falls Church Va

Do you have any thoughts on flat earth theory?

Shout out to Virginia ❤️

Interesting how a similar dynamic as the WV/VA divide worked out in the mountain counties of Western NC and Eastern TN, however without separation. As in WV, these were yeoman farmers working small parcels of land, living and working independently from the slavery power centers. Most of those NC and TN counties sent more men to the Union Armies than the Confederate Army. While these Virginian "faux aristocratic" slave-driving fops were eager to continue their leisurely, decadent lifestyle, proud and strong men and women who worked the land with their OWN bodies in the western, mountainous part of the state had had enough of the whining, sissy VA plantation culture and rightly separated from these dandies and formed the free, great State of West Virginia.

As a West Virginia, we look forward to Virginia rejoining the fold and becoming Mountaineers once again.

One the map at 1:43, I saw a large group of islands at roughly the same latitude as Virginia, but in the middle of the Atlantic. They seem too large to be Bermuda, but I could be wrong. Any ideas?

Charleston 46,000 people kanawha county 178,000 people but you’re right about the metropolitan area not quite sure how they come up with that but it must encompass several counties ?

Country music. Yes

As mentioned in the video, West Virginia was allowed to have slaves at the start. If not mistaken, Lincoln wanted Virginia to split because he wanted the USA to have the Baltimore and Ohio railroad for the Civil War and of course more representatives for the USA.

The proper name is "Less East Virginia"

Because without West Virginia, John Denver couldn't have written that song.....

One is cool and the other is Virginia.

And Next Up in "what you missed when you fell asleep in high school history class and didn't bother studying because you were lazy" ... "the Missoiri compromise ..."

Within 4 hours!

9:09 "Virginia has far larger and more metropolitan cities than Virginia."

The law was broken in order to allow West Virginia to split off.

How did Virgina lose the Kentucky part of the state?

Arlington county was the opposite… in 1840s when the south part of DC saw slavery may be abolished, it voted to be reintegrated into Virginia. It was integrated in Alexandria, but later northern Alexandria became Arlington county. Named after the Arlington House, confederate general Robert Edward Lee’s and Custis estate, which was converted into a cemetery by union troops. Even in the 1920s, Arlington was known for the many dairy farms. Now it’s home to Ronald Regan DCA airport, the Pentagon, Arlington national cemetery, the Air Force memorial, the marine corps memorial statue… in the 1960s, it was the first county in Virginia to desegregate black students which the rest of the state did by the early 70s. It’s the smallest county in the US and one of the wealthiest.

There's more than that, my Aunt Ginny's another Virginia.

Where's Kentucky?!

I was born in Bath County on the Virginia side of the line. It’s very similar to WVA, including sending delegates to Richmond with instructions not to secede. Still not entirely sure why it’s not part of West Virginia.

One State for each family.

As a lifelong West Virginian, I can say that I am proud of the culture of my home state. We don’t have much and in some circumstances we have been abused by out of state companies who come and take natural resources for low pay and then outsource that revenue elsewhere instead of seeing it reinvested. I’m proud of the idea of what this state is: hardworking people who get by on love, loyalty, and friendship cause they don’t have much else. But it’s increasingly frustrating to see a state stagnate like West Virginia. Why can’t we keep our beliefs and our culture and simultaneously decide that our people need better jobs, infrastructure, education, and health?

Interesting. So there is a precedent of a state being created from an existing state. Hmmm? I think there are several areas of the US that want this to happen again (maybe) -- Colorado, Oregon, Washington.

Where I lived in WV we sent more men to fight for the Confederacy than we did the Union. Heck, there's a Confederate soldier monument in Hinton to this day.