History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 2, Part 194

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WILLIAM PRESTON TAULBEE VARNEY, vice president and cashier of the Day and Night Bank of Williamson, Mingo County, has been closely associated also with important commercial and industrial enterprises in this section of West Virginia. He was one of the promoters and organizers of the Pond Creek By-products Coal Company, is secretary and treasurer of the Leckieville Land Company, and ie presi- dent of the Ira Coal Company and the Tug Valley Fuel Company. In his home city he is a loyal member of the Kiwanis Club, his political allegiance is given to the demo- cratic party, he and his wife hold membership in the Bap- tist Church and he is affiliated with O'Brien Lodge No. 101, Free and Accepted Masons, as well with other York Rite bodies and with Lodge of Perfection No. 4, Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite, at Huntington, and with the Tem- ple of the Mystic Shrine in the City of Charleston. Mr.

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rney gave active service in local patriotic work in the rld war period, especially in furthering the campaigns support of the Government war loans, the service of the 1 Cross, etc.

Mr. Varney was born on a farm in Pike County, Ken- ky, October 28, 1886, and is a son of Asa Harmon Var- and Nancy (West) Varney, both likewise nativea of xe County, the West family, early founded in Virginia, ving numbered representatives among the first to settle Pike County, Kentucky. Asa H. Varney was actively gaged in farming and school teaching for the long period forty-four years, made a splendid record in the pedagogic ofession and was honored by being presented by Ken- cky a life certifieate that entitled him to teach in any unty of the state which he might choose. In all of his ars of teaching he never failed to attend the annual achers' institutes until the final one before his death, en ill health eaused his absence. The Varney family was unded in Virginia in the Colonial period of our national story. Of the children of Asa H. and Nancy Varney four ns and four daughters are living. W. P. Taulbee Varney rly began to assist in the activities of the home farm, id he continued to attend the district schools of his native unty until he was seventeen years old. Thereafter he issed a year in the graded schools at Pikeville, the county at, and three years as a student in Pikeville College. In le meantime he taught about five months of each of three ammers in the rural schools, and in January, 1907, he ame to Williamson, West Virginia, and took a position in ne weighmaster's office of the Norfolk and Western Rail- bad. In the depression in the railroad business that came h the following year he lost his position, and he thereupon eturned with his family to Pike County and resumed his ervice as a school teacher. Somewhat more than a year ater he returned to his former railroad position at Will- amson, was transferred to Portsmouth, Ohio, in 1910, and a 1912 was appointed weighmaster of the Norfolk & West- rn at Williamson. At the expiration of one year Mr. Var- ley resigned this office to take the position of bookkeeper in he National Bank of Commerce, in which he was eventu- illy advanced to the position of cashier and with which Ire continued his connection until the spring of 1919, when he became associated with other citizens of the county in or- ganizing the Day and Night Bank, of which he was made cashier and, in the latter part of the same year, the viee president also. He has since retained these executive offieés and has been the foremost factor in developing the substan- tial business of the representative financial institution. He is one of the loyal aad progressive citizens of Mingo County, and has a secure place in popular confidence and good will.

On June 7, 1907, Mr. Varney wedded Miss Emma Pinson, who likewise was born and reared in Pike County, Ken- tucky, where the marriage was solemnized. The Pinson family is one of long American lineage and one of its rep- resentatives, Alonzo C., is now sheriff of Mingo County. Mr. and Mrs. Varney have three children: Golfrey Wendell, born August 25, 1908; Frances Helen, born June 7, 1912; and Anna Margaret, born September 26, 1919.

DAY AND NIGHT BANK, of Williamson, is one of the newer financial organizations of that city, and was insti- tuted not only to furnish general banking facilities, but also to give a service through hours not included in ordinary banking schedules.

The bank, located in the Goodman Building on Logan Street, was organized in March, 1919, and opened its doors May Ist of that year. Mr. Hurst, Mr. Greene and Mr. Var- ney were primarily responsible for the organization. The first officers and directors were W. A. Hurst, president, J. H. Greene, vice president, J. M. Smith, vice president, W. P. T. Varney, cashier, and H. F. Carper. Through the acei- dental death of Mr. Hurst a change in the personnel was instituted, and the present officers and directors are J. H. Greene, president; J. M. Smith, vice president; W. P. T. Varney, eashier and vice president; Dr. G. T. Conley and A. B. Scott.

