We see fit that they will grow up to be strong holler girls or boys. The marriage of one of their blue boys, Zachariah, to his mothers sister triggered the line of succession that would result in the birth, more than 100 years later, of Benjy Stacy. And shop at Walmart. Martin Fugate was a French orphan who emigrated to Kentucky in 1820 to claim a land grant on the wilderness banks of Troublesome Creek. Theyre known simply as the blue people in the hills and hollows around Troublesome and Ball Creeks. When West Virginia University decided to put "Black Lives Matter" decals on the back of their football helmets, the reaction by the people of . It like to scared me to death! Wait. The story of an Appalachian malady, an inquisitive doctor, and a paradoxical cure. It was later discovered ascorbic acid can do this, as well. When Two Strangers Lost the Genetic Lottery Martin Fugate arrived in the unsettled frontier of Kentucky in 1820. Intermarrying with people other than close relatives meant the likelihood of any Fugate descendant being born with the condition reduced. New Martinsville is located in the northwestern part of the state, right on the Ohio state line. All rights reserved. Somebody with only one gene would not have the condition but could pass the gene to a child. He found references to methemoglobinemia dating to the turn of the century, but it wasnt until he came across E. M. Scotts 1960 report in the Journal of Clinical Investigation (vol. by Cathy TrostScience82, November, 1982. The Fugate family didnt leave the area for generations, continually intermarrying with relatives. The Derby Bar & Grill, Fairmount, WV. That total makes West Virginia the 38th most populous state in the country. Once he had the enzyme deficiency isolated, methylene blue sprang to Caweins mind as the perfectly obvious antidote. Green human are possible. Written family records do not indicate Martin's skin color, but family legend says he was blue. Two days of tests produced no explanation for skin the color of a bruised plum. Settling in the remote hills of Kentucky, there werent a lot of other people nearby, and marrying people who were closely related became common among the Fugates. Days of testing provided no answers; but then Benjy's grandmother told the doctor a story about the "blue" Fugates. The blood disorder is inherited as a simple recessive trait - meaning that to get the disorder, a person would have to inherit two genes, one from each parent. Old color photographs of the family clearly show about half of the members to have a distinct cobalt blue skin color, while the other have regular white skin color. He concluded that inbreeding levels in Appalachia [are neither] unique [n]or particularly common to the region, when compared with those reported for populations elsewhere or at earlier periods in American history.. Grafton has the highest percentage of its population that didnt finish high school. God Bless America. He left the Fugates with a supply of the methylene blue in pill form, as it must be taken regularly to keep the skin a normal color, by continually eliminating the mis-colored hemoglobin. In 1980, anthropologist Robert Tincher published a study titled Night Comes to the Chromosomes: Inbreeding and Population Genetics in Southern Appalachia, based on 140 years worth of marriage records. Instead, football players bore a bronzesque gold helmet emblazoned with a blue outline of the state of West Virginia and the letters "WVU" inside an oval. They took the doctor to see their uncle, who was blue, too. In most people, there is an enzyme present called diaphorase that converts methemoglobin back into a usable form of hemoglobin. The Informant learned this information from her brother, when he returned home after his first semester at school. In response, Sen. Robert Byrd of West Virginia railed against the veep, accusing him of astounding ignorance toward his own countrymen. Howd West Virginia get a reputation for inbreeding? Which means lots of weekend warriors probably live here; its the families that have boats and who book nice family hunting trips. Additional comment actions. Diet: Insects, seeds, and grains. She and her husband Alva have a strong sense of family. Cawein drew lots of blood from the Ritchies and hurried back to his lab. Benjy was a pretty big item in the hospital, his mother says with a grin. valley in the mountains in West Virginia with a barn and cows visible West Virginia Mountains Fall Foliage The Mountain Spruce Fall Colors Beautiful Pictures In fact, change is seen as a negative to many West Virginians and disruptive to their way of life. The enzyme eventually builds to normal levels in most children and to almost normal levels in those like Benjy, who carry one gene. If the blue people did have methemoglobinemia, the next step was to find out the cause. In his research, he found a 1960 article by E. M. Scott that was reported in the Journal of Clinical Investigation. Only adopted cousins are allowed to marry, while in Vermont, Virginia, and many other states, first cousins can tie the knot. When young people started moving away from the farms surrounding Troublesome Creek in the mid-20th century, they took their recessive blue genes with them. Cancel any time, no strings attached. There are still blue people around today, but some of them developed their blueness from ingesting colloidal silver. Everyone knew the blue Fugates were healthy people. 702 ft (214 m) Time zone: UTC-5 (Eastern (EST)) Summer : UTC-4 (EDT) GNIS ID: 1549599: Blue is an unincorporated community in Tyler County, West Virginia, United States. Because of the dispersion of fluids, the solution only lasts for about a day so the carrier would have to drink a serving every day. Her name was Ruth Pendergrass, and she had been trying to stir up medical interest in the blue people ever since a dark blue woman walked into the county health department one bitterly cold afternoon and asked for a blood test. Its nothing.. For the record, West Virginia has strict anti-incest laws. He recounted how, after hearing the story for the first time, he and his roommates would make a show of continuously checking to see if their other friends lips or skin ever looked blue. West Virginia: County: Tyler: Elevation. Hearing this story and conducting some research of my own led me to believe that people love to come up with their explanation for things they cannot explain, no matter how perplex. The famous painting of the blue Fugates is not based on an actual family photograph, but was a composite illustration created by artist Walt Spitzmiller for a 1982 magazine article. 