CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- West Virginia University Press won awards at the New York Book Show for its book jacket designs on the first two volumes of the new "West Virginia Classics" series.

The series is a joint project between the WVU Press and the West Virginia Humanities Council.

The Book Industry Guild sponsors the New York Book Show. One of its goals is to judge the physical and artistic quality of newly published books.

The two books that won awards are:

• "West Virginia: Its Farms and Forests, Mines and Oilwells" by J.R. Dodge, first published in 1865. Born in 1823, Dodge became the first statistician at the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

Dodge's book provides details about industrial statistics, terrain and the population of the newly formed state, as well as interviews with business owners.

• "The Shenandoah" by Julia Davis, first published in 1945.

Born in Clarksburg in 1901, Julia Davis Adams recounts the history of the Shenandoah Valley and River, drawing on her own research and the experiences of ancestors who settled and lived in the area.