CURTIS EARL PRUNTY. The business of real estate in a broad sense should also involve real estate improvement and development, and it has been in this natural combina- tion of related lines that Mr. Prunty has beeome an im- portant factor in the business affairs of Clarksburg during the past two deeadcs.

Mr. Prunty was horn on his father's farm in Doddridge County, West Virginia, February 22, 1878, son of Hughic Benton and Martha Ann (Cross) Prunty, the former a nativo of Harrison County and the latter of Ritchie County. His parents spent their married life on a farm in Doddridge County, where the father died in 1906 at the age of fifty- nine, while the mother passed away in 1889. Their children consisted of three sons and four daughters.

Curtis E. Prunty had as youth on the farm, acquired his education in the country schools. Ilia last experience after farming was as a wage worker for James Maxwell, a Doddridge County farmer. The wages were too small to give promise of any future, and at the age of nineteen he left the farm to become an employe of the Eureka Pipe Line Company. lle was with that company one year and in 1899 removed to Salem, West Virginia, where he soon after took up building construction work. With aceumulat- ing capital, credit and experience, he invested in real estate in Salem, but his ambitions soon led him to a larger field for his promising business and in 1900 he located at Clarks- burg. Since then he has handled real estate and building construction, and has been instrumental in developing some of Clarksburg's most attractive sub-divisions and vacant property. He organized in 1909 the Prunty Real Estate Company of which be is president. This company laid out and marketed a sub-division known as the White and Stone- wall Park additions. The Prunty building in Clarksburg was erected in 1914, as a modern office building, and Mr. Prunty now has under way a supplementary building, front- ing on Third Street and connecting on the rear with the present Prunty building. This new structure is planned ultimately to rise eleven stories.

Mr. Prunty has never married. He is president of the Bland Realty Company, a dircetor in the Percy Oil Com- pany, and the Clarksburg Trust Company of which he was an active organizer. He is a republican and a member of The Old Colony Club of New York.

DAVID MOSSER GOOD haa achieved reputation and sue- cess in his professional work as a eivil and mining en- gincer, and as a consulting engineer he has developed a substantial and representative business, with headquarters at the Hill Reservation, Williamson, Mingo County.

Mr. Good was born at Ragersville, Tusearawas County, Ohio, July 27, 1871, a son of David Mosser Good, Sr., and Elizabeth Ann (Shunk) Good, hoth of whom were natives of Pennsylvania and representatives of families early founded in that state. The father was born Decem- ber 12, 1812, and died at the age of seventy-three years. The mother was born in May, 1833, and passed to the life eternal in 1900. They became the parents of three sons and two daughters. David M. Good, Sr., followed the tanner's trade in his early manhood, and later became a hotel kecper, besides building up a substantial general merchandise business. He hecame one of the honored and influential citizens of Tusearawas County, Ohio, and there both he and his wife died.

He whose name initiates this review attended the pub- lic schools of his native place until he was sixteen years of age, and in the meanwhile he had found employment at farm work, besides working at intervals in the livery and feed stable conducted in connection with his father's hotel. He was finally placed in charge of the livery barn, and thus continued until he was nineteen years old, when he took the position of masonry inspector in the office of the chief engineer of the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad at Cineinnati, Ohio. A few months later he bceame rodman in connection with civil engineering service with this rail- road, and in the ensning two years was located in turn at Alderson, West Virginia, Richmond, Virginia, and Thur- mond, West Virginia. By study and practical work he had

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in this period gained valuable experience in civil engineer- ing work, and in 1893 he entered the employ of L. W. Atkinson, a mining engineer at Thurmond, in the capacity of transit man. In June of the following year he became engineer for the Quinnimont Coal Company at Quinnimont, West Virginia, where the company was operating two coal mines. In the spring of the following year Mr. Good became associated with J. M. Clark, a contracting engineer at Kanawha Falls, this state, but in the fall of the same year he again took the position of engineer of the Quinni- mont Coal Company. In 1898 he became mechanical drafts- man for the Covington Machine Company at Covington, Virginia, and while thue engaged he took a course in mechanical engineering through the medium of the Inter- national Correspondence School of Scranton, Pennsylvania. In 1900 Mr. Good once more became engineer of the Quinnimont Coal Company, and was also made its assistant superintendent. In 1902 he joined the War Eagle Coal Company, for which he had supervision of the entire work- ing plant for its four mines, and with which he continued as engineer for a period of eleven years. On the 28th of August, 1912, he established himself in independent busi- ness as a civil, mining and mechanical contract engineer, with residence and professional headquarters at William- son, and he is now mining and consulting engineer for the Williamson Fuel Company, the War Eagle Coal Company, the Stone Mountain Coal Corporation, at Matewan; the White Star Mining Company, at Merrimac; the Sullivan Pond Creek Company, offices at Tralee; Triangle Coal Company, at Pinson, Kentucky; Sudduth Fuel Company, Bailey Fuel Company, Black Gem Coal Company and Carry-On Coal Company, ali at Toler, Kentucky; Grey Eagle Coal Company, Grey Eagle, West Virginia; Webb By-Products Coal Company, at Webb, this state; Inspira- tion Coal Company, at Krum; Katona Coal Company, at Wayne; West Williamson Coal Company, at Williamson; Standard Thacker Coal Company, at Chattaroy; Burning Creek Coal Company, at Kermit.

