Kenova, WV

At the 2020 census, Kenova was a Wayne County city of 3,030 people at the confluence of the Ohio and Big Sandy rivers, across from Kentucky and in the Huntington-Ashland orbit. Its name is a three-state mashup: Ken-tucky, O-hio, and (West) Va-rginia. L. T. Peck bought 900 acres of bottomland, laid out the town in 1889, and built its early future around the Norfolk & Western bridge. By 1894 Kenova was incorporated, and the riverfront town had become a railroad junction.

Dreamland Pool gives Kenova its best local plot twist. Opened as a private business in 1925, the pool measures 125 by 250 feet and once carried a three-story pavilion with a dance floor where Glenn Miller, Benny Goodman, and Louis Armstrong played. A 1973 fire destroyed the pavilion, but Kenova bought the pool and reopened it in 1974; after repairs, it returned again in 2010. Kenova is a city named like a border joke, built on railroad bridges, and remembered through a swimming pool that doubled as a concert hall.