Charles B. Shaw
Encyclopedia
Charles Shaw was an engineer
best known for overseeing building of the Northwestern Turnpike
.
An inscription at US 50, Capon Bridge
says:
Engineer
An engineer is a professional practitioner of engineering, concerned with applying scientific knowledge, mathematics and ingenuity to develop solutions for technical problems. Engineers design materials, structures, machines and systems while considering the limitations imposed by practicality,...
best known for overseeing building of the Northwestern Turnpike
Northwestern Turnpike
The Northwestern Turnpike is a historic road in West Virginia , important for being historically one of the major roads crossing the Appalachians, financed by the Virginia Board of Public Works in the 1830s. In modern times, west of Winchester, Virginia, U.S...
.
An inscription at US 50, Capon Bridge
Capon Bridge, West Virginia
Capon Bridge is a town located in eastern Hampshire County, West Virginia along the Northwestern Turnpike , approximately twenty miles west of Winchester, Virginia. As of the 2000 census, the town population was 2,178, 200 of which live within the town limits. Originally known as Glencoe, Capon...
says:
In 1784, WashingtonGeorge WashingtonGeorge Washington was the dominant military and political leader of the new United States of America from 1775 to 1799. He led the American victory over Great Britain in the American Revolutionary War as commander-in-chief of the Continental Army from 1775 to 1783, and presided over the writing of...
proposed the Northwestern Turnpike as an all-VirginiaVirginiaThe Commonwealth of Virginia , is a U.S. state on the Atlantic Coast of the Southern United States. Virginia is nicknamed the "Old Dominion" and sometimes the "Mother of Presidents" after the eight U.S. presidents born there...
route to the OhioOhio RiverThe Ohio River is the largest tributary, by volume, of the Mississippi River. At the confluence, the Ohio is even bigger than the Mississippi and, thus, is hydrologically the main stream of the whole river system, including the Allegheny River further upstream...
. Authorized in 1827 and started in 1831, it remains a monument to the skill of its engineers, Charles Shaw and Colonel Claudius CrozetClaudius CrozetBenoit Claudius Crozet was an educator and civil engineer.Crozet was born in France. After serving in the French military, in 1816, he immigrated to the United States. He taught at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York, and helped found the Virginia Military Institute at Lexington,...
.