Mr. Good is president of the Good Construction Com- pany, which has been recently organized. His professional ability has further been demonstrated in his building of the suspension bridge at Matewan and the free public bridge across the Tug River at Williamson. In nearly all of the important mining companies with which he is associated, as noted above, Mr. Good has installed the operating plants, and he is financially interested in several of these corporations. During the World war period he gave effective service in promoting the various patriotic agencies in his home district and volunteered his services to the Government, the authorities deciding that his work could be of greater value in connection with fuel produc- tion than in military service, so that he continued his zealous activities in advancing coal production through the medium of the various companies with which he was con- nected at the time. He has the distinction of having been elected to full membership in the American Institute of Mining and Metallurgical Engineers. He is a republican in political allegiance, and he and his wife are active members of the First Presbyterian Church of Williamson, in which he is serving as an elder.

March 24, 1889, recorded the marriage of Mr. Good and Miss Mary A., daughter of Frederick F. and Eliza- beth Snellenberger, the former a native of Ohio and the latter of Pennsylvania. Mrs. Good was born in Ohio, August 12, 1872. The names and respective birth dates of the children of Mr. and Mrs. Good are here recorded: Ethel Blanche, January 13, 1890; Vida Fern, May 15, 1892; William Earle, May 21, 1898; Orpha Elizabeth, February 15, 1903; and Margaret Alice, March 20, 1910. The only son, William E., was a student in the Virginia Polytechnical Institute at the time when the nation became involved in the World war, and he there remained in study- ing for a commission after he had enlisted in the Marine Corps. Miss Ethel B. Good served as secretary of the local chapter of the Red Cross during the war period, and she still retains this position.

RUSSELL A. SALTON, M. D., who is engaged in the gen eral practice of his profession at Williamson, Mingo County has demonstrated in ability and effective service the con sistency of his choice of profession. The doctor was born at Walton, New York, August 12, 1887, a son of Robert E. and Margaret (Henderson) Salton, the former of whom was born in the State of New York and the latter in North Carolina. Robert E. Salton gained much of success in the raising of and dealing in live stock, especially horses, and became a leading representative of these lines of enterprise in his section of the old Empire State. He served a num- ber of years ae county superintendent of roads.

The public schools of his native place afforded to Dr. Salton his preliminary education, and after his graduation from high school in 1905 he was for one year a student ir the University of Syracuse, New York. During the ensu- ing year he was employed, and he then began preparing himself for his chosen profession. In 1911 he was gradu- ated from the Baltimore Medical College, Baltimore, Mary- land, and after thue receiving his degree of Doctor of Medi- cine he became house surgeon in the West Virginia State Hospital at Welch, McDowell County, this being Miners Hospital No. 1. After an effective service of eighteen months at this institution Dr. Salton established his resi- dence at Williamson, judicial center of Mingo County, and here he has developed a successful and representative gen- eral practice, the while he has gained specially high repu- tation as a skilled surgeon. His private practice was inter- rupted when in June, 1917, shortly after the nation became involved in the World war, he became a member of the Medical Reserve Corps of the United States Army. On the 4th of January, 1918, Dr. Salton was called into active serv- ice and assigned to duty at the base hospital at Camp Stu- art, Newport News, Virginia, where he remained, with the rank of first lieutenant, until the 18th of the following Oc- tober, when he was assigned to duty with the Forty-eighth Infantry, Twentieth Division, at Camp Sevier, Greenville, South Carolina. His command had orders to sail for France, but the outbreak of the great epidemic of influ- enza caused the entire command to be quarantined, and be- fore this quarantine was lifted the armistice was signed and the war came to a close. Dr. Salton remained at Camp Sevier until January 23, 1919, when he received his hon- orable discharge. He was commissioned captain in the Med- ical Reserve Corps, and is still an active member of this or- ganization.

