Somehow that topic didn’t come up in 7th grade WV History class. Going to have to dig into that as it would make a great post.

Edit: JFC, I had no idea this happened. And I live here and have toured the Whipple Company Store (again, in 7th grade).

https://wvpublic.org/what-was-the-esau-scrip/

“We’ve had multitudes of women and tell us as little girls they remember their mothers coming to the company store and one of the things that a lot of more the lovely ladies had to do was come upstairs. Some of the young girls had the stories shared by their mothers stating that they would be escorted in the shoe room. There would be a selected guard that would be waiting for them and they would receive a brand new pair of shoes with no accountability other than to perform whatever the service the guard wished to have in lieu of pay. We had one woman in particular share with us that her mother was a young girl about 25 years old and bought her first pair of shoes here and the women’s entire life those shoes remained in the shoe box on her closet shelf never to be worn and she refused to wear another pair of shoes her entire life. She made her shoes out of cardboard, newspapers and twine.”

- Joy Lynn, owner and tour guide, Whipple Company Store