When we talk about growing up in a small town, there are a few common experiences that transcend place: hanging out in WalMart parking lots and trying to find ways to escape the oppression of rurality as quickly as possible. Central to my upbringing in Lewis County, WV was “Graffiti Hall,” a random but art-filled underpass and an airstrip that presented the perfect opportunity to drive dangerously fast.
Out in the hills, kids have to get creative when looking for ways to fill up time. If you have the gas to get to the next county over to reach the only place that feels like real civilization, maybe a weekend can go by without scouring around in search of new prospects. Typically, one doesn’t get so lucky. The weekend is about confronting the landscape that begins to feel like a jailhouse as the years go by. Down backroads where generational homes deteriorate with inhabitants still living inside, you get a sobering reminder that this place is a trap so many loved ones have succumbed to.
So the best option? Just keep moving. Don’t look too long into the harsh realities around every corner. Take off into the mountains or to the mall, whatever works. The only way I ever stayed afloat was by holding on to the few places where I could take a break from planning my escape and feel that there was something bigger than me. All those mundane places that so many adolescents before me somehow made special destinations provided solace.
Most of our destinations were decrepit, man-made spaces that were remnants of early life in the area: abandoned churches, tunnels, hospitals, schoolhouses. Each place held some intricate story that included how it became haunted and how you can prove it, like if you toss a ball into this dark room, the spirit of the little girl who died there will throw it back to you or something to that effect. I always believed these tales and sought them out, hoping for a fresh experience, which was hard to come by in that town. The best place to go and get yourself scared growing up was Loveberry Church.
I yearned for the day a friend got their license or a parent offered to take us on a ghost hunt to liven up a sleepover. Loveberry, formally known as St. Bernard Church, is about 20 minutes outside Weston, the county seat. It promises an ample amount of time to stare out the car window and build up your anxiety for what’s to come. There’s a long winding road that leads you past the towering hill where the church is perched, complete with foreboding jagged boulders jutting out of the mountain resembling the scenery of a horror film.
After creeping up the hill and around a few bends, the starch-white, gothic revival structure stands tall amidst a clearing in the thick woods. The same land was home to early Irish Catholic immigrants who established this area as a place of worship in the 1850s. Sacred grounds to Europeans who first came to develop central West Virginia, it is now a pillar of adolescence to those who grow up in the area surrounding Loveberry. The site of many’s first ghostly encounters or memorable adventure with no adults allowed, one must rise to the occasion and somehow summon a spirit.
The most circulated test to prove one’s superstition is associated with the church house itself. A bible sits at the altar, as is typical of a church. Not so typical is the rousing that occurs if an intruder attempts to walk out of the chapel with the book. It grows heavier and heavier the further its bearer strays from the pulpit, until the bible becomes unwieldy and drops to the floor. No one in my generation had the chance to enter the sanctuary, even if they dared to. After years of break-ins and vandalism, the church was locked and equipped with a security system, deterring any curious soul from proving the tale.
Accompanying the church is a cemetery encased by a jagged iron fence. Follow the fence, and you’ll eventually come across a headstone that appears misplaced. The rock sits alone, a few feet away from the long line of others in the cemetery. Some say the source of some of the supernatural activity in the church is John Kennedy — a 19-year-old man who committed suicide in 1872. After jumping from the Loveberry’s bell tower, John’s body couldn’t be buried within the grounds of the cemetery due to Catholic rules regarding suicide. With his corpse resting on the steep bank beyond the fencing, we naturally assume his soul cannot rest, and his supposed supernatural legend still exists amongst conversations today.
The answer to what exactly is going on up on that hill is never quite clear, leading hordes of young people to seek out the answer. I can’t even count how many times I’ve visited Loveberry. Something about the atmosphere captivates me. We all echo the same legends, but each experience is singular and far off from the typical tales. There is something even more terrifying about having no one to relate to when sharing your experience, almost isolating.
My most vivid memory of this place is of a random night during the summer before my friends and I were off to college. We were out of options for ways to fill our time and decided to ascend to Loveberry. As we rounded the curve that sits at the top of the hill and reveals the commanding structure from the curtain of trees, a lean, white-eyed dog stood in the middle of the road. I can’t even remember the color of the animal’s fur, just the way his gaze pierced mine. He moved to the side as I continued to inch forward, but there was a fresh sense of fear that engulfed the inside of the car.
With an understanding that we were not meant to venture out into the graveyard that night, I turned the car around. Now there were two identical dogs standing in our way. In this moment, we knew we made the right choice and continued down the hill towards the creatures as they slowly parted and let us by. Keeping pace as we crept away, the animals seemed to be keeping watch and ensuring we did not trespass on this night.
This experience was not one I had ever heard in other’s stories of Loveberry. Even when gathering stories for this piece, I asked if dogs were an element to any rumor or tale about the church. Only when speaking to Mandy Vickers, a lifelong resident of Lewis County, did she mention some recollection of a story about a dog. Mandy was unable to come up with exactly what she heard, but it rang a bell and that mattered to me. Similarly, Mandy shared a story with me that had no correlation to any common knowledge of Loveberry that circulates through the community.
One night in 1989, Mandy headed up to Loveberry with a few friends “trying to get creeped out.” As they walked through the cemetery, Mandy noticed something off about the stained glass windows and alerted her company. “Guys, that’s really weird,” she remarked to catch their attention, “tell me that doesn’t look like an embryo.”
This imagery seemed so outlandish and out-of-place in the plain, geometric design of the panes. Mandy didn’t think much of it until the next morning when her friend called to reveal that she was pregnant. The symbol of the fetus that appeared in the glass settled into both of their minds, transforming into a warning instead.
This seems to be the theme with Loveberry: a warning to recognize the forces present and to not go any further than you are welcomed. Seemingly effective, these cautions stick with all those who are subject to them – as Mandy noted, “Well, I mean, I’ve had a stroke and my memory is just,” she paused to stick out her tongue and blow a raspberry. “And I still remember what all I told you.”
The church is an enigma, a destination for those looking for an answer to all the wild ghost stories. No one ever seems to find the answer they are looking for.
This sentiment is echoed in those I grew up with. Seemingly isolated to Generation X and beyond, Loveberry is a fresh addition to our lore in central West Virginia. The church evolved to serve a new purpose as life shifted from the remote parts of the county into the more centralized county seat of Weston. With no habitual churchgoers attending service each Sunday, the plot now takes in those from all walks of life in search of a haunting story to pass down to the next group of lonely, rural kids.
