The founders of 1863nft.

Michael “Moose” Malfregeot, Clarksburg, WV.
Jeff Noah, Morgantown, WV.
Rob Raffety, Arlington, VA by way of Buckhannon, WV.
Jason “Stew” Wilhelm, Long Bottom, OH by way of Clarksburg, WV.

Moose, Noah, Raff, and Stew met as undergrads and Theta Xi Fraternity Brothers in the mid-to-late '90s at West Virginia Wesleyan College. Some twenty-five plus years removed from their reckless youth - after decades apart and in some cases relatively sporadic contact - this middle-aged crew reunited virtually in 2020 in the most unlikely of ways - around a shared fascination with the emerging technology class broadly known as web3.

While none of these four old friends works in the tech sector, they each found their imaginations consumed by the boundless potential of the blockchain. Periodic group texts led to more frequent phone calls and recurring check-ins. Friends who had drifted apart over the years suddenly found themselves in communication multiple times a day. Life can be funny like that sometimes.

NFTs.

It all started innocently enough last May when Raff minted several core VeeFriends. Drawn like a moth to the flame of Gary Vaynerchuk's thermonuclear charisma, Raff genuinely didn't realize what he was getting himself into at the time. But in the weeks and months following his VeeFriends purchase, he just wouldn't shut up about this strange new thing called "NFTs."

Fast forward a couple months, and by mid-to-late summer all the Buy Guys were dabbling heavily in the space. From VeeFriends, BirdGirl, Crypto Baristas, and the Candy Digital Stadium Series, to Mauer, EspoVisuals, House of First, and National Parks (and everything in between) - ALL of the Buy Guys simply can't get enough NFTs!

And then - seemingly out of nowhere - individually and collectively - it hit them all all at once - a gnawing thought they couldn't suppress - a burning inquiry that demanded an answer - three short and simple words - a question so dangerous and alluring when contemplated by any human that so few ever take time to ponder it…

Almost Heaven.

Anyone who's ever spent time in the West Virginia knows there's something very special about the Mountain State. Given that the four founders met in West Virginia and all of them have strong ties to the state (Moose and Jeff still live there), and in light of the opportunity to introduce this technology to so many Appalachians for such immense benefit, the choice was obvious - the Buy Guys needed to create a project to honor the greatest state in the Union - West "By God" Virginia!

And from there - honestly? - the project practically wrote itself! Well, not really, but it was super fun to contemplate. Over weeks and months of slow and steady progress - day by day, step by step, brick by brick - what started as a “little idea” began to evolve and take shape.

As for 1863 - that's the year of West Virginia's birth as a state. Our inaugural mint of 304 tokens pays homage to the dominant area code - a small but nevertheless ambitious mint for first-timers.

As for the artwork - West Virginia is home to countless world-class artists and artisans of all kinds. It was just a matter of finding them and recruiting the best partners for mutual benefit. It didn’t take long to to sign up five extraordinarily talented West Virginia-based artists to work with, and from there things really started to take off!