A history of Thomas,
then and now
Postcards, papers and photographs of Thomas from public archives, woven together by decade. Neighbors fill in the gaps.
The story
from WikipediaRead it all ↗Thomas was platted in 1884. Thomas was named for Thomas Beall Davis (1828-1911), brother of Senator Henry Gassaway Davis. The Davis brothers, in 1883, opened a mine near Thomas and had coal ready to ship when their railway arrived a year later. By 1892, Davis Coal and Coke was among the largest and best known coal companies in the world and employed 1,600 people. At the peak of its operations in 1915, there were nine producing mines within a mile of the company's office in Thomas.
Immigrants flocked to the area as miners, railroad laborers, or merchants. The company employed a man named Wladyslaw Dackiewicz as an interpreter. He could speak, read, and write eight languages and his services were much in demand with the influx of immigrants.
Text from Wikipedia, licensed CC BY-SA 4.0.
Timeline
built from the dates on the items belowFinish Thomas’s story
Most archives stop around 1920. The photos from after that are in family albums, not libraries.
3 of 10 decades since 1900 have photos 🔁Retake an old viewTrain-load of ore and miners outs…, 1904: stand where they stood+15 📦Share a family photoSign in to add one+10Thomas, decade by decade
LOCTrain-load of ore and miners outside Davis Coal and Coke In…1904
CommonsBuxton and Landstreet Company Store Thomas WV ca 19061906
CommonsCottrill Opera House Thomas WV ca 19061906
CommonsDavis Coal and Coke Co Mining Operation at Thomas WV ca 19091906
CommonsWestern Maryland Railroad Depot Thomas WV ca 19061906
1990s
4 historic places in Thomas
Thomas has 4 listings on the National Register, and they protect 51 historic buildings, because Thomas Commercial Historic District alone counts 48.
Where they are
When they were listed
Listed 1979Cottrill Opera House
Listed 1998Thomas Commercial Historic District
Listed 2011Davis Coal and Coke Company Administrative BuildingListed 2022Buxton and Landstreet Company StoreThen & now
No then-and-now pairs yet. Take a photo from the same spot as Train-load of ore and miners outside Davis Coal and Coke Industry (1904) and it appears here side by side.
🔁 Retake this view · +15Stories next door
nearby towns’ historyFrom Wikimedia Commons (7) and the Library of Congress (5). Images are copied here with their credits and licenses, shown on each photo’s page. Refreshed monthly.