Richard Marting took me to Paul Ferguson's camp to trout fish Shaver's Fork of the Cheat River for the first time in about 1971 or 1972. I remember sleeping in the high roofed part of the cabin shown below (second photo) as I believe the light brown part of this cabin was added on at a later date. Seems there was a coal stove in the cabin and after midnight the fire went down and we had to dig out of our sleeping bags and recharge the fire (maybe global warming is effecting temperatures - it seemed a lot colder then). Today, you can often still smell the heavy coal smoke in the cool morning air as you have need to go outside the cabin. As I recall, and Richard will probably correct me, at that time the main cabin was the one closer to the river and when Jim purchased the place he remodeled the "upper cabin" and made it the main camp. Hard to believe but I have been going to Bemis, West Virginia for near 40 years. Richard shared a photo of Paul and Jim Williams that was dated 1969 but I was not able to download it here because of the type of format (I'll try again in another post). Before he passed away, Paul sold the place to Jim and I was fortunate enough to purchase it from Jim's widow Dorothy (Dot) in the summer of 2007. Here is a photo of (right to left) the river cabin, bath house, implement shed, and outhouse. The main cabin porch is at the left edge of the photo.
Are you crazy? I know that when my wife learned that I was plotting to buy the cabin from Dot Williams she thought I had totally lost it. Maybe I was/am a little touched? Here is a photo taken in October of 2007 of the back of the cabin - north and west sides (I still get confused about where north is because the river runs due north and that is just plain wrong). You can tell from this photo that the place isn't the Hilton - for that matter it isn't the Days Inn either. It has changed some and I'll share some newer photos in a later post.
Knowing how much I liked going to WV fishing, Sue - as she most often does - submitted and allowed me to go ahead with the purchase with the understanding that I would fix the place such that she would at least stay there overnight. You should realize that although Jim had furnished the place with adequate equipment (as Dot well knows, you can find at least 2 of almost anything that you can think of in one of the 6 buildings) you had to secure water from the hand pump outside and the outhouse was about 30 yards from the porch door. As depicted in this photo from November 2008, sometimes that 30 yards was more than most women would want to navigate - even though it is a "two holer".
Why in the world would anyone want to own, or even go to a place in Bemis, WV you ask. Here are two photos that were taken in October of 2007 that will answer that question. The 3 largest were all 17" rainbows.
I still use this photo as my computer monitor screen saver and reminder for "I need to plan a trip to the mountains!"
In closing, I would relate that a good thing about digital photography is that dates are stamped automatically thus making it easier to tell a story in chronological order. That same trip, mid-October, 2007 (that's the week that we always try to go because that's when WVDNR complete the fall trout stocking - they normally stock the big brooders then) Buck Belt brought wife Jane, daughter Eleanor & son-in-law Dave and the two grandkids (photo below) down from Cumberland, Maryland to let Jane check out the place. She hasn't been back - must have been the outhouse - but she has allowed Buck to come back with in-law George Earnest and friend Jim Lawrence. Yes, it does sometimes get cold early in Bemis.
I'll close for now and save some for the next post.
