Dingess, West Virginia

Dingess, West Virginia
Unincorporated community
Dingess, West Virginia Dingess, West Virginia
Coordinates: 37°52′20″N 82°10′29″W / 37.87222°N 82.17472°WCoordinates: 37°52′20″N 82°10′29″W / 37.87222°N 82.17472°W
Country	United States
State	West Virginia
County	Mingo
Elevation	971 ft (296 m)
Time zone	Eastern (EST) (UTC-5)
• Summer (DST)	EDT (UTC-4)
ZIP code	25671
Area code(s)	304 & 681
GNIS feature ID	1554306[1]

The old Dingess Tunnel as it served the 2 Pole Line of the Norfolk & Western Railway between Lenore and Wayne, WV.

Dingess is an unincorporated community in Mingo County, West Virginia, United States. Dingess is 11 miles (18 km) north of Delbarton. Dingess has a post office with ZIP code 25671.^[2]

Dingess is known throughout the area for a tunnel on a county road south of the town. Originally built for railroad use, it has been opened to one lane vehicular traffic for many years.^[3]

The old Dingess Train Depot

The Dingess Tunnel as it looks today, with paved road and serving single lane traffic.

The Dingess Petroglyphs

History

The community was named after William Dingess, a pioneer settler.^[4]

As of 1894, Dingess contained two hotels, eight boarding houses, four restaurants, four groceries, four saw mills, and a school with two teachers and about 100 students. 133 coal miners lived in Dingess.^[5]

The community once garnered a reputation for being a lawless land. In his book They’ll Cut Off Your Project, Huey Perry, wrote “Old-timers there said it was common practice to have a killing once a month. As ‘Uncle’ Jim Marcum described it, ‘Why, a colored person couldn’t think about riding through Dingess. They would stop the train, take him off and shoot him, and nobody would say a word. Why, they would even stop the train and take all its cargo. It was a wild country then, and it ain’t much better now.’”

From 1900 to 1972, approximately seventeen lawmen were shot to death in the area which stretches fifteen miles along Twelve Pole Creek.^[6]

IN 1901, robbers raided the community, dynamiting a large safe. According to a November 23, 1901, edition of the Bluefield Daily Telegraph: "Citizens were on the scene almost immediately after the heavy report, and the burglars hadn’t time to gather up their booty as a number of citizens opened fire and probably forty shots were exchanged. The burglars, who secured a lot of valuable jewelry, escaped on a hand car which was recovered later four miles from Dingess, and on which blood spots were plainly visible.^[7]

References

1. U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Dingess, West Virginia
2. ZIP Code Lookup
4. Kenny, Hamill (1945). West Virginia Place Names: Their Origin and Meaning, Including the Nomenclature of the Streams and Mountains. Piedmont, WV: The Place Name Press. p. 209.
5. Logan County (WV) Banner, 27 September 1894.
6. "Dingess: One of West Virginia's Most Lawless Regions at the Turn of the Century". Appalachian Magazine. December 28, 2014.
7. "Bluefield Daily Telegraph". November 23, 1901 – via Newspapers.com.

External links