Hawks Nest, West Virginia

English writer Harriet Martineau, who passed through the area in the 1830s, found the view at Hawk's Nest nearly as moving as Niagara Falls.

The Chesapeake and Ohio Railway was completed through the area on January 29, 1873, and a ceremony was held at Hawk's Nest Station.

As a result, thousands of workers, mostly poor and African American, died from silicosis, sometimes as quickly as within a single year.

In addition to the real-life tragedy of the Hawk's Nest Incident, an overlook in the state park called Lovers' Leap is the location of legendary stories of romantically inspired suicides by young lovers who cannot be together due to family and cultural obstacles.

Hawks Nest State Park offers a nature museum, a nine-hole golf course, a 31-room lodge, jetboat rides and hiking.