English: Title: A Chesapeake & Ohio Railway coal train approaches Thurmond, a mostly deserted old Appalachian coal town in West Virginia

Physical description: 1 photograph : digital, tiff file, color.

Notes: Purchase; Carol M. Highsmith Photography, Inc.; 2015; (DLC/PP-2015:055).; Credit line: West Virginia Collection within the Carol M. Highsmith Archive, Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division.; In the 2010 census it's population was 5. During the heyday of coal mining in the New River Gorge in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Thurmond was a prosperous town with a number of businesses and facilities for the C&O line. The town was the filming location for John Sayles' 1987 movie "Matewan" since it still possesses many of the characteristics of a 1920s Appalachian coal town. As of 2015, much of Thurmond is owned by the National Park Service for the New River Gorge National River. The passenger railway depot in town, renovated in 1995, functions as a Park Service visitor center, and occasional coal trains such as this one still pass through. Thurmond, incorporated in 1903, was named for onetime Confederate Army captain William Thurmond, who had surveyed the area.; Title, date and keywords based on information provided by the photographer.; Forms part of: West Virginia Collection within the Carol M. Highsmith Archive.