Logan Hanson

Updated: July 01, 2020

NORTHFORK, W.Va. (BVM) — Peeling light blue paint covers the walls of the long abandoned Northfork High School gymnasium. The floor is decorated with a mix of wet marks and soggy, rotted pieces of the ceiling that fell from above. On some walls, yellowing team pictures of the basketball team that once roamed the court still hang. On a wall just below a few rows of concaving bleachers, running parallel to the long ignored hardwood court, red letters, which miraculously are still able to be made out, read: “Northfork Blue Demons.”

“The team was supported by the whole community,” Northfork Mayor and Northfork High School alumni Carol Sizemore said. “When there was a game in that school there was not a place to sit. (It was) standing room only and it was overflowing with students, supporters, and family. It was remarkable. It was electric, it was electric in that gym when we played.”

The famed “Demon Den,” that at one time would have over 1,300 fans packed into the 900-person capacity gym to get a glimpse of the team’s greatness, is now a shell of its former glory. In February, the McDowell County School Board voted to demolish the once famed high school, which after being converted into a middle school in 1985, fell into disrepair following its closure in 2001 due to damage from severe floods in the area. According to Sizemore, this decision was made to ensure the safety of the community and its citizens.

“There are mixed emotions about the demolition of the school,” Sizemore said. “Most are sentimental and possibly wanting to utilize the school for another purpose. … The governor and I spoke and we had engineers come down and they deemed no, it couldn’t be saved. So now it is more of a health hazard, a safety issue, because we couldn’t keep people out of it.”

For the tiny West Virginia town of Northfork, the school held something of value. The Blue Demons were more than just a basketball team, they were the spirit of the city. It has been over three decades since the last Blue Devils team took the court before the school was consolidated into Mount View High School in 1985. The merger ended what was perhaps the greatest boys basketball program not just in the state, but in the entire country.

Over a 13-year span from 1971 to 1984, the Blue Demons were a powerhouse in the state, dominating the court with relentless defensive effort and a pass-happy offense that helped the team win 10 AA basketball championships in the timeframe. Most impressively, the team also established a then national record for the most consecutive basketball state championships ever with eight straight titles from 1974-1981 (before being passed by Jersey City St. Anthony’s nine consecutive in 1991, a record still held today according to the National Federation of State High School Associations).

“I’ve been very fortunate in getting the young men who have participated in our program to dedicate their lives to basketball,” former Blue Demons head coach Jennings Boyd once told PM Magazine. “I have always asked that they put basketball second only to God and their families and I guess whatever secrets there are to that we have been very successful in it.”

Boyd, whose name may be the most recognizable in the city even today, was the Blue Demons’ head coach over many of those years. Starting in 1966, Boyd led the Blue Devils for 15 years and finished with a 307-62 record (including a 102-5 record at home), nine AA state titles, 100 consecutive victories over AA opponents and three unbeaten seasons before retiring in 1981 following his final state title.

A math teacher at Northfork High School on top of his work as the basketball coach, Boyd ran his program how he ran his classroom, with a high attention to detail and a mutual respect between teacher and learner. Though he had his tough policies such as having his players (and their parents) sign contracts to follow an array of team rules, including a strict 11 p.m. curfew where the boys would have to physically wave to Boyd as he and an assistant drove past their homes each night, Boyd would also give exceptional care to each of his athletes. He would also go above and beyond for other members of the basketball community, such as creating a separate locker room for the referees inside the school’s gymnasium. This gave Boyd an almost prophetic-like reverence in the small town as well as throughout the state with kids lining up to get autographs from the coach and waiting for their turn to don the red, white and blue Northfork uniforms.

“Everybody loved Jennings. He was one of the most respected men in the town and the boys worshiped him,” said Patty Boyd, Jennings’ wife of 48 years.

Patty described her husband as a converted Catholic and a converted Italian, as he took some traits from her side of the family, such as constantly talking with hand motions. After being high school sweethearts at Northfork, the couple went to college together at Concord College in Athens, W.Va. before getting married in 1954. The couple would eventually have three children, all boys, but they had many more “sons.”

When Boyd was in charge of the Blue Demons, the players were his family and the program was a child of the community. Patty would help create mascot outfits, order team jackets and create signs and banners during game days. Community members would donate money or even suits so the players could have matching professional attire for their games, another Boyd staple. Even the school’s home economics teachers would stitch ripped or torn jerseys for the boys before games if they were needed. The Blue Demons and Northfork were truly one in the same.

“It was a community affair,” Patty said. “Everybody went to the games. They closed down the town and locked all the doors.”

During all 15 years of his coaching tenure at Northfork, Patty never saw Boyd lose a game. This isn’t because he didn’t lose any, he did on a handful of rare occasions, but because in her nervousness at the end of the games, Patty would sit patiently in the bathroom until the final whistle. Even though the team may have lost some games, Patty doesn’t believe there has ever been a better team in the state.

“Every game was a good game. We beat everybody,” the 87-year-old Patty said. “By the time we got to Charleston or Morgantown (for the state tournament) it was like a practice. They were ready for anybody and could beat anybody. Northfork could beat anybody, anytime.”

For his efforts, Boyd was elected into the National High School Sports Hall of Fame in 1984 before being inducted into the West Virginia Sports Hall of Fame in 2002. Boyd passed away that year at the age of 68 following a battle with lung cancer.

“He was a great guy,” Patty said. “There wasn’t anything he couldn’t do. Everyone loved him very much and it was a great loss when he died.”

Though the school’s girls teams were also impressive in their own right, winning three state championships in the ‘70s, the boys were the big draw for the city. Sadly for Northfork, as the basketball team faded from existence, much of the town did as well.

