High up on the hill in the middle of Webster Springs is a huge, earth-colored stone building that is impossible to ignore. While I’ve never been in this nearly 130-year-old building, I’ve enjoyed taking pictures of it over the years, and my latest trip included a view I’d never had before, straight down the steps of the courthouse down through the town. I can only imagine what the original wooden courthouse must have looked like in person, which was burned (a far too common fate for a Webster Springs building) in 1888. __________ pictures 1-3 2014; picture 4 2011; pictures 5-9 2023 | by Kacie Fleming

I have more Webster Springs books than I think I do… And one of the absolute most exciting, for obvious reasons, is this one by Mark Romano. And I’m pretty sure it was found years ago at the Addison Visitor Center . Take a look at the rest of the pictures for a sampling of the black and white goodness.

  While the Addison Visitor Center is a newer development for the Cutlip building, it’s on my must-stop list when visiting Webster Springs. In years past, I’d drool over the books. My grandfather rocked my world and got my genealogy-obsessed heart a highly prized one many years ago—it was either Roots & Wings by Leslie W. Hamrick, Jr. or A Pictorial History of Webster County WV by Mark Romano … or it may have been both at separate times. On my latest trip, I oohed over every antique, found both a Webster Springs shirt and a Lovers Lane one, and got some special, locally made gifts and decor, from jewelry to a Mother’s Day wreath.   There’s no quick shortcut to take at this stop, and I spent nearly two hours in there (it had been 9 years, so it was quite overdue), and it was as lovely as ever. What has been your favorite find at the Addison Visitor Center?    

My heart danced from the shore of the Elk River to the mountain-hedged golden hour to the heights of Lover’s Lane on a recent, rare anniversary trip with my husband, our first visit to Webster Springs in 9 years. With every pause to take pictures, an idea flickered across the hills then waved my way then completely stopped me in my tracks. And at the Hamrick Barn just outside of Webster Springs, this page, this undertaking, this passion on paper (or screen) was born. As someone who can never have enough naming opportunities, naming this page was more of a struggle than I thought it would be, but once it was settled, so was I. It was a gradual thought but a fast decision. And here we are.   There is so much to celebrate and marvel at and relive about my favorite town, but we’re going to take it one square at a time and delight in every minute of it.    As with all things I launch myself into, I don’t know why I didn’t think to do this sooner. But this idea appeared out of ...

We have years, we have minutes, we have decades; We have every separator man could find. But one scent, one sound, one song in one split second Obliterates the laws of space and time.   Time travel isn’t real, we’ve all been told; And yet we all know we’ve been told a lie, For we’ve all jumped a decade instantly To places no machine can seem to find.   - Kacie Lynn Fleming from Meeting Me: Poems of Hope, Truth, and Transformation