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Timed to coincide with the 150th anniversary of the Civil War, the Appalachian Regional Commission has released a new travel guide. United States heritage tourism is growing in popularity, and states are looking to cash in on this growing trend by offering guides that take tourists beyond the well-trod battlefields like Gettysburg, Pennsylvania, and Antietam, Maryland.

There are a lot of hidden gems in Appalachia in terms of stories about families and communities that can be of interest to heritage tourists. The travel guide put together by the Appalachia Regional Commission brings together 150 of these lesser-known Civil War destinations on a 13-state map, which was released at Independence Hall in Wheeling, Virginia. This is the spot where Virginians gathered when the war erupted in 1861 to hold their own constitutional convention and form the breakaway state of West Virginia two years later.