Marconi

But there were some fascinating athletes and personalities found along those narrow strips of sometimes rutted pavement.

West Virginia University football standout Bruce Bosley came from well-hidden Green Bank in rural Pocahontas County. Bosley became an NFL star after his four years in Morgantown, leaving his legacy in San Francisco with the 49ers.

Chuck Howley came from the Wheeling area to play his often-acclaimed football at WVU. He changed positions at times before finally surfacing in the NFL with the Dallas Cowboys, where he became history’s only player for a losing Super Bowl team to be named that game’s MVP.

The dangerous and curved roads even led out-of-state where much-decorated Joe Marconi was found in Fredericktown, Pa. and recruited to star for WVU in the autumns when Art “Pappy” Lewis was coaching and making his news in Morgantown. Marconi later was a stalwart player for Coach George “Papa Bear” Halas in Chicago.

Bosley

And even though he hailed from Ohio, basketball’s Fred Schaus became a virtual icon at WVU, where he was a class president, Hall of Fame player, coach of the always-winning teams of the “golden era” wherein six consecutive Southern Conference championships were achieved and later even coached the Los Angeles Lakers, before returning to Morgantown as the school’s athletic director.

Schaus is — along with one of his players, Jerry West — the most revered of Mountaineer athletic figures in the university’s history.

Back again along the narrow roads in West Virginia, came basketball luminaries West, Hot Rod Hundley, Rod Thorn, Ron Williams and Mark Workman.

West played at long-gone East Bank High in Kanawha County, near Charleston. He almost personally delivered a big-school state championship in the mid-1950s and then almost elevated the Mountaineers to the NCAA national championship in 1959.

Beaten in the national championship game by one point by California, West later became a member of the 1960 USA Olympic team, which swept away all opposition to claim the gold medal.

West

West had an unequaled career with the Los Angeles Lakers and even coached that team for a time.

One year, Hundley, who was from Charleston, was the first player taken in the NBA draft, but suffered a knee injury that hampered his professional career. He became an award-winning broadcaster in Phoenix and has a statue of himself placed just outside the WVU Coliseum.

Thorn came from Princeton, played at WVU and then in the NBA before eventually becoming the commissioner of that league.

Williams made his history at Weir High before coming to WVU. His Red Rider teams enjoyed unbeaten regular seasons and the attention of the entire state.

“Fritz” went on to a heralded career with the San Francisco Warriors of the NBA.

Schaus

The 6-foot-8 Workman was plucked out of Charleston and became a consensus All-American at WVU.

Two men who became familiar with the state’s country roads from the media business standpoint were sports writer Mickey Furfari, a Morgantown native, and broadcaster Jack Fleming, also from Morgantown.

Both Furfari and Fleming attended WVU.

Furfari wrote sports into his late 80s and lived into his 90s. His vast knowledge of Mountaineer sports and the personalities associated with the school became legendary.

Fleming achieved such a status and state-wide fame that challenged even the most well-known figures of the state and mid-Atlantic region.

Howley

He was recognized as “The Voice of the Mountaineers” in both football and basketball.

The country roads led to many a small piece of heaven, where the famous and revered athletes rose to both amateur and professional fame.