1972 – California disability rights activist Ed Roberts and his associates founded the Berkeley Center for Independent Living with funds from the Rehabilitation Administration. It is recognized as the first center for independent living.

Congress passed a rehabilitation bill that independent-living activists cheered, but President Richard Nixon's veto prevented this bill from becoming law. Disability activists launched fierce protests across the country. In New York City, Judy Heumann, an early leader for disability rights, staged a sit-in on Madison Avenue with eighty other activists, stopping traffic.

1973 - After a flood of angry letters and protests, Congress overrode Nixon's veto and passed the Rehabilitation Act, which prohibits discrimination in federal programs and services and all other programs or services receiving federal funding.

According to former Goodwill of KYOWVA Area, Inc. board member, Nancy Meadows, “It [the founding of Goodwill] came about in 1973 when the Rehabilitation Act changed on the Federal level (to) where you had to work with the most severely disabled individuals…to try to find them employment. Prior to that you served “disabled” without the word “severe” in front of it. But we had to start providing them services that would put them into competitive employment. Eddie Michael was the branch office supervisor.

“At the same time, Doug Glover, Barbara Bragg and Kent Bryant had their offices at Fairfield School,” Meadows remembered. “They were working with students who were severely disabled but who were being mainstreamed into the regular school system. Fairfield was where Barnett [Child Care Center] is now. At that time, they were totally segregated. All the physically, mentally and emotionally impaired students had a school of their own. While they were there, they worked. They may have cleaned, but they were paid for it. Kent Bryant was the employment specialist for the district and…Barbara Bragg was the psychologist. They both realized that the kids had potential if they were in a training program before going to work. While the children were at Fairfield, they may have worked in the cafeteria serving the other kids, or doing dishes or cleaning up – something that was considered a work activity that they could be paid for by the Department of Labor. By being mainstreamed into the regular classroom, that service [to evaluate them in a work place] was going to be lost and the children would also be lost. They were primarily junior and senior high school age.” According to Bragg, the students could be between 12 and 21.

Bragg said, “We needed an interim place for training, so they’d have some place to go between school and being in the workplace. I had no idea what I was getting into... We recruited everyone we could…” Kent Bryant recalled that Bragg traveled to the Charleston and Cincinnati Goodwills at her own expense to find out what it would take to begin an agency here. At that time, the only other Goodwill in the state was in Charleston. Bragg had the then CEO of the Charleston Goodwill visit several times. She also spent long hours recruiting other folks from the WV Division of Rehabilitation Services (Charles Lovely, Eddie Michael, Kent Bryant, Cornelius Williams, and Douglas Glover) and anyone else she could - including her cousin, Paul Beckett - to discuss how to bring Goodwill to Huntington. Bragg said they applied for and got a $25,000 conditional grant from The Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation, to be matched by community donations; then they had to raise the $25,000. She said it might as well have been $2.5 million but, “we recruited any one we could to raise money…$5 and $10 donations. I spoke to more women’s group in that period of time…and they gave money. I told them about the purpose of Goodwill, what it was about and why we wanted it.” Providing interim training for the students was their “whole focus and we thought Goodwill was the way to go.” At least one committee met in Paul and Judy Beckett’s living room at 326 W. 12th Avenue, according to Meadows.

The state charter of Goodwill of KYOWVA Area, Inc. was signed on October 31, 1973 with Bud Williams as its first Board Chairman. November 5, 1973 marked the official date of incorporation for the agency. The official address of Goodwill Industries on the Articles of Incorporation is 326 W. 12th Avenue, the home of Paul and Judy Beckett. This may be the only Goodwill with the founding address of one of its CEOs.

1974 – A fundraising campaign, dubbed “Dollars for Dignity,” was launched on April 15 to raise the $25,000 necessary to match the Benedum grant. According to news articles, the amount needed to start a successful Goodwill was closer to $100,000.

To indicate the level of money raised, a tape was stretched along 4th Ave between 8th and 16th Streets. If $5 was raised for each foot of tape, the goal would be reached. Doug Glover, President of Goodwill said individuals could either attach their donations directly to the tape or call to pledge contributions. Marshall University students and Huntington business men collected $600 to kick-off the fund-drive. According to Bragg, Marshall students with donation cans collected money on the street corners of Huntington.

Later in April, a miniature train - the Precious Cargo Line, donated by the local chapter of the Railroad Community Service Committee - offered rides through the downtown area to help raise the matching funds. Rides were $.25. By August, the agency was looking for temporary space. They were also asking for donations of office equipment and store fixtures.

By August the goal of $25,000 had been reached but an additional $10,000 - $15,000 was needed to insure the successful operation for two years. A search for a facility in which to house Goodwill had begun. Additionally, the board was conducting a search for an executive director and other staff.

In October, Goodwill collected used telephone books as part of their fundraising effort. The books were recycled by selling them to Tri-State Waste paper for $5 a ton. They hoped to receive 100,000 books and raise $250, but according to Bragg, the effort was not successful.

A $10,000 Community Development Block Grant from the city of Huntington and a $5000 donation from the Ashland Oil, Inc. Foundation helped support the match while the WV Department of Vocational Rehabilitation pledged grants for equipment and materials as an in-kind donation to complete the total needed.

1975 – In February Bernard Kern was hired as the first Goodwill CEO. He recalls, “I was ordained in the Lutheran ministry in 1962…following four years at the University of Texas in Austin, Bachelor’s Degree in Business and then a Theology degree from the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago…I served ten years in the parish ministry. The priority or passion I had most in the ministry was in the area of social service, social justice, things like that. When I came out of seminary it was right in the middle of the 60s, it was the civil rights movement and then the Vietnam War and all that business. I had real difficulty in the mainline church at that time and felt that perhaps my talents and abilities would be best used in the social service field.

