Locations

Source: Text from the 100th year celebration church bulletin.

Located on the hill known to residents as Black Oak Mountain.

The first church was built of logs in 1853 by Methodists who joined with neighboring settlers.  It was located near the Virginian Railroad tunnel, on a knoll, on the Blackoak Mountain Road off of State Route 71.  The church was first named “Old Zion”.  In 1887 the church united with Cedar Cliff members and formed a church on the present location.

The land was dontated by Charles Walker Bailey and the lumber by Samuel Shutt.  The name of the church was changed to Rock Episcopal Methodist.  One of the first pastors was Rev. J. W. Rader.  In the early church, familys made and carved their own benches.  The church was first heated by a pot-bellied stove, and later was converted to a coal furnace.  It is now heated by electric heat.

In later years, the church was completely renovated.  The large basement, known as Bailey Hall, where social activities were held,  was made possible through a dontation by the late Alice Bailey.

The Youth Fellowship, through faith and hard work installed chimes in the church and dedicated them to the late Kenneth Bailey, son of James and Nancy Bailey.

On August 15 – 16, 1987, the Rock United Methodist Church celebrated its 100th Anniversary.  On Saturday, August 15, a fellowship reception was held in Bailey Hall.  Gospel singing was held later in the evening.  At the singing, memories of the past were shared by former and present members.  Videos were shown of past home comings.  On Sunday, the 16th, the church gathered for worship with the pastor, Kevin Lantz.  Following worship, a dinner was held on the church lawn.  More singing followed in the afternoon.  The day was filled with joy and celebration of the churches Christian Faith.

The church had a quartet known as “The Solid Rock”.  The members of the group were John Syres, Nina Basham, Bonnie Underwood and Vickie White.

The Baptist Church is located well up on the side of a hill on the East side of the Bluestone river in the heart of Rock. It is still in use as a church to this day. The Rock Baptist Church was built between 1914 and 1916. The church was named Good Hope Baptist Church. Some of the pastors and minister’s that served the church were: Rev. I.A. Gadd, Rev. C.D. Sweet, Rev. W.O. Keys, Rev. Cleve Young., Rev. Paul Hall, Rev. James Dunford and Rev. Snidow.

Establishment of rural route 1 in Rock, West Virginia

In the summer of 1926, William O. Keys prayed for a job, and God showed him a mail route which was not in existence. He wrote to the Post Office Department in Washington, D.C. for an application blank for a rural route. It came in a few days. A few days later, he was on horseback with the application, getting signers for the proposed route. Then he mailed the application with the signatures back to the P.O. Department.

The application was accepted and he received a letter from an Inspector Buckley, who asked him to meet him in Matoaka, WV. He said he needed a car with a speedometer to measure the route. They went out on the street and the first man they asked, said he had a car with one in it. They got in the car with the man and went to the post office in Rock, and started measuring the route. When they returned they had 20.6 miles. That was the length of the route for a short time. It increased to 41 miles.

William O. Keys started carrying the mail on October, 1, 1926, as a temporary carrier and was appointed regular carrier in 1927. The route grew to 42.8 miles. He had a T-Model Ford, but when winter came, he had to carry the mail on horseback or use a horse and buggy. It was too hard for one horse to pull the buggy, so he used two horses until an accident happened. At a place on Rock River Road called Cedar Cliff, some children were playing on the side of the cliff. They kicked shale down on one of the horse’s back. It scared the horses so bad that they grabbed the bridle bits and took off. He got scared and jumped out of the buggy. The horses ran about two miles. He followed and found the buggy against a stump beside the road smashed so badly that he couldn’t move it. The mail was all intact. One of the horses was in a field eating grass, the other one was feeding beside the road. He borrowed a saddle from a farmer nearby and put it on the horse beside the road and took all the mail on around the route and left the other horse in the field. The roads and weather were bad in those days. One day he was carrying the mail in his car and it started snowing and got so deep that he had to go so slow that it got dark on him. A chain came off of the wheel. He went to a nearby house and repaired it and put it back on the wheel, delivered the mail and did not make it home until 2:00 a.m. Still another time, his car spun on ice into a ditch. He walked and carried the mail on his back until a man came along and gave him a ride. He made sure his patrons received their mail, no matter how extreme the weather or the circumstances. He was truly dedicated to his work.

In the early 1940’s William O. Keys became an ordained minister. Still working as a mail carrier he was able to reach out to the people on his route anytime there was a need. He would pray with patrons who were ill, comfort those who had lost a loved one, deliver groceries to the shut in, even perform a marriage ceremony if requested. He was able to provide a service in the rural hills which people still remember. In “The National Rural Letter Carrier”, a newsletter style publication of the Postal Service, an article appeared in February,1992, which told of the ministerial service which he provided while working as a employee of the Postal service–a story of service which one would be hard pressed to repeat in the 1990’s.

Inspector Buckley came to Rock post office one day and told the postmaster,this man did something I never heard of before, he worked up a job with the Post Office Department and also got the position. After twenty-eight years and four months, he retired from the mail route on January 31, 1955.

