バーバー郡となった地域最初の白人開拓地は1780年に、リチャード・タルボットとその兄弟のコッテラルおよび姉妹のチャリティが、後にフィラピーの町となった場所から3マイル (5 km) 下流に設立したものである[4]。当時この地域はバージニア州モノンガリア郡に属していた。この地域にはインディアンによる恒久的な定住地が無かったので、インディアンとの抗争も比較的少なかった。それでもタルボット一家は何度かその家産から立ち去る必要性に迫られ、2回はアリゲイニー山地より東に戻る必要があったが、その度に戻ってきた。この一家でインディアンの攻撃によって殺された者は出なかった[5]。
^The Talbotts settled on Hacker's Creek. Maxwell, Hu (1899), The History of Barbour County, From its Earliest Exploration and Settlement to the Present Time, The Acme Publishing Company, Morgantown, West Virginia. (Reprinted, McClain Printing Company, Parsons, West Virginia, 1968.), pg 473.
Barbour County West Virginia...Another Look (1979), Compiled by The Barbour County Historical Society, Taylor Publishing Company, Dallas, Texas and Paoli, Pennsylvania.
Coonts, Violet Gadd (2nd ed, May 1991), The Western Waters: Early Settlers of Eastern Barbour County, West Virginia, Assisted by Gilbert Gray Coonts and Harold Cart Gadd, Published by Stephen P. Coonts, Denver, Colorado.
Coffman, Mary Stemple and Ethel Park Stemple (1978), Footsteps of Our Fathers: Early Settlers of Tacy (Barbour County) W. Va.; Baltimore.
Mattaliano, Jane K. and Lois G. Omonde (1994), Milestones: A Pictorial History of Philippi, West Virginia, 1844-1994, Virginia Beach, Virginia: The Donning Company Publishers.
Myers, Karl or Elmer (ca. 1935), One-Room Schoolhouses, 1 min. home movie of one-room Barbour County schoolhouses; West Virginia State Archives (Available on DVD set Treasures from American Film Archives: 50 Preserved Films, 2000).
Shaffer, John W. (2003), Clash of Loyalties: A Border County in the Civil War, Morgantown, West Virginia: West Virginia University Press.
Smith, Barbara and Carl Briggs (2000), Barbour County (Series: Images of America), Arcadia Publishing, Charleston, South Carolina.
Zinn, W.D. (1931), The Story of Woodbine Farm, Buckhannon, West Virginia: Kent Reger, Job Printer. (A detailed account of life and work on a Barbour County [Shooks Run] farm in the late-19th/early-20th centuries.)