crowded out by the growth of an extraordinarily dense climax red spruce forest, intermixed with balsam fir and hardwoods. The first Europeans to see Canaan Valley were likely the surveyors of the famous Fairfax Line who crossed Canaan Mountain in 1746 under conditions of extreme difficulty. The origins of Canaan Valley's name are controversial. According to local legend, a German settler named Henry Fansler, who was migrating from the Shenandoah Valley, viewed the valley from Cabin Mountain in April, 1748 and exclaimed "Besiehe das Land Canaan" ["Behold the Land of Canaan"] :593 However, numerous early documented accounts of the Valley (as discussed in the previous paragraph above) describe it as being just the opposite, a nightmarish landscape..."gloomy, foreboding", with extremely difficult access in the 1700s. In fact, the first documented description of the Valley only 2 years prior to Harness's supposed 1748 proclamation stated that it was so wild and forbidding that it was "sufficient to strike terror into any human or creature". Furthermore, the river emptying the Valley (now called the Blackwater) was called the River of Styx, meaning River of the Dead. This dark history, along with the Valley's cold, snowy climate and eastern Canadian-like forest and landscapes, have led some to theorize that the original name was actually "the Canadian Valley". Fansler and his family hacked out a living on Freeman Creek in the Valley for three years before the harsh winters and poor farming potential forced them to move to the mouth of the Blackwater a few miles away. Fansler was the first Canaan settler whose name is known, although there is known to have been an earlier abortive homesteader in the 1770s or '80s who left descendants elsewhere in the county.:378 The rugged and remote "High Allegheny" region (what is now east-central West Virginia), including the Valley, was bypassed by development for many decades. As large-scale settlement occurred to its north, south and west the region remained relatively wild. In the 19th Century, the Valley was a last refuge for many of the large mammal species that were being exterminated from the eastern United States. In about 1843, for example, three elk were killed in Canaan Valley by members of the Flanagan and Carr families, local settlers who habitually hunted there. These were likely the last elk found wild in the region that later became West Virginia. The earliest settler to make a successful and