William O. Keys was born October 24, 1891 and lived to be 100 years old. Below is a list of the Presidents of The United States that held office during Mr. Keys’ lifetime:

Benjamin Harrison    1889-1893
Grover Cleveland    1893-1897
William McKinley    1897-1901
Theodore Roosevelt   1901-1909
William Taft    1909-1913
Woodrow Wilson    1913-1921
Warren G. Harding    1921-1923
Calvin Coolidge    1923 -1929
Herbert Hoover    1929-1933
Franklin D. Roosevelt    1933-1945
Harry Truman    1945-1953
Dwight Eisenhower    1953-1961
John F. Kennedy    1961-1963
Lyndon B. Johnson    1963-1969
Richard M. Nixon    1969-1974
Gerald R. Ford    1974-1977
Jimmy Carter    1977-1981
Ronald Reagan    1981 -1989
George H. W. Bush    1989-1993

Mr. Keys lived through the Spanish American War, World War I and World War II, The Wright Brothers’ first flight, prohibition, the beginning of radio broadcasting, Lindberg’s first solo flight, the first “talkie” motion picture, the Great Depression, F.D.R’s New Deal, Truman’s Doctrine, the beginning of television, JFK, Martin Luther King, Jr., Sputnik 1, Apollo, LBJ, Nixon, Carter, Reagan, the Cold War, Vietnam, microchips  and computer technology. He not only witnessed the history of this century, he also, was one of the key ingredients in the recipe of the success of this great nation.  A caring, loving, hard working citizen, which has enhanced the lives of many people.

On December 4, 1991, after years of service to God and his fellow man he quietly slipped away to be with his Lord.

Rock Postmark and Stamp commemorating Elvis Presley’s Birthday.

On January 8, 1993 Elvis Presley stamps went on sale celebrating the King of Rock N’ Roll. The most “Rocking” Post Office of all was in Rock, W.Va. Fans came not only for the stamps, but to get the unique Rock, W.Va. postmark, dated January 8, Elvis’ birthday. There was a party at Rock Post Office that day to commemorate the event. Elvis Presley music was played on vintage eight-track cassettes. Many patrons bought Elvis records and other collectibles. Requests came in for the stamp and postmark from Massachusetts, Iowa, Virginia and Pennsylvania, said postmaster Hattie Crouse. Fans sent envelopes and money to get both the stamp and postmark. Crouse said she checked and discovered there is a Roll, Arizona. She planned to get that postmark and have Rock N Roll. One Thousand Five Hundred letters were postmarked on that day at Rock Post Office with the Elvis stamp.

The below photos shows the new Rock Post Office and the dedication of the new building.

Pictured in this class photo are Bernice Reed and E. W. Reed. The teacher is Mrs. Hall. You may recognize some of these kids in the photo. Tommy Ernest, Patty Wright, some of the Eller’s, Belcher’s, etc. Yvonne Boyer. Not sure what year E. W. was born in 1939 and Bernie 1940) it looks like this might be 5th, 6th graders.

In this photo the old steel bridge is showing it’s age and will not be standing much longer. You can see the Rock school house in the background and you can see that the roof over the porch has fallen down. Not sure of the date this picture was taken.

The below photo taken during high water. Mike remember’s walking to school across the bridge to school when it was like this. It was a little scary with the water and debris licking at the bottom of the bridge. All the kids thought it was fun to see the water up in the road. But some of the residents who lived along the road didn’t think it was much fun!

The next photo was taken shortly after the new concrete bridge was built to replace the old steel bridge. You will note that the Rock Elementary School is missing from the background. We miss it!

The eldest son of Samuel Bailey, Chrispianos whose name is sometimes spelled Chrispi Anos, lived on and operated a large farm about a mile below Rock, West Virginia, on the Lake Shawnee Road, overlooking the scenic Bluestone River. About a quarter of a mile from his beautiful old home is a loop of the river, one and seven-eights of a mile long; however, the loop is only fifty yards across. At the neck there is a layer of rock at the river’s surface, then a layer of sand, about seven feet in thickness, with another layer of rock above. The river falls twenty feet in the length of the loop.

In 1852, Chrispianos and his brother Charles, conceived of a mill at this point. They employed Matthew Bolton to do the physical work of boring a tunnel, one hundred twenty-five feet through this layer of sand, and erecting a mill on the lower side of the loop. This mill, known as “THE TUNNEL MILL,” was used for grinding wheat and corn. A carding machine about thirty feet long was also placed in this mill enabling the farmers of the area to bring their wool to be carded. Their wives could then make material necessary for making clothing.

The mill was busy for many years, both day and night, with farmers coming from as far away as Flat Top and Athens to grind their grain. The mill was operated until some time in the early 1900’s when railway construction brought in outside goods, making the operation of the mill unprofitable. The Norfolk and Western Railroad bought the mill sight, then later sold it to the Virginian Railway. Later, a flood washed away most of the contents of the mill.