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Meet Dr. Tom Hatcher, Mayor of War, West Virginia. Dr. Hatcher
does
full circle, off to college; earning Bachelors, Masters, PHD,
teaching career, Exchange Program Director - traveling to 75
countries and returning to his homeland, Appalachia.
Dr. Hatcher, native son of Appalachia,
returns to his homeland to answer "The Call", care for his region
and his people.
Date: November 21, 2001
Time: 11:00 am
Place: War, City Hall - an old train station
Interviewed by: Betty Dotson Lewis
Dr. Tom Hatcher
My birth place was Iaeger, West Virginia and I lived
most of my younger life in McDowell County, Iaeger, and War. I
graduated from Big Creek High Creek in 1958. I received my
Bachelors and Masters Degrees from West Virginia University. I
taught school in McDowell and Monongalia Counties and then
started teaching for Marshall University.
While at Marshall I became interested in obtaining my PH. D. The
Ohio University in Columbus was where I attended to receive a PH.
D. in Developmental Psychology and Education.
I returned to West Virginia University to teach from
1967 to 1980. In 1980 I accepted a position as Secretary General
of the Council of International Programs, “CIP,” located in
Cleveland, Ohio and began my work as director of an exchange
program for professionals in the Human Services, Education,
Social Work, Psychology. Eventually the program expanded to take
in many areas including Business, Law and the Medical
Profession..
While serving as Director, I traveled to more than 75
countries on every continent except Australia and Antarctica and
to some countries, more than one time, selecting participants for
the Exchange Program and working with Government Offices or
Ministries of Social Welfare, Economic Development and Ministries
of Health or Education. A lot of these participants were funded
by those sources working through the American. Embassies from
each country.
The program was then moved to DC. I moved there with it. I didn't
stay in DC long. In 1991 I left it all behind to return to
Appalachia, my homeland for family reasons.
I began teaching at Big Creek High School. I taught
there for four years and then moved to
the McDowell County Schools Central Board Office in Welch to work
in the Title I Program. I retired in 1998.
In 1995 I got interested in the politics of this town,
War, West Virginia, by accident, I think, I didn’t run for the
job as city council member, but one member who was elected in
1995 and had a job with the WV Department of Health and Human
Resources which turned out to be a conflict of interest. He
resigned and I was appointed at the beginning of the term and
served on the War City Council with a mayor who was eventually
convicted of fraud.
The mayor was involved in a scam involving a private
rescue squad here in town. He was convicted of mail fraud and was
sent to a penitentiary in Morgantown for about thirty-three
months. Possible related fraud items in the city were there, if
we had chosen to pursue them, but because he had already plead
guilty, we let them go.
My father was the one who developed this rescue squad
and after dad’s death in 1981, the Mayor of War became the
President of the Board of the Rescue Squad.
I think shortly after the scam was started
all the records for Medicaid and Medicare payments were destroyed
except those going back to 1991. I think the problem started in
the 80’s. Medicaid and Medicare did have records to show that
3.75 million dollars being sent to the Big Creek Rescue Squad,
none of which had gone through the books.
The fed authorities never found the 3.75 million. They
thought they knew who got it but could never prove it. They did
not charge anyone with the $3.75 million disappearance but with
mail fraud. There was a plea bargain at the end of the Mayor's
term in 1997, and he served about 33 months in prison. My sister
was appointed the Board of Directors to help clean up the rescue
squad and straighten out the financial situation there.
The rescue squad has since declared bankruptcy and
started over with a new name, and my sister Jerry is still
President of the Board of Directors and has successfully cleaned
out all that financial mess.
The rescue squad had a lot of district people on the
Board of Directors who were very good people and who believed in
the President of the Board and accepted his word for everything.
And he did have that side to him because he and my father were
good friends. There were two sides to his character; the public
side that could be trusted and then the secret, dark side. He
served his 33 months and is back in War. He and I have made peace
with each other. There is no point in carrying a grudge just
because of a person's past. We had known each other for years. I
am sure he will be here for many years..
At the end of that council term in 1997, I decided to
run for Mayor of War. The previous mayor was still in office.
This was just before he accepted the plea bargain. Instead of
supporting me, he got a young man who was about 23 and on welfare
at that time to run against me. He supported him and did his
campaign signs and helped him a lot. Fortunately the people here
saw what was happening and he was defeated.
On the night of the election when the results were
posted on the wall of City Hall, I don’t remember exactly how
many votes he got but it was about 125 and he said, "Hell", I've
got more relatives in this town than that. I told him. "Did you
ever think maybe they didn’t all vote for you?"
I have served two - two year terms and I am in a four
year term now. I have tried to do what has needed to be done;
things the previous mayor should been working on years ago while
he was mayor. He served as mayor for more than 20 years. We
now have a brand new 8.7 million dollar sewer project and a lot
of equipment that goes along with that. I have worked on cleaning
up the town, removing debris and burned out houses. We have
worked on the water situation. We do not own the water, and I
hope that is going to come about soon through the purchase of
that water system at the first of the year.
We were active with Governor Underwood. Governor Underwood was
good to McDowell County and War. We have not had as much contact
with Governor Wise, although this is improving.. We are
Democrats, however, not Republicans, and we want interaction with
Wise.
We have had two major crises in the town to which we
have had to respond. In 1999, three juveniles broke into the
public library and proceeded to set it on fire. The $500,000.
complex with 40,000 volumes of books, burned to the ground.
A 19 year old girl, her 18 year brother and their16 year old
cousin were charged. Then about six months later in 1999, on
Halloween night, the Fire Department burned from an electrical
fire. We have had those two big crises to face. That was close to
a million dollars we lost with the Fire Department. We lost
everything, vehicles, fire house, the works. We have been able to
build a new fire house and get most of the equipment back. We are
presently working on the library. The remainder of the library
should get built before the fall of 2002.
I returned here because of family reasons and
to get myself away from a big city environment and back to my
homeland and to get my son away from the city. He had gotten into
some trouble, and I needed to come back where I could have more
control, but that turned out not to be the case. There is as much
peer pressure here in this small town as there is in a big city.
We are experiencing a breakdown in child rearing practices. Teens
are doing more today to get them in trouble than has ever
happened before.
When I came back I thought I would do something about
the history of the county, because that has never been done. So I
helped to form the McDowell County Historical Society. A small
group of us started working on the Heritage of McDowell County,
West Virginia - First Volume 1858 to 1995
Volume 2, 1858 – 1999.
I think both of those attempts have generated other
interests in the history of McDowell County. Another person who
has written about McDowell County is Jean Battlo, a personal
friend.
Jean Battlo’s parents were Italian immigrants to
McDowell County and her father worked in the coal mines. She is a
McDowell County playwright. She has been recognized for the "Sid
Hatfield" Play. Jean has also done a text on McDowell County.
Growing up here, my parents were school teachers in
McDowell County and Mingo County. They lived in the same
communities, Iaeger and War. Mother, Beatrice Carter from
Tazewell County, Virginia; her ancestors had been in Tazewell for
200 years.
The Hatchers were from Mercer County, but my
dad was from McDowell. Since my mother was in Tazewell County and
was reared there, I am interested in the Tazewell County
Historical Society and have been active in that since 1992. I
have been President since 1997. I have been President of McDowell
County Historical Society since 1992.
My Dad, Glenn Hatcher, was a community-minded person.
He was constantly helping people, belonging to community
organizations. He represented McDowell County in the House of
Delegates and WV State Senate. All three of us children in the
family, without being taught about serving people, saw, in
action, Dad and Mom's example about community service. All three
of us are very community minded.
end of interview. |
