Tygart Valley River

Geobox|River
name = Tygart Valley River


image_size = 290
image_caption = The Tygart Valley River at the mouth of the Buckhannon River (just above center). Photo taken along the B&O Railroad between Belington and Philippi.
image_first =
country = United States
country_

state = West Virginia
state_

region_type = Counties
region = Barbour
region1 = Marion
region2 = Pocahontas
region3 = Taylor
region4 = Randolph
length =
length_imperial = 160
length_note =cite web |url=Gnis3|1553309 |title=Geographic Names Information System entry for Tygart Valley River (Feature ID #1553309) |author=Geographic Names Information System |authorlink=Geographic Names Information System|accessdate=2007-03-12]
watershed =
watershed_imperial = 1329
watershed_note =cite book| last= Rice |first= Donald L. |editor= Ken Sullivan (ed.) | title= The West Virginia Encyclopedia |year= 2006 |publisher= West Virginia Humanities Council |location=Charleston, W.Va. |isbn= 0-9778498-0-5 |pages= p. 721 |chapter=Tygart Valley River]
discharge_location = Philippi, WV
discharge_average_imperial = 1922
discharge_max_imperial = 61000
discharge_min_imperial = 4.9
discharge_note = cite web |url=http://pubs.usgs.gov/wdr/2005/wdr-wv-05-1/ |pages = [http://pubs.usgs.gov/wdr/2005/wdr-wv-05-1/pdf/monongahela.pdf Monongahela River Basin] |title=Water Resources Data, West Virginia, Water Year 2005 |first= S. M. |last=Ward |coauthors=G. R. Crosby |publisher=United States Geological Survey |accessdate=2007-05-20]
discharge1_location = near Dailey, WV
discharge1_average =
discharge1_average_imperial = 358
discharge1_note =
source_name = Allegheny Mountains
source_location = Pocahontas County, West Virginia
source_location_note =
source_lat_d = 38
source_lat_m = 28
source_lat_s = 06
source_lat_NS = N
source_long_d = 79
source_long_m = 58
source_long_s = 51
source_long_EW = W
source_coordinates_note =
source_elevation =
source_elevation_imperial = 4540
source_elevation_note = [Google Earth elevation for GNIS source coordinates. Retrieved on March 12, 2007.]
mouth_name = Monongahela River
mouth_location = Fairmont, West Virginia
mouth_location_note =
mouth_elevation =
mouth_elevation_imperial = 863
mouth_elevation_note =
mouth_lat_d = 39
mouth_lat_m = 27
mouth_lat_s = 54
mouth_lat_NS = N
mouth_long_d = 80
mouth_long_m = 09
mouth_long_s = 11
mouth_long_EW = W
mouth_coordinates_note =
tributary_left = Middle Fork River
tributary_left1 = Buckhannon River
tributary_right =
tributary_right1 =


map_size = 290
map_caption = Map of the Monongahela River basin, with the Tygart Valley River highlighted
map_first =

The Tygart Valley River, sometimes known as the Tygart River, is a principal tributary of the Monongahela River, approximately 160 miles (257 km) long, in east-central West Virginia, USA. Via the Monongahela and Ohio Rivers, it is part of the watershed of the Mississippi River, draining an area of 1,329 square miles (3,442 km²) in the Allegheny Mountains and on the unglaciated portion of the Allegheny Plateau.

Course

The Tygart Valley River rises in the Allegheny Mountains in Pocahontas County and flows generally north-northwestwardly through Randolph, Barbour, Taylor and Marion Counties, past the towns of Huttonsville, Mill Creek, Beverly, Elkins, Junior, Belington, Philippi, Arden, and Grafton to Fairmont, where it joins the West Fork River to form the Monongahela River.cite book| title= West Virginia Atlas & Gazetteer |year=1997 |publisher= DeLorme |location=Yarmouth, Me. |isbn= 0-89933-246-3 |pages= pp. 25-26, 36-37, 47]