“So I was in Houston at the time and one of the (Goodwill) training centers for executives was there. I think they had a major grant from the Kellog Foundation to train new executives. It was a period of pretty fast growth at Goodwill and they needed trained executives to start new Goodwills. I talked to one of the executives there and went through their screening process. At that time they were looking for people who particularly had a background in business and the church. The Methodist church still had a strong influence in Goodwill, with the executives particularly. I was a pretty good match for Goodwill at that time…I entered the program and became associated with Goodwill. That’s what I ended up doing in Huntington, was starting a new Goodwill. At first, Bud Williams gave me a place to work…where his office was. They [Goodwill] had a bank account and there wasn’t a lot of money in there. In the first five or six months, the bank account kept decreasing until the store opened. That was the turning point.”

The first store and office location was in an Urban Renewal building at 820 Third Avenue that was slated for demolition. Kern says, “…they had started collecting a bunch of things. They knew that retail sales under-girded the basic program, so their garages were filled with all kinds of stuff they had gotten from friends, churches, etc.

“A key person who made this thing happen was Dave Harris, Director of Urban Renewal at that time. When we wanted to find something, he said, ‘You know I can’t promise any length of time for this place, it’s condemned, it doesn’t have any electricity or heat or anything.’ They allowed us to put a propane tank in there to heat the building. We cleaned it out…that took a lot of stuff going to the dump. It had already been abandoned and it was already slated for demolition. We…pushed it right up to the limit of how long we could stay there.”

According to Marlin Clark, (right) the first employee hired by Kern, Goodwill had a slogan: “Coming Alive in ’75. That was even up on the front of our building.” When Clark was hired, he was interviewed by Kern at an office at Fairfield School. He says that his previous thirteen years of driving experience for Johnny Stanley’s Produce is what gave him the edge over the other applicants. Clark recalls, “Our first truck… was owned in the beginning by Heck’s Stores. I thought it was worn out, but we used it a long time. If you were coasting downgrade, it would come out of gear on you. You had to hold it to stay in gear.

“We bought a brand new truck – a red International – we used it a long time. He [Kern] bought us one used from Steiner’s. It was a yellow truck, a little bit bigger. I drove it for a long time, and then we got a new Ford diesel.”

According to Clark, the first donation boxes were given to the agency by the Charleston Goodwill. When we started having them built, they were of 3/4” plywood and had a door with two padlocks so people could put stuff in, but couldn’t get it out. It had a chute so it went down. But, trash was a problem from the beginning. Often there was more trash than there was good stuff. It was a daily thing to go to the landfill.

Bernard Kern recalled that “before I got there, they had started collecting a bunch of things. They knew that retail sales under girded the basic program, so in their garages were filled with all kinds of stuff they had gotten from friends, churches, etc. So we had a lot of material when we first started.” In the early days, Gene Pierce, Bragg’s pastor at Bates Memorial Presbyterian Church, kept the books as a volunteer until staff growth dictated they hire a bookkeeper.

Goodwill opened the doors at the Urban Renewal location on March 31, 1975. By Sept 7 they had 10 “employees” or clients, sales of $4000 monthly and six donation boxes. The staff included Kerns, Ken Bailey-Operations Director (pictured left); Sandy Washington-Secretary; Marlin Clark-Truck Driver; and Patricia Parsley-Store Manager. The Board Chairman was Steven A. Meadows, assistant professor of counseling and rehabilitation at Marshall University. Ken Bailey had held the same position in Charleston. He helped set up the processing system.

According to Executive Director Kern, Goodwill’s mission was work adjustment. Under a US Department of Labor exemption, client employees were not paid minimum wage, but a percentage corresponding to their functional working capacity. “If they’re earning minimum wage, they should be getting out into the competitive world,” Kern said in a September 7, 1975 news article. A news story stated that Kermit Harsbarger was one of the first three disabled people employed by the agency. He had been on the job three weeks when the store opened in March.

“We had one small grant that Goodwill International had given us to start with…it was something like $20,000 or $30,000,” Kern said. “The rest of it we did ourselves from sales. DVR started giving us money [fees for services] even though we weren’t accredited or really didn’t have much of anything.”

On May 17, Goodwill celebrated its first “Good Turn Day” with over 200 individuals collecting clothing, toys, books, and household items to sell in the new store. The agency also held an open house that month in conjunction with National Goodwill Week.

Maurice Cooley was the first Rehabilitation Counselor hired. His responsibility was to get the rehabilitation program started because there was not one. Cooley recalls, “I had finished graduate school at Marshall in 1975 with my Master’s in counseling and was looking for work in the field. I had never heard of Goodwill Industries in my entire life. I went to 5th Ave in Huntington to the employment office and there was a vacancy for a rehab counseling position at Goodwill Industries. They didn’t explain what Goodwill was…I thought it was a factory that made something. Over the next two and a half years [from summer 1975 – 1977] that I was there, I developed the Work Adjustment Training (WAT) program, the extended employment program, the job placement program and a lot of partnerships with all the Vocational Rehabilitation at DRS counselors. We got to know them well and they got to know us. The first group of clients came from Voc Rehab referrals.

“We had some clients who came from Huntington State Hospital. Around 1976 there was an initiative in the state where all the psychiatric institutionalized hearing impaired clients were moved from other sites, primarily Weston, to Huntington State. Huntington State then developed a deaf unit. There were a few clients from the deaf unit that came to the sheltered workshop. Of course, none of us could sign. I went to Marshall and took courses. With the combination of studies and signing all day, I became rather fluent with signing. Relevant to that population, we had a fair amount of support from the deaf community. Many of our clients went to Grace Gospel Church and Reverend Asbury was a supporter of Goodwill and the deaf clients. We would sometimes go to Grace Gospel because of their ministry to the deaf and have meetings and sign. Rev. Asbury was very fluent in signing.”

