The West Virginia Enterprise was founded by Christopher Payne and J.B. Cabell, circa 1885.
[3] Similar to the earliest-known black newspaper in West Virginia, the Pioneer Press, the paper focused on feature stories, including one issue about asylums for the insane.
[4] Payne was a community leader for African Americans in West Virginia, and he took advertising space for an exhibit at that year's state fair.
[4] Fees for subscribers were $1 per year (or $0.76 per half-year), and its advertisers included pseudoscientific medical products for healing and curing ailments.
[8] A similar description was written by historian Wilhelmena S. Robinson in a 1969 encyclopedia,[9] and in a 1972 newspaper article.