2019 Foreign-Born Population 30.2k people As of 2020, 1.64% of West Virginia residents (29.6k people) were born outside of the United States, which is lower than the national average of 13.5%. Then he began to construct the family genealogy and traced their roots back to Martin and Elizabeth Fugate. She told me that her family was the blue Combses who lived up on Ball Creek. Is there anything really wrong with being called a West Virginia redneck? Most lived to their 80s and 90s without serious illness associated with the skin discoloration. The Appalachian region of the US is a beautiful place with a rich and sometimes tragic history. You have the most bars and trailer parks per capita in the state, and your high school graduation rate is 70%. Admitted to the union as the 35th state in 1863, it is a relatively small state. But as Kentucky became more populated and more genes came into the Fugate family tree, there were far fewer children born blue. Howells Pawn and Guns, New Martinsville, WV. June 18, 2015. In the early 1960's, this blue malady caught the attention of Madison Cawein, an inquisitive hematologist from the University of Kentucky. "For the first time in their lives, they were pink. He married Elizabeth Smith, who carried a recessive gene for a genetic condition called methemoglobinemia, which gives those who have it blue-toned skin, even though they are otherwise perfectly healthy. Google Maps. It was painful. Regardless, this place might be the whitest, redneckest of them all. He married a red-haired American named Elizabeth Smith with a very pale complexion. Martin Fugate arrived in the unsettled frontier of Kentucky in 1820. The expedition descended that river to Peter's Falls on the future Virginia-West Virginia border and claimed for England all the land drained by the New River and its tributaries. 11 HINTS YOU MIGHT BE DESCENDED FROM ALIENS, FUGATES OF KENTUCKY: SKIN BLUER THAN LAKE LOUISE As My World Turns, If Your Skin Is Blue, Dont Marry Your Other Blue Shaded Relative interesting12, Daily News investigates: Mystery of family with blue skin solved | Bazaar Daily News, If Your Skin Is Blue, Don't Marry Your Other Blue Shaded Relative - interesting12. Curiosity drove him to Hazard where he was introduced to a nurse, Ruth Pendergrass, who had met a "dark blue" woman. The only thing Stacy cant or wont remember is that his wife Luna was blue. Scotts Alaskans seemed to match Caweins blue people. Excise tax on bottled soft drinks, syrups and dry mixtures; disposition thereof. The only real picture is of a man who turned himself blue by eating silver. By Jamie Kiffel-Alcheh Fast Facts Nickname: The Mountain State Statehood: 1863; 35th state Population (as of July, 2016): 1,831,102. My grandmother Luna on my dads side was a blue Fugate. One relative describes her as blue all over, and another calls Luna the bluest woman I ever saw.. Population: 18,763Bars per capita: 6th in West VirginiaFishing/bait shops per capita: 4thMobile home parks per capita: 5th. Stacys son has built a modern house next door, but the old logger wont hear of leaving the cabin he built with timber he personally cut and hewed for Luna and their 13 children. 1:52. She was one of the "blue" Combses who lived up on Ball Creek and was a sister to one of the Fugate women; her brother, Luke, was also blue. What he got from Martin Fugate was dark blue skin. Answer (1 of 3): Depends on what you mean by blue. Researchers believe this to truly be the case, a result of the family suffering from a genetic condition called methemoglobinemia, which is an excess of methemoglobin in the red blood cells of the body. It was real bad in her, Alva Stacy, the boys father, explained. Stereotypes about West Virginian breeding practices have long been linked to the states poverty. Chasing Chains, LLC. However, the disorder didn't seem to cause any special health problems. West Virginia Get facts and photos about the 35th state. Levels at or above 70% are considered life-threatening and are accompanied by erratic heartbeats and circulatory problems. Definitely not a poaching bunch, these Hurricane rednecks. Many is more accurate since the practice is legal, or legal under certain circumstances, in more than 20 states. Inbreeding in eastern Kentucky has been turning offspring blue since the early 1880s. What neither she nor Martin could have known is that they both carried the recessive gene for a rare hereditary blood disorder called methemoglobinemia. Using Yelp and Google Maps, this is the criteria we used: Note: For the sake of getting reliable numbers, we counted places within a citys border, as well as within a short driving distance. Fear that more inflation will cost jobs. They werent sick; it was just the way they look. Slate is published by The Slate Group, a Graham Holdings Company. I was actually born with my twin sisters fetus inside me. Bluefield State is committed to being the region's leading institution of higher education. This genetic defect comes from a rare recessive gene, so most people arent affected by it unless they happen to reproduce with another person who carries it. The Blue Ridge was reached in 1670, and in 1671 another expedition encountered the first westward-flowing stream, the New River, in southwestern Virginia. Stacy counts Fugate blood in his own veins. 2 Hereditary diaphorase deficiency and methemoglobinemia. Got a question about todays news? Due to all this inbreeding, there were a lot of blue people running around the backwoods of Kentucky. How far from Flatwoods , ky? "That's crazy.". Folklore maintained the Fugates were blue due to heart disease or lung problems. Thankfully, Benjy lost his blue shade after a few weeks and the only lingering effects were blue fingernails and lips when he was cold or angry. His two room log cabin sits in the middle of Laurel Fork Hollow. Luna Stacy possessed the good health common to the blue people, bearing at least 13 children before she died at 84. Cawein advised giving the child methylene blue and not worrying about it. If this conversion continued, all the bodys hemoglobin would eventually be rendered useless. Elizabeth had pale white skin, almost translucent. Dern it, Princeton. 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blue people of west virginia