According to Cooley, “The first sheltered workshop [at the 8th Street & Third Ave. site] was a bench. The bench was probably 20-30 ft long by 4-5 feet wide. It was an old wooden bench and our offices were in the workshop, too. Everything was in the workshop. Ken didn’t have an office and Maurice didn’t have an office. About 10 feet from the bench was Bernard Kern’s office. It wasn’t a full office; it was a cubicle with a wall that went up to six feet. Then my cubicle was next to his, we were all in these cubicles. It was a family.”

1976 – Goodwill opened a second store location at 2908 Auburn Avenue (Rt. 60 W) on April 1. Located in Wayne County just over the Cabell County line, it was also a site for sheltered employment. The store manager was Tom Armstrong who served as an accountant, as well. Prior to being named store manager and accountant, Armstrong was a client. In 1976 the agency had two trucks for home pick-up of donations.

The first annual meeting was held on May 14, 1976 with Dean Phillips, Goodwill Industries of America (as it was then called) President and CEO, as the keynote speaker. Tom Armstrong was honored as Worker of the Year.

Making way for Urban Renewal, Goodwill closed the 820 Third Ave. site in May and relocated to one at 2127 3rd Avenue. Nancy Meadows described it this way: “We had one room there. Bernard Kern’s office was not as big as the smallest bathroom you can think of. You could get a desk and a chair in there and that was it. It was just one large room separated into work stations and a place for sorting clothes and selling.” After the agency moved into the 2127 3rd Avenue site, discussions were held about finding a permanent building to house the training and rehabilitation services. The agency’s goals included developing five programs: 1) evaluation and comprehensive diagnostic services to determine strengths and weaknesses of clients, 2) establishing a systematic program of training, 3) establishing a work activity program for those who need close supervision, 4) strengthening the sheltered workshop (currently the major program of the agency) and 5) placing persons in outside employment.

Kerns tells this story about early client, Harshbarger: “Kermit was one of the first clients and the guy was blind. He was a client of Don Chumley’s at DVR. He wasn’t totally blind. He had ‘travel vision’; he could get around. We were going to remove a wall… at [2127] 3rd Ave. We were going to tear part of that wall down. Kermit said, ‘Well, I’ll get that wall down.’ And he backed off and ran into the wall and it about knocked him out.”

1977 – Goodwill signed a lease in January for a 14,000 square foot third store site at 2626 5th Ave., formerly Heck’s department store and Carpet Land. The building owned by Garland Fraser once had housed Fraser’s Marine Supply Company. Rev. Henry Helms, the son of Goodwill’s founder Rev. Edgar J. Helms attended the opening and ribbon cutting of this new facility. The previous office at 2127 3rd Avenue became an expanded retail store as did 4500 sq. feet of the new space. After a year, the old location was abandoned.

The new location enabled the agency to put the sheltered workshop in the back and the offices upstairs on a balcony. Cooley said, “It was real fancy. We thought we were in a big corporation.” With the location on 5th Avenue, Goodwill began to pursue subcontracts for jobs such as packaging, collecting, assembling, inspecting, mailing and a janitorial service. By now the agency had four or five employees in the store and the same number processing, along with one or two trucks.

According to Cooley, Goodwill’s placement rate was the highest of any sheltered workshop in the state. He credits the partnership between Vocational Rehabilitation and the community with this statistic. Cooley left Goodwill in mid-1978.

1978 – In August, Goodwill moved from another store at 611 W. 14th Street to a location with twice as much floor space at 720 W. 14th Street (previously Kincaid Furniture.) Mayor George Malott presided at this grand opening. By October there were forty persons enrolled in the workshop, another three worked the midnight shift hauling refuse from Chemtron and several more worked at other off-site locations. Nineteen collection boxes around Cabell and Wayne counties, Ashland and at the Greenup Mall provide locations for individuals to take their donations.

In October, Don Mega was hired to implement a Vocational Evaluation program. Mega recalls, “I spent one week training in Philadelphia. Upon completion we received the hardware. We sectioned off a small portion of the workshop and began to receive clients for a 2-week vocational evaluation. “We marked off this little area back in the back. It wasn’t much and it had no ceiling. We wanted it to be as real work as possible. We did a lot of testing in there. It was general aptitude, basically spatial and form perception, manual and finger dexterity, eye-hand-foot coordination, color discrimination…all that kind of stuff. It was what they called work aptitudes, not psychometric testing, but work testing. At the time I arrived at Goodwill, there was only one credible rehab program ~ work adjustment training. It was not CARF certified, and the rehab plans were not well documented. There was one Rehab Counselor. No other rehab people were on staff.”

He said, “While I was on staff, a significant Federal legislation was enacted, and eventually the 80s were called “the decade of the disabled.” From a small WAT program to Vocational Evaluation, Sheltered Employment, and Job Placement, our staff grew from one person to six. I left the Vocational Evaluation program after about 18 months and was appointed the first Director of Rehabilitation Services, as it was then called. We implemented CETA (Comprehensive Employment & Training Act) and JTPA (Job Training Partnership Act,) which allowed for additional support staff.”

Mega recalls the 5th Avenue location somewhat differently than Maurice Cooley. Mega said, “What a place! When you walked into the place, it smelled from the dampness. The air-conditioning leaked and there were puddles all over the floor. In the workshop, the clients had to wear coats to work. It flooded in the back door; they took their smoke breaks out in the alley…and the bathrooms were awful. The commodes rocked, the sinks leaked, the electricity was awful…” The industrial rag operation sold salvage goods cut into wipers baled into 25 and 50 pound quantities. While only the sixth largest agency in the number of clients served, Goodwill ranked first in outside job placements with 11 placed trainees.

