They include the Robert C. Byrd Center for Legislative Studies. On the campus of Shepherd University, the center has become the home for much of what Byrd had amassed in his Capitol Hill offices during his more than a half-century there. One year later, center staff continues to catalog the estimated 3,000 cubic feet of documents, photographs, art objects, mementos and other items.
Center Director Ray Smock said they've begun finding Byrd's margin notes throughout thick briefing books, copies of legislation and other volumes.
"We keep discovering things about Sen. Byrd, including how meticulous he was as a student," Smock said Friday. "He was just devouring information. He would underline something and write `Memorize this.'"
Smock said the center has long-range plans for a Byrd legacy project. It will start with traveling exhibits of recordings, documents, photos and other items within the next year. Staff also intends to compile an oral history from Byrd's colleagues and friends, Smock said, while assembling memorabilia, letters and stories shared by constituents.
That unofficial archive provided by West Virginians will include such anecdotes as one from a woman who told staff of how Byrd saved her family's dairy farm 30 years ago by going to bat against a proposed federal Department of Agriculture regulation change.
"These stories are often lost unless someone goes after them," Smock said.
The center is also about to publish "Congress Investigates." The two-volume, 1,200 page study ranges from Congress' first investigation, in 1792 of a disastrous U.S. defeat against Native Americans, to the 2005 probe following Hurricane Katrina. The 27 investigation topics in between include Watergate, the Clinton impeachment case and the Sept. 11 attacks.
"This is the kind of work that Sen. Byrd wanted this center to do," Smock said.
But not all his namesakes have endured.
The Robert C. Byrd Honors Scholarship Program aimed to reward college-bound, high-achieving high school seniors. It lost its funding earlier this year amid the ongoing struggle to tackle the federal deficit.
Among the state's delegation, spokeswomen for Republicans Reps. David McKinley and Shelley Moore Capito noted that the Obama Administration decided to cut the program. Capito's office added that Congress hasn't finished its look at education funding. Rep. Nick Rahall, a Democrat who represented Byrd's hometown of Sophia, says he'll try to restore funding. Rockefeller and Manchin support that move, their spokespeople said.
Around 28,000 college students nationwide received the scholarship before it shut down, at a cost of around $42 million. Barth said the individual amounts were modest -- each student received $1,500 annually for four years -- but that the point was to encourage youth who embrace education.
"He used to get the sweetest thank-you notes from student from all over the country. They were grateful for the recognition of their academic success," she said. "We always wrote them back to thank them for the thanks, and telling them to keep up the good work."
CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- The state that U.S. Sen. Robert C. Byrd represented for more than half a century still feels the effects from his death one year later, while his legacy continues to evolve beyond its borders.
From political upheaval within West Virginia to the debate on Capitol Hill over Afghanistan and the powers of the president, Byrd casts a shadow.
"We remember him for his passionate speeches and his fierce defense of West Virginia," said Anne Barth, a Byrd aide for more than 23 years who was his state director upon his death. "But there's also how he stayed in touch with West Virginians. Any small town we visited, he knew people and he knew them by name."
Barth and other veterans of Byrd's staff have been exchanging anecdotes and lessons as the June 28 anniversary of his death approaches. Former Byrd spokesman Jesse Jacobs said the current climate of discourse in Congress could use a dose of Byrd.
"I can see him sitting at his desk in the Capitol, shaking his head with his white mane of hair moving side to side in disappointment at the way the members of the world's greatest deliberative body talk around, over, about -- anything but to one another to address the problems confronting our country," Jacobs said in an email.
Sen. Jay Rockefeller spoke of Byrd's "special place in our collective history" in advance of the anniversary last week. The fellow West Virginia Democrat was Byrd's Senate colleague for more than 25 years. History's longest-serving member of Congress, Byrd was elected to a record nine six-year terms in the Senate following three, two-year terms in the U.S. House.
Byrd even altered the federal calendar. At his suggestion in 2004, the U.S. celebrates Constitution Day each Sept. 17. While not a federal work holiday, the resulting law requires any school and college receiving federal money to teach about the nation's governing document on or around that date.
West Virginia faces a court-ordered special election for governor Oct. 4 that can be traced to Byrd's death. The election was prompted when now-Sen. Joe Manchin resigned as chief executive after winning last November's special election for Byrd's seat.
The political domino effect triggered by Byrd's death also spilled into the state Legislature. The state Constitution tapped state Senate President Earl Ray Tomblin to act as governor upon Manchin's departure, leading to the state's first acting Senate president.
When he wrote the president last week on the U.S. mission in Afghanistan, Manchin invoked, at length, an October 2009 speech by Byrd. Manchin's predecessor had warned that nation-building in that country would come at the cost of both stateside needs and the focus on destroying al-Qaida.
Manchin said Byrd also would have agreed with his Thursday vote targeting White House policymakers who are not subject to Senate confirmation. Manchin bucked most of his party in supporting the unsuccessful amendment.
Surviving Byrd are more than three dozen roads, campus buildings, research centers, business parks and other entities beading his name. These reflect the prowess of Byrd, who died at age 92, of securing federal funds for projects back home.
They include the Robert C. Byrd Center for Legislative Studies. On the campus of Shepherd University, the center has become the home for much of what Byrd had amassed in his Capitol Hill offices during his more than a half-century there. One year later, center staff continues to catalog the estimated 3,000 cubic feet of documents, photographs, art objects, mementos and other items.
Center Director Ray Smock said they've begun finding Byrd's margin notes throughout thick briefing books, copies of legislation and other volumes.
"We keep discovering things about Sen. Byrd, including how meticulous he was as a student," Smock said Friday. "He was just devouring information. He would underline something and write `Memorize this.'"
Smock said the center has long-range plans for a Byrd legacy project. It will start with traveling exhibits of recordings, documents, photos and other items within the next year. Staff also intends to compile an oral history from Byrd's colleagues and friends, Smock said, while assembling memorabilia, letters and stories shared by constituents.
That unofficial archive provided by West Virginians will include such anecdotes as one from a woman who told staff of how Byrd saved her family's dairy farm 30 years ago by going to bat against a proposed federal Department of Agriculture regulation change.
"These stories are often lost unless someone goes after them," Smock said.
The center is also about to publish "Congress Investigates." The two-volume, 1,200 page study ranges from Congress' first investigation, in 1792 of a disastrous U.S. defeat against Native Americans, to the 2005 probe following Hurricane Katrina. The 27 investigation topics in between include Watergate, the Clinton impeachment case and the Sept. 11 attacks.
"This is the kind of work that Sen. Byrd wanted this center to do," Smock said.
But not all his namesakes have endured.
The Robert C. Byrd Honors Scholarship Program aimed to reward college-bound, high-achieving high school seniors. It lost its funding earlier this year amid the ongoing struggle to tackle the federal deficit.
Among the state's delegation, spokeswomen for Republicans Reps. David McKinley and Shelley Moore Capito noted that the Obama Administration decided to cut the program. Capito's office added that Congress hasn't finished its look at education funding. Rep. Nick Rahall, a Democrat who represented Byrd's hometown of Sophia, says he'll try to restore funding. Rockefeller and Manchin support that move, their spokespeople said.
Around 28,000 college students nationwide received the scholarship before it shut down, at a cost of around $42 million. Barth said the individual amounts were modest -- each student received $1,500 annually for four years -- but that the point was to encourage youth who embrace education.
"He used to get the sweetest thank-you notes from student from all over the country. They were grateful for the recognition of their academic success," she said. "We always wrote them back to thank them for the thanks, and telling them to keep up the good work."
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