Help the WVSTA and the MITB Chapter
develop a new segment
of the Mary Ingles Trail
in the upper Kanawha Valley!

MARY INGLES MEMORIAL TRAIL (MIMT)

  • The Proposted Trail

    The Mary Ingles Memorial Trail will be a 1-mile loop trail designed as a healthy outdoor corridor in a pleasant, restored natural setting that is currently a favorite spot for birders, anglers, and other nature enthusiasts.

    The upper Kanawha Valley is one of the least-served areas in Kanawha County. Currently, visitors are restricted to walking on the roadway that leads from the parking area to the fishing area.

    The loop trail will provide a mile of walking in a more natural environment free from potential road hazards. The trail will also provide cultural history and natural history education through signage describing the important east-west trail corridor provided by the river and its valley.

  • Mount Holly Lawn Committee

    In 2022, the WVSTA’s Mary Ingles Trail Blazers Chapter formed the Mount Holly Lawn Committee to continue the work of a local citizen group to convince the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to allow development of a 1-mile loop trail at the Marmet Locks to memorialize Mary’s journey right past that very spot.   

    Mount Holly Lawn is an unusual mound-like topographic feature in the river bottom on the northeast side of Kanawha River near Belle, WV and directly across the river from the village of Marmet. 

    Holly Lawn was the name of the estate of the Reynolds family who were salt manufacturers. 

    The Mount took on the name of the estate.  When the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) constructed the Lock and Dam infrastructure, they used eminent domain to purchase the properties in the vicinity, including Mount Holly Lawn. 

  • Archaeological Investigations

    When the locks were scheduled to be enlarged, the USACE was required to oversee archaeological investigations of the site, 1995-2015. 

    Cultural Resource Analysts performed the work and then documented it with two videos/dvds:  Red Salt and Reynolds and Secrets of the Valley.  These are definitely worth watching. 

    The archaeological investigation found evidence of human occupation of the site from the late Paleo period (9,000 B.C.) through the salt manufacturing era of the 19th century.  They even found a late 17th century palisaded settlement that might have been the town visited by Gabriel Arthur in 1674, called Moneton (Great Water in the Tutelo or similar language) after the river.

HELP NEEDED TO SECURE GRANT FUNDS

  • Grant Award

    The Mary Ingles Trail Blazers Chapter has been awarded a grant from the Recreational Trails Program (RTP) of the West Virginia Department of Transportation.

    The project award was $212,432. However, the full cost of the project was estimated in FY2023 at $363,040, leaving the MITB with the daunting task of raising $150,608. 

  • Matching Funds Needed

    We are now in FY2025, and materials and labor costs have gone up.  Now we need to raise $175,000 to complete the project. 

    Please contribute to this much-needed community project.

    There are three ways you can donate: 

THREE WAYS YOU CAN DONATE

WVSTA/MITB volunteers Rick Gregg (L) and Fielding Moss (R) pose with the prop check representing the awarded grant from the Recreation Tails Program of the WV Dept. of Highways.  The trail will be on the federal property, where Mary Ingles walked on her way into captivity in 1755.  Beautiful, steep, wooded hillsides are on both sides of the Kanawha River at this location.