Thomas, WV

Thomas is a Tucker County city and former coal town along the North Fork of the Blackwater River, where the 2020 census counted 623 residents. It was platted in 1884 and named for Thomas Beall Davis, brother of Senator Henry Gassaway Davis. Davis brought the railroad through the valley, and the Western Maryland line made Thomas a coal and timber shipping point.

At its height, Davis Coal and Coke employed about 1,600 workers from across Europe and the wider United States, giving the town an unusually international workforce. The company's coal, timber, rail yard, and power infrastructure sat together along the river and tracks. Thomas's Commercial Historic District, Cottrill Opera House, and Davis Coal and Coke Administrative Building preserve that industrial townscape; the city also supports music, festivals, and outdoor recreation in the Blackwater country. Thomas now pairs a small river city with a historic commercial core, where coal-era buildings, rail traces, and current local culture share the same steep valley.