 In 1914, with the county virtually denuded of standing trees, the ground burned continually for 6 months.As a result, top soils that once produced huge timbers on the mountainside — including the largest tree ever harvested in West Virginia, a white oak some 13 feet in diameter just 10 feet from the ground — washed down into the narrow valleys and bottom lands, which had always been too narrow for harvesting productive crops or livestock.Uncontrollable soil erosion and flooding further degraded and depopulated the region.