Downstream of Elkins, the Tygart Valley River passes through a gap between Rich Mountain and Laurel Mountain, which are considered to be part of the westernmost ridge of the Allegheny Mountains and the boundary between the Alleghenies and the Allegheny Plateau. [cite book| last= Adkins |first= Howard G. |editor= Ken Sullivan (ed.) | title= The West Virginia Encyclopedia |year= 2006 |publisher= West Virginia Humanities Council |location=Charleston, W.Va. |isbn= 0-9778498-0-5 |pages= p. 10 |chapter=Allegheny Mountains] The river collects its two largest tributaries, the Buckhannon River and the Middle Fork River, in Barbour County between Belington and Philippi. Just upstream of Grafton, the river was impounded by a U.S. Army Corps of Engineers dam in 1938 to form Tygart Lake. [Cite web |url=http://www.lrp.usace.army.mil/rec/lakes/tygartla.htm |title=Tygart Lake |author= United States Army Corps of Engineers |authorlink= United States Army Corps of Engineers |accessdate= 2007-03-12] Valley Falls State Park is along the river between Grafton and Fairmont. [cite web| url=http://www.valleyfallsstatepark.com/ |title= Valley Falls State Park |accessdate= 2007-03-12]

Flow rate

At the United States Geological Survey's stream gauge in Philippi, the annual mean flow of the river between 1940 and 2005 was 1,922 ft³/s (54 m³/s). The river's highest flow during the period was estimated at 61,000 ft³/s (1,727 m³/s) on November 5, 1985. The lowest recorded flow was 4.9 ft³/s (0.1 m³/s) on several days in October 1953.

At an upstream gauge near the community of Dailey in Randolph County, the annual mean flow of the river between 1915 and 2005 was 358 ft³/s (10 m³/s). The highest recorded flow during the period was 19,900 ft³/s (564 m³/s) on May 17, 1996. Readings of zero were recorded for several months during autumn of the years 1930 and 1953.

History

The Tygart Valley was first settled by Europeans in 1753 when David Tygart (for whom the valley and river are named) and Robert Files (or Foyle) located (separately) with their families in the vicinity of present-day Beverly. Although there had been no recent history of conflicts between whites and Indians in that immediate area, that summer a party of Indians traveling the Shawnee Trail discovered the Files cabin and killed seven members of the family. One son escaped and alerted the Tygart family, allowing all to escape. No other white settlement was attempted in present Randolph County until 1772. (It has been thought that Tygart was again among those settling then, but this is not certain). [cite book | author = Maxwell, Hu| title = The History of Barbour County, From its Earliest Exploration and Settlement to the Present Time, The Acme Publishing Company, Morgantown, W.Va. (Reprinted, McClain Printing Company, Parsons, W.Va., 1968)| year = 1899| pages = 180-181]

The brothers John and Samuel Pringle, who had taken up residence in the Buckhannon tributary of the Tygart (in present Upshur County) in 1761, acted as their contemporary Daniel Boone was doing in Kentucky and guided numerous immigrant settlers into the main valley of the Tygart which at that time abounded in game and fertile bottomlands. Settlers of the 1770s and '80s included the Connelly, Hadden, Jackson, Nelson, Riffle, Stalnaker, Warwick, Westfall, Whiteman and Wilson families. [cite book | author = Rice, Otis K. and Stephen W. Brown| title = West Virginia, A History, 2nd Edition, The University Press of Kentucky, Lexington, Kentucky| year = 1993| pages = 29]

Variant names and spellings

The United States Board on Geographic Names settled on "Tygart River" as the stream's name in 1902, and changed it to "Tygart Valley River" in 1950. According to the Geographic Names Information System, the Tygart Valley River has also been known historically as:

ee also

*List of West Virginia rivers

References

Citations

Other sources

*Hamilton, Carolyn Fortney (2004), "West Virginia's Lower Tygart Valley River: People and Places", Terra Alta, West Virginia: Headline Books, Inc.