HOUSE CONCURRENT RESOLUTION 88

(By Delegates Hanna, C. Martin and P. Martin

[Introduced February 14, 2020]

Requesting the Division of Highways name bridge number: 51-26/1-0.02 (51A051), (38.48655, -80.29984) locally known as Bergoo Box Beam, carrying CR 26/1 over Leatherwood Creek in Webster County, the “Johnnie Bryant Moore Memorial Bridge”.

Whereas, Johnnie Bryant Moore was born in Upshur County, West Virginia, on September 30, 1890.  He married Hattie Samples and had six children, two of which died as infants. Hattie died of tuberculosis in 1925. Johnnie remarried and he and his wife had four children. Johnnie Bryant Moore moved to Bergoo, Webster County, in the late 1920s where he worked in logging for several years before going to the coal mines. As a miner, he had to buy his own tools to dig coal, hand pick and throw out any rock that was in the coal, load the coal and take it outside.  The miners of his day had no dust apparatus, with their only equipment being their hard hat, picks, shovels and carbide lights; and

Whereas, Johnnie Bryant Moore knew the miners and their families could not continue under these conditions and he began to talk with the local miners about the UMWA. The miners were fearful for their lives if they took steps to form a union in Bergoo, but Johnnie and some of the other miners began a long, hard fight to get the union into the local mines. They literally fought, some were killed, but they succeeded in forming the first United Mine Workers of America union in Bergoo. Johnnie was a proud charter member of the UMWA 1466, District 31; and

Whereas, Johnnie Bryant Moore died on April 11, 1990, at age 99, five months shy of his 100th birthday, and his union dues were paid through December of that year; and

Whereas, It is fitting that an enduring memorial be established to commemorate Johnnie Bryant Moore and his contributions to our state and country; therefore, be it

Resolved by the Legislature of West Virginia:

That the Division of Highways is hereby requested to name bridge number: 51-26/1-0.02 (51A051), (38.48655, -80.29984) locally known as Bergoo Box Beam, carrying CR 26/1 over Leatherwood Creek in Webster County, the “Johnnie Bryant Moore Memorial Bridge”; and, be it

Further Resolved, That the Division of Highways is hereby requested to have made and be placed signs identifying the bridge as the “Johnnie Bryant Moore Memorial Bridge”; and, be it

Further Resolved, That the Clerk of the House forward a copy of this resolution to the Commissioner of the Division of Highways.