June marked the beginning of the Governor’s Summer Youth Program.

The payroll was $180,000 and the operating budget was over $300,000. Industrial Contracts Department was established to provide business services, bench-work operations, bookkeeping services and tax work. The jobs were provided either on-site or at the Goodwill workshop. The City of Huntington designated $250,000 for facility improvements through another Community Development Block Grant.

Goodwill became a United Way Agency for the first time. Approval was granted in fall of 1978 for funding in 1979. Both Family Service Resource Center and Consumer Credit Counseling became United Way Agency members at the same time.

1979 – The first store out of West Virginia was opened on May 1st in Catlettsburg, KY.

Staff and clients participated in the Special Olympics Parade.

For the second year in a row, Goodwill placed the largest number of people in jobs of any of West Virginia’s 22 workshops for the disabled. Surpassing the Charleston Goodwill, they placed 16 trainees in paying jobs.

1980 – In 1980 the agency wrote grants for UMPTA 16-B2 grants through the state and the federal government. Mega remembered: “I remember Jay Rockefeller handing us the keys to the van and I drove it back.” In conjunction with the Tri-State Transit Authority, Goodwill initiated a DIAL-A-RIDE SERVICE on March 3 to provide transportation for the severely disabled and the non-ambulatory elderly in the Huntington area. Approximately 250 persons were served monthly.

“Della Crosby (left) was the first passenger on the Dial-A-Ride van. She was on the committee…she was the client we were trying to serve, the reason the service was needed. She would tell that the taxi cab would come and then they wouldn’t take her. The taxi company said, ‘Yes we do.’ But they didn’t; they would pull away when they saw. Bill would say the same story. They’d call the taxi company and they’d come but as soon as they saw it was them, they’d pull away. That’s the story they told. Della went with me when we went to the Governor’s office to get the van,” recalled Don Mega.

When the original Dial-A-Ride driver quit, Goodwill needed a new driver and Marlin Clark took over. “… I didn’t want to leave the truck. I didn’t want to go on the van at all. I had a bad feeling about it, but my supervisor, Clay Carroll, said, “Try it for a week and see how things work out. If you absolutely don’t like it, I’ll put you back on the truck.” I come in one day after I’d been doing it for several days and I told him to get another driver ‘cause I was staying with Dial-A-Ride. I was getting older. Dial-A-Ride was a much easier job, a cleaner job. I could spruce up a little bit if I wanted to, which I did. I loved helping elderly people and people with handicaps, so it just fit me to a T.”

The Governor’s Office of Economic Development awarded an unprecedented $160,000 JTPA [Job Training Partnership Act] grant to Goodwill to run a job training program designed to train 35 individuals. No grant that large had ever been awarded for such a program before. However, all the training was done in the workshop. According to Don Mega, “They were cashiers, sales clerks, material processors, truck driver, and helpers, whatever. We didn’t have any sophisticated training programs back then. Placement was the big thing, so we had a job placement person.”

1981 – By the annual meeting in May, a Capital Funds Drive to raise the money to build a new facility at 1005 Virginia Avenue was underway. Co-Chairmen were Mrs. Orin G. Atkins of Ashland and Carter Wild of Huntington. Jody G. Smirl was the Campaign Director. Smirl said, “Bob Hardwick and Alan Simmons were the two head people for the drive and they used their own offices. Somerville and Co. had a nice big office and equipment that they let us use as an in-kind contribution to Goodwill.

“We thought it would take one year to raise $1.7 million but it took two years. But we raised it and then some; we had enough for building it and furnishing it as well as re-doing some things that weren’t done right. God was looking after us because, when we kicked off, American Car & Foundry gave us a $30,000 pledge to start it off, to get the ball rolling. Within a month, they wouldn’t have been able to do that in anyway; they just had a crisis and wouldn’t have been able to do it.” An $85,000 grant from the Kresge Foundation also helped.

The land, valued at $191,837, had been donated as had a donation of $400,000 from the Community Development Block Grant/HUD/City of Huntington. This amount was also matched by the Appalachian Regional Commission.

In 1981 the annual operating budget was $576,000 with $233,549 in revenue coming from retail sales. Government grants accounted for $213,366.

Stores at 611 14th St. West and 2676 5th Avenue sold donations placed in 17 collection boxes or picked up by staff drivers. Plans call for house pickups to begin in Ashland by summer. According to Pete Norris, the Ashland store, a 20x80, two-story building on Greenup Avenue, was open when he was hired in 1982.

Industrial Contracts produced 64 tons of industrial wipers, according to the annual report.
According to Kern, “…we did start that rag cutting business then. There’s a good story…. Don Chumley, he was a blind counselor and he was blind. He came over one time and I asked if a blind person could operate the rag cutting machine. He said he thought so. So he sat down to try it and promptly cut his tie in half. It was unbelievable.”

1982 – Long-time board member, J.P. Childers shared some of the background of the Virginia Avenue building. “Back after the session in Judy’s living room, our company [Childers Construction] was solicited for a contribution to Goodwill --- this was prior to building the Virginia Avenue building. We made a contribution of $1500, as I recall. That was around 1980. Then Dean & Dean drew the plans and put it out for bids and we were the successful bidder. So, we built [Virginia Ave. building.] it. Of course, this is just a big, sandy valley here. [Architect] Brooks [Dean] came up with the idea…rather than drilling caissons and pouring concrete, driving about 30 foot wood pile and that got to bedrock. That’s what the Virginia Ave. building is sitting on. It was made of treated timbers, logs…about 30 feet long, then you cut them all off at exactly the same height and then you build the building on it. Concrete caissons were much more expensive. It was a good design. Brooks was down there almost every day during construction. He was vitally interested in it.”

