Village of Beech Bottom

BEECH BOTTOM — Beech Bottom and its leaders have been honored by the West Virginia Municipal League for their efforts to preserve the village’s history and address a major drainage issue affecting local roads and properties for many years. The community has been named a West Virginia All-Star Community by leaders of the league, who also presented honors to Mayor Becky Uhlly and John Niven, a longtime member of the village’s water board and council. Municipal League officials cited the establishment by village officials and volunteers of roadside parks marking the former site of an airfield established to train pilots for World War I and a former community whose prosperity relied entirely on a major power plant. Located west of state Route 2, near Beech Bottom’s north end, Lambert Park was named for Courtney Lambert, a pilot who died when his plane crashed during training at a privately funded airport at the site. Lambert was among members of the West Virginia Flying Corps, a volunteer group formed to provide air support to American military forces fighting in World War I. The group failed to attain military status, leading its founder, Louis Bennett Jr., to join the war effort as a member of the British Royal Flying Corps.