Twenty-five states have changed their minds about the location of their capitals, so West Virginia is in good company. Nonetheless, the back and forth between Wheeling and Charleston makes for one of the Mountain State’s most amusing stories.
Just shortly after being granted statehood during the Civil War’s battle between North and South, West Virginia’s capital location became a battle royale between the state’s powerbrokers of its north and south. With government records making the trek up and down the Ohio River so frequently, the steamboats seemed to house them more than any great building created just for that purpose.