Banská Bystrica (above), Charleston (below) (source: Wikimedia/Flickr)
Appalachia, central Slovakia. Kanawha River, Hron River. Both medium-sized cities in heavily forested regions of their respective countries – Charleston, West Virginia, and Slovakia’s Banská Bystrica – make for unlikely family members.
Separated by the Atlantic Ocean and approximately 7,500 kilometres, the two cities are not the first places that spring to mind when thinking of cousins. Yet the ties go back to the very formation of the newly independent Slovakia.
Appalachian hospitality and a Slovak welcome
According to WV MetroNews, the relationship between Charleston and Banská Bystrica began to take shape when Charleston residents Christine and Chuck Daugherty travelled to Slovakia in the 1990s as part of a United States Agency for International Development (USAID) project.
“During the three-year trip, the Daughertys worked with the people there, helping them in many ways following the dissolution of Czechoslovakia in 1992 – mainly in forming civil society and democracy in the wake of the collapse of socialism,” the report stated.
In recent weeks, there have been multiple exchanges of people and ideas between the two cities.
The Kanawha County Public Library launched a month-long exhibition on Charleston’s sister city. The exhibit included an interactive map of Slovakia, as well as several books related to the central European nation.