According to statistics from the United States Census Bureau, Northfork saw its population reach its peak sometime in the ‘70s as it rose from 737 in 1970 to 1,105 in 1980 before falling to 656 in 1990. Today, the Bureau has the population at 291.

For Patty, it is a sad statistic.

“Now the city is dead,” Patty said. “We don’t have a grocery store, we don’t have dry cleaners, we don’t have a bank….We just don’t have any business now. Everybody’s gone. When the team was gone, (all the pride) was gone. No more pride. No more high school. No more Northfork.”

Blue Demons teams of the past have also begun to fade as well.

Along with their coach, a couple of former Blue Demons champions have also passed away. This included Boyd’s son Michael, who Patty described as being with his dad constantly until the day he died, who passed away in 2015 from a drug overdose at the age of 52. Mark Page, a senior member of the 1974 squad and an eventual coach of the team, also passed away last year at the age of 62.

One person who has witnessed both the rise of the Blue Demons and the decline of the city first hand is Gary Dove. Dove was the statistician for the Northfork boys basketball teams from 1965 to 1981 and has become the team’s unofficial historian in town. According to Dove, the amalgamation of the city, Boyd and timing helped to create the team’s spectacular run.

“It was a perfect storm over the 15 years that (Boyd) coached,” Dove said. “It was a combining of great talent, of great coaching, attitudes and cooperation of the players and parents; everything just meshed together. It was like building a house, it started out early on with the foundation and each year built on the success of the previous year.”

As the town and its citizens grow older, the excitement over the Blue Demons in younger generations falls back a little further. With each passing year, although the city never forgets its historic past, newer basketball players aren’t as impacted by the team’s once large influence.

“It’s known, but it’s kind of like talking to me about us landing on the moon,” Dove said of the younger kids’ understanding of the team’s significance. “It’s something we know happened, but as far as first hand knowledge and it hitting and becoming a realistic fact isn’t as well known as it was to kids back in the ‘80s right after it happened. Time kind of destroys some of those memories and we’re doing things to try to keep it alive.”

Though some people and locations have been lost to time, the town still revels with pride for its Blue Demons. A welcome sign on Highway 52 greets guests to the small town with a brief history lesson of their basketball success. The sign reads: “Welcome to Northfork, Basketball Capital of the United States, State AA Champions 71, 74, 75, 76, 77, 78, 79, 80, 81, 84, State AA Girls Champions 76, 77, 79.” In the top right corner of the sign sits a bright orange basketball that reads: “Record 8 Straight. National Record.”

In June 2018, Mount View High School, the school that took in the Blue Demon family in 1985, honored the team with a celebration known as Blue Demon Night. During the night, the school unveiled the West Virginia Sportswriter’s Hall of Fame plaque honoring Boyd, which would now be housed at the school following years in the Charleston Civic Center Coliseum. Many former players, coaches and even teams from the Blue Devils’ historic run have also been recognized by McDowell County over the years with inductions into the county’s sports hall of fame.

Last year, the city approved the renaming of a bridge off of Highway 52 that crosses over Elkhorn Creek to “Blue Demons Bridge”, a fitting name as it leads to a local park with a basketball hoop. Today, many of the team’s trophies and several other artifacts from its historic run are housed in the Northfork Town Hall and at Mount View High School for generations to see and reflect on the town’s memorable basketball lineage.

A group of Blue Demons faithful have created a Facebook page to reflect on the team’s long history. The group, which had 336 members (or more than the projected population of the town) as of April, share their stories of the memories the Blue Demons have given them. Many share anything they can find or think about of the former team, from pep rallies to cheerleaders, celebrations to trophies.

The most active among this group of diehards is Jon Casey, a former newspaper writer who has been gathering information on the team for a book. Casey runs the page and floods it with information almost as quickly as he receives it. Team photos, in-game pictures, updates to the welcome sign, interesting artifacts, all get thrown onto the page thanks to Casey. Casey also has a deeper connection to the team as well, as he married Boyd’s niece, and wanted to keep the memory of the team and their coach alive. With his dedication, Casey has been able to help people relive some of the school’s most prominent and historic moments while also showing newer generations what the once proud high school once held.

Even as some of the team’s history has faded a bit, people still look back happily at the
Northfork heyday.

“It certainly has not gone by the wayside. Folks still remember and remember fondly those years,” Dove said.

Although restrictions due to COVID-19 have slowed the demolition of the building, Sizemore said it will be completed by year’s end and she wants it to be completed by the end of the summer. As an alum, she understands what the loss will mean to the community, but urges people to remember the spirit of the Blue Demons is still alive and well.

“The legacy is still there,” Sizemore said. “Different graduating years still hold reunions to bring people back and celebrate their heritage within the school. It’s still there even though the building won’t be and has not been usable in years and that will continue. Once a Blue Demon, always a Blue Demon. That, I think, will carry on until there is no Blue Demon graduate alive.”

As an alum herself, Patty has received many invitations to see the building torn down, but she has turned down each offer. She can’t see a school where she grew from a young first grader to a high school senior and where she once had so many life events happen be taken away.

“I had a good time in that school and I loved it,” Patty said.

It has been decades since the county has seen another basketball state championship. The last team to do so came in 1984, when the Blue Demons won the last of their 10 titles. As physical pieces of the past continue to deteriorate and be demolished, the memories of the team are still clear to all the citizens that got to enjoy the Blue Demons wild and famous ride. The once flourishing “Basketball Capital of the United States” may be craving a return to the top, but it will never forget what the Blue Demons basketball team once brought to the city.

Just seconds after winning his final game in the 1981 championship when asked if he was going to miss coaching, Boyd told PM Magazine, “I already miss it. … The last 25 years of my life I wouldn’t trade for anything in the world.”

The City of Northfork misses it too, and wouldn’t trade those years for anything in the world either.