Ground was broken on March 12 for the new facility at 1005 Virginia Avenue. Participating in the ceremony were Jimmy Farrar, Goodwill’s first client who was hired in 1975, Woodrow Adkins, the most recent client at that time, Bernard Kern, CEO, Governor John D. (Jay) Rockefeller and Bob Hardwick, President of Goodwill’s Board of Directors.

According to Bernard Kern., the agency received $400,000 in Community Development Block Grants funds, $400,000 from the Appalachian Regional Commission, $100,000 from the WV Division of Vocational Rehabilitation and about $50,000 in pledges from area businesses, industries and private individuals. In addition, the Chessie System presented a $40,000 check, and the C&P Telephone Co. gave $9,000 on the day of the groundbreaking.

Kern credits this as the biggest achievement during his tenure in Huntington. “The most important thing was securing a permanent home. That took most of my energies all the way through - running the operation and then having the priority of fundraising, with the board momentum of having a permanent home. We were really lucky…Everything came together at the right time. Jennings Randolph and Gov. Rockefeller were where the money came from…of course the land was from urban renewal. Dave Harris, he was the one that really pressed us for the details, building plans, etc. before the fundraising really began. I think the thing that really got us off dead center was the relationship with Dave Harris. He was just really sold on Goodwill, the more he saw of it [the more he realized] that he was really helping people that couldn’t help themselves. Then we had good luck with the foundations and the building was paid for by the time we moved in. The land was urban renewal land. That’s why we located there.”

Once the agency was in that building, the focus began to change from a “sheltered workshop” environment to that of a training facility. According to Meadows, “we just didn’t have the clientele to do it. You needed trainers who knew how to do a skill…we tried it with caning chairs, we tried it with electronics…but we had to have someone skilled who could oversee it. And we couldn’t keep that up.”

On March 26, Goodwill national president, Rear Admiral (retired) David M. Cooney, was the keynote speaker at the annual banquet held at Marshall University’s Memorial Student Center. Jody Smirl, campaign director for the Capital Fund Drive, announced that the campaign was only $100,000 short of the $1.7 million goal thanks to a challenge grant of $50,000 from the Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation. Receipt of the grant hinges on raising the final $100,000 needed.

Pete Norris came to work for Goodwill in 1982 as the Manager of the 5th Avenue store. His responsibility was to maintain that store until the lease was up in 1983. CEO Kern wanted it to pay for itself until the Virginia Avenue store was opened, and then Pete was to move to another store. However, he did so well that Kern signed another lease and kept the store open. Norris reminisced, “It was almost as large as Virginia Ave. At that time we stored out-of-season clothes. Our back area was full of clothes, row after row. I went in one day and Marlin Clark came in with some people to leave something back there. They had the clothes on galvanized pipe on supports, hung neatly. But someone had backed into those and turned them over. There must have been 50,000 garments in the floor.”

Worker of the Year, Joy Black, 29, was honored for reaching the “optimum goal” of placement in competitive employment. After three years at Goodwill, she was hired by Morrison’s Cafeteria. Dan Morrison, her employer, received the Employer of the Year Award.

A “Fashion Show and Tell” held in April at Lazarus in the Huntington Mall benefited the Capital Funds Drive, as well, while receipts from a sale of donated cars were used to pay salaries of the handicapped.

1983 – The first activity in the new building was aluminum can recycling program. “This new project will provide another training opportunity for the handicapped,” said Jerry Walsh, Project Director. Walsh had an MSW from West Virginia University and was a behaviorist who knew how to write training plans, how to monitor. Don Mega gives him credit for the agency’s first CARF accreditation.

The can recycling project relied on buying clean beverage cans, crushing them and then selling them to an aluminum processing plant in Marion, Ohio. The revenue was used to pay the wages of the workers. However, Kern recalled that it also attracted bees. “I remember when we got the new building we were doing can recycling…aluminum cans. It was a profitable deal, but I can remember the bees around that thing. We would collect the cans, buy them and sell them. We had a thing that would crush them and blow them into the trailer then they would come and pick them up.” About the project, Don Mega said, “They’d turn that machine on…no wonder I can’t hear today. It wasn’t worth it. Somebody talked Bernie into that…showed him that it would work…Anheuser-Busch sponsored it somehow and they brought all that equipment in. It would spit those cans into a trailer.” Ultimately the project was ended.

Senator Jennings Randolph, D-WV, gave the keynote address at the dedication of the new facility at 1005 Virginia Avenue on April 15, 1983. An open house preceded the 2 p.m. ceremony. The capital fund drive launched in 1978 enabled the agency to build the $1 million-plus facility.

In June, the second store outside of Huntington opened at 409 Main Street in Point Pleasant. The manager, Lola Kirker and her assistant, Janice Rice were the only two employees. At that time, Judy King was the Sales Director. According to Rice, who became the Store Manager only two months later, “When we first opened on Main Street, our donations went to Huntington to be processed. We weren’t allowed to process our own donations. Everything came back already tagged with the price, the prices had to be exactly what was on them, and we had to put everything that came off the trucks out on the floor. We got three shipments a week…and if we made $100 a day, Huntington was elated.”

Ron Murphy, fondly called “The Payman” came to work this year. He recalls when all accounting functions, except the payroll, were done manually. At this time, payroll was sent out to a service after the time-cards were prepared.

1984 - “I believe we were one of the first CARF accredited facilities in the state. That was a big thing,” Kern remembers. “I know we talked about it even when we were there on 5th Avenue and decided the facility wouldn’t allow us to do that… by the time we got into the new facility, by then it was pretty well in place.” Don Mega agrees, “I spent three days in Colorado Springs, CO, attending a CARF prep seminar and reviewing all the standards (900 in the early 80s). Because of our physical plant, we elected to forego CARF until we had a better building. Once we got settled into our new “digs” we pursued CARF accreditation for the first time. I think I must have taken a year, or maybe more, to prepare. We had pre-CARF visits from the “experts” and finally pulled it off in the spring of 1984. It was an exciting period of growth for me, both personally and professionally.” Mega left shortly after the accreditation review for a position at the Huntington State Hospital.

