While a quick online search will give you some results for the Charleston Gazette-Mail, you may be surprised to find out that there is no newspaper in West Virginia by that exact name. Instead, on weekdays you can find two daily papers at the newsstands: The Charleston Gazette and The Charleston Daily Mail. So how did these rival papers come together to sponsor a local spelling bee?
According to Tina Taylor, spelling bee coordinator, it all started much earlier when the two papers combined in a joint operating agreement to begin publishing weekend editions known as the Saturday Gazette-Mail and the Sunday Gazette-Mail.
"Since coverage of the spelling bee runs in the weekend papers, it made sense for our champion to represent The Charleston Gazette-Mail," Taylor said. "While this is not the actual name of our weekend papers, it seemed the best alternative for identifying our champion."
And so it is that the champion from this 22-county region in the southern half of West Virginia represents The Charleston Gazette-Mail - a newspaper that doesn't technically exist.
Along with its unique name, The Charleston Gazette-Mail Regional Spelling Bee is quite the event.
The bee is televised every year by a local station, which increases the pressure but also prepares the students for the bright lights of Washington, D.C.
When competitors and their families arrive, they are greeted with decorative nametags, specially designed t-shirts, souvenir copies of that day's newspaper with their pictures, and certificates. There are also printed programs and local sponsors with giveaways, including one college savings initiative that gives the champion $2,500 in college savings.
"We believe that the bee is a great sponsorship fit for a newspaper," Taylor said. "Good spellers invariably are good readers, and good readers like newspapers."