Delbarton, West Virginia

Delbarton is a town in Mingo County, West Virginia, United States. The population was 522 at the 2020 census.

History

Delbarton was incorporated September 6, 1946, by the Mingo County Circuit Court.

The name Delbarton comes from the New Jersey country estate of Luther Kountze, a Wall Street financier and part owner of the United Thacker Land Company, a large coal mining company. Currently a Catholic high school with the same moniker, the Delbarton School, is located on this site. The estate and town and school all derive their name from a portmanteau of syllables in the names of Kountze's three children (DELancey, BARclay and LivingsTON).

Prior to being incorporated as a town, Delbarton was a coal camp built and owned by the Thacker company. Thacker needed such camps; soon after, in 1909, acting for the company, Luther Kountze arranged the purchase of thousands of acres in the area from Jane Hatfield, a woman widowed in 1882 by the murder of her husband, Ellison Hatfield in the famed Hatfield-McCoy Feud. Jane required money for herself and her children and sold cheaply, unaware of the fantastic mineral wealth she was losing out on. After this acquisition of land, Delbarton was created for the needed miners who were recruited and brought in to work the soon to be opened coal mines.

Poverty is endemic in the town of Delbarton, as it is in Mingo County where it is located. US Census Bureau estimates as of 2018 put the residents living below the poverty line percentages at 36.5% for Delbarton and 28.7% for Mingo County. These rates compare to 17.8% for West Virginia and 15% for the USA overall. Economists attribute the most significant cause of this high level of poverty to the drastic decline in the number of jobs in the local coal mining industry. The loss of such employment which has been going on for several decades is blamed on two factors: the reduction in the amount of coal being extracted in the area and the ever increasing use of less labor intensive removal methods for what coal is still mined.

Some commercial buildings in town, no longer needed for their original purposes of retail or mining administration, are now used to cater to the growing tourist industry.

Geography

According to the United States Census Bureau, the town has a total area of , all land.

Demographics

2010 census

As of the census of 2010, there were 579 people, 260 households, and 150 families living in the town. The population density was . There were 326 housing units at an average density of . The racial makeup of the town was 96.4% White, 0.7% African American, 0.2% Native American, 0.2% Asian, and 2.6% from two or more races.

There were 260 households, of which 27.7% had children under the age of 18 living with them, 43.1% were married couples living together, 10.0% had a female householder with no husband present, 4.6% had a male householder with no wife present, and 42.3% were non-families. 39.2% of all households were made up of individuals, and 11.6% had someone living alone who was 65 years of age or older. The average household size was 2.23 and the average family size was 2.99.

The median age in the town was 39.3 years. 22.1% of residents were under the age of 18; 7.2% were between the ages of 18 and 24; 29.1% were from 25 to 44; 29.8% were from 45 to 64; and 11.6% were 65 years of age or older. The gender makeup of the town was 54.1% male and 45.9% female.

2000 census

As of the census

M. C. Kirkendall, 1946–1950
Dr. J. R. Farley, 1951–1954
Lewie Chapman, 1955–1956
W. A. Curry, 1957–1958
Melvin Steele Brooks, Sr., 1959–1960
W. A. Curry, 1961
Jonce Baisden, 1962–1963
Rush B. Farley, 1964
Paul H. Sizemore, 1965–1977
Noah Maynard, 1978
William “Bill” Stratton, 1979–1980
Earl Spence, 1981–1983
Donnie Robertson, 1984
Earl C. Spence, Jr., 1985–1988
William Thomas Crum, 1989–1990
Steven Cook, 1991–1992
Elmer R. Spence, 1993–1996
John W. Preece, 1997–2019
Elmer R. Spence, 2019–2023
John W. Preece, 2023
Mont Crum, 2023–Present