Blue Ridge Country January/February 2023 - 29

CURIOS
ON THE WEST VIRGINIA-KENTUCKY BORDER
The Bridge the Soviets Nearly Built
In the 1970s, the tiny West Virginia community of Vulcan became so desperate
for a crossing into Kentucky that they reached out to Russia.
By SU CLAUSON-WICKER
he tiny West Virginia community
of Vulcan sits on Mingo
County's border with Kentucky,
surrounded by mountains on
three sides and the Tug River on
the other. Once Vulcan was a
booming coal town, but its real
claim to fame is the bridge linking it to
the outside world, a bridge that was almost
built by the Russians to insult the
U.S. some 40 years ago.
T
The 50 or so families of Vulcan went
for nearly six years without a passable
bridge-or a legal road. They had no safe
way to drive out of town after the bridge
that had been built by the coal company
collapsed in 1974. The only way people
could get in and out was to drive up the
Kentucky side of the Tug and walk across
a narrow swinging bridge. For years,
John Robinette, Vulcan's self-appointed
mayor, pleaded with coal companies and
legislators at all levels for a rebuild. They
all said there was no money.
The situation was dire. Children had
to crawl under parked railroad cars at the
railroad's bridge to get to school. A kid
lost a leg doing that. A few motorists tried
to take the railroad right of way over the
river to the roads in Kentucky, but there
wasn't much room next to the live tracks.
Twice, elderly couples flinched, jerked
their trucks, and ended up in the river.
The railroad began prosecuting anyone
caught on their property.
Robinette and the town were losing
patience with their government. A bartender
and carnival worker who flew Old
Glory over his trailer, Robinette was ready
for a drastic move. In 1977, he wrote the
Soviet embassy in Washington, DC, as
well as officials in Communist East Germany,
describing Vulcan's plight and
requesting foreign aid for a bridge. The
Soviets savored the opportunity to embarrass
the U.S. and dispatched a journalist,
Iona Andronov, to Vulcan. Andronov
said the Soviets would fund the bridge if
the American government did not.
By witnessing and broadcasting the
locals' woes, the Soviet journalist finally
brought attention to the ignored comUndated
photo at left shows the
remains of the original swinging
bridge from Vulcan, West
Virginia, across the Tug River to
Kentucky. Google Earth photo at
right shows the 1980 bridge.
munity. Within hours of Andronov's
visit on Dec. 16, 1977, word came down
from Gov. Jay Rockefeller that West Virginia
was working with Kentucky to build
a new bridge.
Newspapers across the nation were
talking about Vulcan's appeal to the
Kremlin. Some fervent anti-communists
were not amused. Local newspapers and
radio stations in West Virginia received
threats that any bridge built with Red aid
would be blown up.
But Rockefeller kept his promise. Two
years later, on July 4, 1980, the 300-ft
bridge was dedicated. It had cost over $1
million, the costs split between Kentucky
and West Virginia. According to news reports,
Vulcan residents celebrated with
illegally imported Russian vodka and the
American flag hung high.
JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2023 29
Blue Ridge Country January/February 2023

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