In 1984 a fire broke out at the new 1005 Virginia Avenue building causing moderate smoke and water damage to the main offices but services were not disrupted. The blaze, which may have been caused by a lit cigarette, was confined to the structure’s loading and storage area.

Aimee Cartwright came to work as the Director of Client Services replacing Don Mega. During the two years she was there, she hired Vicki Tambling as the JTPA Case Manager with perhaps 30 clients. There was a Sheltered Program as well as a Summer Youth Program for disadvantaged youth who needed to be doing some kind of work skills.

At that time, Terri Hollinger was the Retail Manager; Sid Barton was the Director of Janitorial and Outside Contracts. Clients were cleaning some of the state offices and doing a rubber contract for American National Rubber, Co. folding things, counting boxed, and strapping them. The contract for American National Rubber included punching gaskets. Pete Norris reported, “It was a big flat rubber soft thing…a lot of them were big and some were small. They had a bunch of holes in them. All the holes had to be cleared and they had a gauge that had to go under one, but not under the other to be in tolerance. Then they had to be stacked and shipped back. I was involved in that pricing with Don Mega. We did about 25,000 pieces a week there, but there wasn’t any real money in it. It kept clients busy.” Aimee Cartwright laughed, “They also did nails, too. I got nails in my tires.”

When centralized processing was the way goods were handled, everything would come to Huntington. Linda Holton and Carolyn Maynard ran the back along with Clay Carroll. All products were tagged and priced - “Good, Better, Best.” Clothing was separated as seasonal and stored. For instance, in summer, the summer stuff is in the stores and everything for winter was handled, trucked to 5th Ave. and stored. Aimee recalls, “It was like a big warehouse in the back and it smelled. BK showed me around and he thought he had a goldmine. I can remember the horrible smell and it was dark. Only lit with candle bulbs barely burning and all these racks were draped with sheets or whatever had been donated. On and on, hanging clothes. He thought it was ready to go”

Judy Beckett was in graduate school when the instructor came in and said, “I just had a call from Goodwill and they are looking for a part-time temporary teacher.” Beckett thought that sounded good because it would allow her to be through when the kids were home for summer. Hired by Jerry Walsh, the Rehab Director, the new instructor for the high school drop-out program went door-to-door to find boys for the classes. The course covered remedial math, reading, spelling, job search skills and resume writing in the hope that the students would return to school. However, if they did not, the program was to help prepare them to do something productive.

Once the class was over, Beckett thought her job was as well. However, Kern came to her and asked her to stay. Beckett believes it was because all 12 of the students in her class completed the course when they had hoped for a 50% success rate. Kern got a JTPA grant to support this program. Under the contract, students had to be in class as well as on the job.

Following this, Beckett went to Philadelphia for training to become a vocational evaluator, a position she held when J.D. Robins arrived.

1985 – J.D. Robins was hired as a retail consultant to implement his system of selling. Affectionately termed “The JD system,” it implemented unit pricing and de-centralized processing. He was asked by Kern to visit the agency because the stores were not making money. Within two weeks of implementing his system, they were profitable. Aimee Cartwright, who was later the Operations and Retail Director, recalled that timeframe. “He was cleaning house literally and figuratively. He was retired from Goodwill and went around the country doing rescue missions for stores….I’ve got a list of the JD System in my retail manuals still today. It was really a quantity and quality theory that everyone should be using anyway. ‘When in doubt, throw it out.’ ‘If you have to look at it twice, you’ve looked at it once too often’ He was all the time doing these quips. But he turned stores around. His idea was to get the product out and it will sell.”

Beckett recalled that before J.D. they didn’t use coat hangers for anything but blouses. Slacks and skirts were folded on tables. Extensive inventory records were kept. He asked why and convinced the staff that it served no purpose. He loved customers, according to Judy Beckett. He often said, “We put new stuff out all the time, so pack your lunch and stay all day”. He created store wide unit pricing.”

Ron Murphy recalled when the only computer - a Junior PC with an attached thermal printer – was introduced in 1985. Only the accounting department used it to do the store sales reports.

1986 – Vicki Tambling came to work for Goodwill to work as the JTPA counselor. She recalls that the programs were a lot smaller than and not as expansive as they became later. She believes she served about 60 people in the JTPA program but that the training programs were not very formalized.

“Sheltered clients were very, very disabled – severely disabled,” Tambling said “I worked with them just getting them ready to go. I did a lot of the social service kinds of things…if they got kicked out of their house, needed food or referrals to Information & Referral. Then I wrote program plans and did all that.” Tambling stayed about 18 months and left to be the social service director at a nursing home, then went to Prestera Mental Health Center.

1988 - In the spring of 1988, the agency had five staff members, recalls Kern. “Don [Mega] must have been the Director of Rehabilitation Services and Judy Beckett was there [as the vocational evaluator], Lisa Beckett, Pam Carroll, and Barbara Rice. Pam Carroll did the fashion shows.” (Photos available in the History pdf)

When Kern left to take the job as CEO of Goodwill in Fort Worth, J.D. Robins returned as interim CEO. Mary Edith, his wife, worked at the 5th Ave. store and he ran the agency. Ruth Martin was the 5th Ave. store manager and Mary Edith dramatically improved the appearance, methods, and sales, according Judy Beckett, who was named Operations Director by Robins. “Sales at 5th Avenue went through the roof,” she said.

1989 – Richard L. Coleman, former vice president of administration for Goodwill Industries in Sarasota, FL was hired as CEO replacing Bernard Kern who took a position in Ft. Worth, Texas. At that time, Goodwill had two stores in Huntington, one in Ashland and one in Pt. Pleasant. The local budget was about $1.2 million dollars.

