He took 64% of the primary vote statewide but just 9% here in coal-rich Buchanan County, for instance, and 12% in neighboring Dickenson County. Though he is now the Democratic nominee, many voters are cool to him -- even some of the party's own leaders and precinct captains.
"I haven't found in my precinct one out of five that will vote for Obama," said Tommy Street, the party's vice chairman in Buchanan (pronounced buck-AN-in) County.
Street, 78, counts himself among the doubters, citing Obama's alliance with Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.). He has always voted Democratic, he said, but this year plans to leave the presidential ballot blank.
Some here blame Obama's troubles on his mixed-race background (his mother was a white Kansan, his father a black Kenyan). Others say his journey from Hawaii and Indonesia to Harvard and big-city Chicago politics makes him an oddity.
The challenge facing Obama was on display at a recent Democratic Party dinner at Twin Valley High School in Buchanan County, deep in the mountains, about a two-hour drive from Bristol, the nearest city.
Looking out at about 70 local Democrats as they ate turkey, ham and mashed potatoes from school cafeteria trays, Phil Puckett, a local state senator who backed Clinton in the primary, said he knew that nearly everyone present had voted for Clinton and that many were not necessarily excited about Obama. But he pleaded with them not to believe everything they were hearing about the Illinois senator, and to seize the chance to boot the GOP from the White House.
"Don't miss this opportunity because someone says to you, 'I'm not voting for him because he's Muslim,' " said Puckett. "If there's a word of truth in my body, this guy is a Christian who believes in Jesus Christ."
Ben and Beth Bailey sat in the back and clapped politely, but they remained unpersuaded. They said they were likely to break from their tradition of voting Democratic and might well not vote at all.
Obama "just doesn't seem like he's from America," said Beth Bailey, 25. Ben Bailey, 32, noted that Obama's middle name is Hussein, "and we know what that means."
Beth's father, Josh Viers, is the party's Whitewood precinct chairman, responsible for working the polls and urging Democrats to vote the party line. He came around to backing Obama only recently, and reluctantly.
"Am I racial? Am I prejudiced? No, I'm not," said Viers. Still, he is frustrated that his job is to persuade other Democrats to back a black man.
