Loafer's Joy

In the West Virginia Archives of History Mrs. Will Gore, daughter of Rev. William Holroyd, wrote “Captain Holroyd had built a store and was selling a great amount of goods. He saw the need of a building to accommodate the people who came to Concord [later Athens] to attend court and other business matters so he built a large frame building, it was called Mountain House.”

She also wrote, “the students [of the Concord State Normal School] came in by numbers…so Dr. Vermillion and Mr. Fanning built cottages for the accommodation of the students and Loafers Joy was added to the Mountain House.”

Loafer’s Joy was a small, rough wood frame building between the Mountain House and Rev. Holroyd’s house where students could congregate, maybe get food or a snack, study, socialize and generally just “loaf.”  A great place for students to relax. 

In the late 1920s it was torn down and the Athens Drug Company building was built in that space which later became Bradley’s Inc.  Bradley's Inc. in described in his chapter in the Grocery and Sundries section.