The Point Pleasant store was moved uptown to 2416 Jackson Street where it stayed for six years. JD Robins recommended the move from the Main Street location to uptown. Bartow Jones, the landlord of the new store was a strong believer in Goodwill’s mission.

1991 – In February, Goodwill won the 1990 Milestone Award signifying that among 33 sheltered workshops in West Virginia, they placed the most clients in jobs. This is the fourth consecutive year Goodwill has won this award. Additionally, the agency also received CARF accreditation – the only private rehabilitation facility in WV to do so.

Henry Helms, the son of Goodwill founder, Edgar J. Helms, addressed the annual award banquet. This was his second visit since the founding of the agency.

In September, Marshall University opened its new football stadium. Coleman had secured the contract for cleaning the facility after each game.

After serving briefly as Interim CEO following the resignation of Rick Coleman, Judy L. Beckett, (pictured left with Cindie Riggs, Director of Finance) was named CEO on September 1.

Beckett quickly learned that the Marshall Stadium contract had been underestimated. “I remember the first game; we were probably there for two days. We had no idea what was involved or how to go about starting. I think he just guessed at a price and way underestimated what it was going to be like. Jack Daniels, the athletic director, came to us and said, “Just go. We’ve got to get this done.” I resisted saying, “we had no idea. This is our first time. We had no clue how to anticipate how many bags it would take, how the trash thing would work, etc. we’ll get it.” We stayed until it was done. I drove a truck full of garbage with a bunch of work release guys, dripping full of beer. Drove it to the dump. The University didn’t provide us with adequate dump sites, because they didn’t know either. It was incredible,” she said. “They put a lot of trust in us to do the sky boxes and to have the people up there. We had very few problems. Once we got it down to where it was manageable, I think we did a pretty good job. It gave us a lot of visibility.”

Goodwill was awarded the WARF contract to maintain the I-64 rest area near Huntington’s 5th Street Exit.

As Interim CEO, Judy Beckett was approached by Dan Smirl, owner of Tri-Data, Inc, a document imaging company. He needed a way to destroy the paper records that he was converting to photographic images. Judy recalled, “He walked over one day and said, “can you get rid of this paper?” I said, “I don’t know, but we can see.” We actually took scissors and started cutting it up. He said, “I have a shredder” and I said, “If you do, bring it over.” It was one of those that will only shred 10 sheets at a time.

After securing a commercial shredder, the problem became how to dispose of the shredded paper. “After we started shredding it, we had it in barrels; we had it in boxes; we had it in laundry carts; we had it everywhere. We called vet offices. We found out that in England they used it around vegetable gardens. We called people who packaged soap. They would come get only a barrel so we still had tons left. We weren’t getting anywhere,” she laughed. Finally they began to bale it and sell it to a recycler.

Vicki Tambling returned as Director of Client Services following the resignation of Don Mega.

1992 –In her new position, Vicki Tambling was responsible for the Business Clerical Training program. It had started in January with twelve computers, two printers, manuals and other supplies donated by IBM. Mary Volk Starkey was the instructor and LeAnn McKenzie was the Job Developer. By 1993 the program had an 80% placement rate.

Aimee Cartwright returned in September 1992 as Director of Operations, taking the position Judy had vacated. At this time there were four stores: Virginia Ave., Pt. Pleasant, 2626 5th Ave and Ashland.

Teresa Swecker was a case manager; Susan Blanco (Smith) was working in the processing areas of Virginia Avenue; Connie Gibson was an Administrative Assistant and director of Dial-A-Ride. The entire staff was housed at Virginia Avenue.

1993 – On September 3, the Barboursville store opened at 6424 Rt. 60 E with Mayor Nancy Cartmill presiding at the ribbon cutting.

After years of leasing, Goodwill purchased the Ashland Store building at 2100 Winchester Avenue for $156,000 from the heirs of the owner O.W. Shockey.

1994 – Two new training programs- janitorial training and paper shredding – were implemented to strengthen the on-the-job training component of the WAT programs. Contracts to clean area businesses were secured as well as shredding contracts with Tri-Data and other firms.

J.D. Robins, a Goodwill Consultant who served as a retail consultant in 1985 and again as interim CEO in 1989 was honored at the 1994 Annual Banquet.

In 1994 the agency hit $1 million dollars in sales with stores at Virginia Avenue, Pt. Pleasant, Ashland, Barboursville and Eastern Heights.

1995 - Although the Goodwill charter was signed in 1973, work as an agency is counted from the 1975 opening of its first store, and the agency’s 20th Anniversary was celebrated this year.

The WV Bureau of Employment Programs awarded a grant jointly to Goodwill and Tri-State OIC to develop plans for a One-Stop Job Center.

The Pt. Pleasant store moved to the Foodland Plaza because the neighboring stores at the old location wanted to expand. Bartow Jones offered to help find a new location. During this process, Mr. Jones died and his daughter took over. The Jones family is also the landlord of the Foodland Plaza location.

1996 – Eastern Heights Store location was opened with a Ribbon Cutting Ceremony. Nanna Gilley, wife of Marshall President, Wade Gilley, presided. Ms. Gilley was the Goodwill Board Chair.

Don Morris, pictured here with Ms. Gilley and Jody Smirl, served on the Board of Directors for many years. According to Judy Beckett, Morris’ dedication to the board and his long service as Chair of the Nominating committee was critical to finding people who were business like and entrepreneurial but who always had the mission of the agency at heart.

The Business Clerical Program was revamped to include more than just clerical skills and renamed Business Employment Skills Training (BEST). The program was supported by JTPA funds. From the very beginning, referrals for this program came from both Kentucky and West Virginia.

Black Diamond Girl Scout Council and Goodwill collaborated on “Good Turn Day” to put over 800 girls in area neighborhoods to collect donations for Goodwill.

1997 – “The Works - Career Center,” a hard-hitting course in developing job-seeking skills, was established as part of the governmental initiative to put welfare recipients in the workplace. Tim Morris was hired as the first director of this program.

1998 – Goodwill joined Weight Watchers to promote “Suited for Success,” a program to provide low-cost professional-looking clothing to welfare-to-work candidates.

The agency cooperated in a Welfare-to-Work program sponsored by United Way. The six-week program pulled resources from various community agencies and individuals to teach skills in getting and keeping a job.

Starting this year, Goodwill became an Associate Member Agency of United Way and did not request an allocation, although tours were still offered and Beckett still participated in the Directors’ meetings.

November 15 marked an Open House and Art Show to showcase the newly purchased Administrative Office Building at 1102 Memorial Blvd. Previously the home of Columbia Gas, it housed the executive director, human relations, finance, operations and marketing departments. An art show with 55 works by 26 individuals with disabilities was held in conjunction with the open house. Purchase of the art work, made possible by donations from area businesses and individuals, will enable it to remain on permanent display. For the first time, the agency secured a mortgage to buy property; however, the debt was cleared within three years.

1999 – The Virginia Avenue building was given an exterior face-lift and the store received an interior renovation. New exterior canopies and a Dry-Vit exterior coating gave it a new look.

The agency’s first website was launched with design provided by Strictly Business. The web address was www.goodwillhunting.org.

In March, a new store opened in Milton. Located in the Perry Morris Square shopping center on Rt. 60, the store formerly housed Vickie’s Cake Decorating.

Fred Grandy, the Goodwill Industries International President and CEO, was the keynote speaker for the 1999 Annual Banquet. Mr. Grandy was well-known for his TV role on the “Love Boat” before taking the helm of the international agency.

Goodwill was awarded $105,811 for training and recruiting workers for the 2000 Census. The grant came from the US Department of Labor to be used to train TANF (Temporary Assistance for Needy Families) recipients. Under this grant, Goodwill had an office set aside just for the Census people. It was manned by board member, JP Childers. People could come in off the street, sign up or get information about the census.

2000 – In June, Goodwill launched shopgoodwill.com, an auction website started by the Goodwill of Orange County, CA. The online store allowed better or unique items to gain a wider shopping clientele.

2001 - January 4 marked the opening of the first completely new Goodwill store and the first location in the Lavalette area. The store, located in the Crossroads Shopping Center, was the seventh for the agency and gave Goodwill a needed presence in Wayne County. This store was the first to be designed and built for Goodwill.

Family Service, a long time Tri-State area community agency that provided counseling services, became a part of Goodwill. Because Judy Beckett was on the Family Service board of directors, she knew of their mounting problems. The board felt the services were too valuable to let them fold. Following a thorough examination, the board voted to assume the Family Service agency as a division of Goodwill Industries. The family counseling services were housed at Virginia Avenue and the Consumer Credit Counseling Service was located at Memorial Boulevard.

Following a grant from the Hitachi Foundation, the agency joined two other Goodwills – Southeast Louisiana and Somerset, KY, as sub-grantors, to study the issue of retention and advancement in the workplace. Called, Making Work, Work, it paired area businesses with Goodwills to study and recommend strategies to improve the rates of retention and advancement, especially among small and medium sized businesses.

Due to demand from the residential health care community, Goodwill launched a ten week Residential Worker Training Program in August. The program was initiated through a United Way performance and outcomes grant.

The Industrial Contracts Division moved into a building with the purchase of a facility at 525 W. 19th Street. The site holds all contract departments – assembly, collating, janitorial contracts and Confidential Document Destruction. A grant from the WV Department of Natural Resources purchased a shredder/baler which doubled the capacity of this division.

2002 - While Goodwill Industries International celebrated its Centennial, Goodwill of KYOWVA launched a new mission-driven interior design program in all stores as well as incorporating the mission design in all print and advertising materials.

A traveling Centennial display promoting the history of Goodwill was placed at the Huntington Mall for one week as part of the celebration.

2003 – Judy Beckett, who had been with the agency since 1985 and was CEO for twelve years, retired in July. She married John Watson, CEO of Southeast Iowa Goodwill and left Huntington to make her residence in Iowa City.

Kim Lewis, formerly director of Trident Literacy in Charleston, South Carolina, was selected to take the reins of the agency.

2004 – In response to the increased retail traffic and residential growth in the Barboursville area, Goodwill merged the Eastern Heights and Barboursville stores into one larger location which opened in January 2004. The new store was located in the old Gateway Motel Conference Center, the site of several Goodwill annual meetings over the years. The new complex, called River Place, featured a variety of specialty stores at 6005 Rt. 60 E. Goodwill’s location covered 7000 square feet. Staffs from the former stores were merged into one sales staff for the new store.

In October, Vicki Tambling, Director of Client Services, resigned after thirteen years of service to the agency.

2005 – On August 1, the agency began offering four career tracks in the newly configured Goodwill Career Center. Students could earn certifications in (BEST) Business Employment Skills, (REST) Retail Employment Skills, (MOST) Medical Office Skills and (HOST) Hospitality Skills.

August 31 marked the Grand Opening of a new 4000 square foot store in Williamson, WV. An additional 2200 square feet on the community services side enabled rehabilitation and Family Services to be offered there as well.

Under the newly passed Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005, Consumer Credit Counseling Services was named by the United States Trustees office in October as one of only 41 certified pre- bankruptcy counseling agencies in the country.

2006 – In July, a new 3800 square foot store in Pikeville, KY opened at Weddington Square, bringing the total number of retail outlets to eight.