Soon after his return to Williamson Dr. Salton initiated the vigorous and well ordered campaign that resulted in the establishing of the Williamson Hospital, and though he encountered many obstacles and difficulties he has the satisfaction of knowing that the county seat of Mingo County can now claim one of the best equipped and most effectively conducted hospitals in this section of the state, an institution whose benignant service stands to his en- during credit and honor. In the conducting of the hospi- tal he has as his able and valued coadjutor Doctor Hatfield, who is engaged in practice in the City of Huntington. Doc- tor Salton is a member of the Mingo County Medical Soci- ety, West Virginia State Medical Society and the American Medical Association. He is affiliated with the American Legion, is a Knight Templar Mason and affiliated also with the Mystic Shrine, and he holds membership in the Presbyterian Church in his home city. The doctor is a wide-awake and progressive citizen, and is essentially one of the leading physicians and surgeons of Mingo County. On both the paternal and maternal sides the ancestry of Doc- tor Salton traces back to staunch Scotch origin. His pa- ternal great-grandfather came from Scotland in 1837, with wife and seven children, and established his residence in the State of New York. On the maternal side the doctor is a scion of the Henderson and McDonald families, which were early established in North Carolina.

In his native town of Walton, New York, in the year 1912, Doctor Salton wedded Miss Ella Robertson, daugh- ter of Alfred and Mary (King) Robertson, both natives of the State of New York, whence they eventually removed to California, where Mr. Robertson engaged in ranch en-

James leflynn

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ise. Doctor and Mrs. Saltou became the parents of da children : Virginia, Robert (deceased), and Russell Jr.

ELAND JAMES has been a resident of West Virginia boyhood, is now a leading exponent of the real estate gness at Williamson, Mingo County, and is a former uber of the State Legislature.

[r. James was born in Martin County Kentucky, on the of September, 1887, and is a son of David and Mary (Hall) James, both likewise natives of the old Blue ss State. David James was engaged in the real estate ness in Martin County, Kentucky, a number of years, in 1898 he turned his attention to the timber business, 1 logging operations in the vicinity of Dingess, Mingo nty, West Virginia. After four years of activity in this of enterprise he removed to Williamson, where he en- ed in the real estate business, in connection with which platted and placed on the market an attractive sub- sion to the city. He continued his active association a the real estate business and did much important de- opment work until 1920, when he retired. He and his e are still residents of Williamson, and both are members the Baptist Church.

n 1904 Ireland James graduated from the Williamson Ich School, and after being associated with his father's il estate operations for a time he served four years as w dispatcher for the Norfolk & Western Railroad. For ensuing four years he was a locomotive fireman for this , and he then resumed his active alliance with his her's real estate business, with which he had continued tbe connected during the period of his railroad service. le father and son conducted also a grocery business, but s they sold in 1920, when the father retired from active siness. Since that year Ireland James has successfully tinued the substantial real estate business in an indi- ual way, and he is one of the leading representatives of s important line of enterprise in Mingo County. He is liated with both the York and Scottish Rite bodies of the isonic fraternity, and also with the Mystic Shrine. He d his wife hold membership in the Baptist Church, and is a republican in political allegiance. Mr. James has en active in the local councils of the republican party, d served one term as representative of Mingo County in 3 State Legislature, to which he was elected in 1915.

At Louisa, Kentucky, in 1914, Mr. James wedded Miss ice Vinson, a daughter of Lazerus and Vicann (Wiley) nson, both natives of that state. Mr. and Mrs. James ve no children. The James family, of English origin, was rly represented in Virginia and Kentucky, and on the iteraal side Mr. James is of Irish lineage.

JAMES W. PETERS has been one of the progressive and ccessful exponents of the real estate business at William- n, judicial center of Mingo County, and has contributed finitely to the material and civic upbuilding of the city id county.

Mr. Peters was born at Parisburg, Giles County, Virginia, pril 7, 1864, a son of John D. and Mollie (Sublett) Peters, th likewise natives of the Old Dominion State, where the spective families were founded in an early day. John . Peters was a gallant soldier of the Confederacy in the ivil war, doing scout duty. During the entire period of le war he was in a Virginia regiment under the command : General Lee. He was a shoemaker by trade, was in- nential in public affairs of local order, served as mayor of adford, as justice of the peace for many years and also 3 assessor of Giles County, Virginia. As a young man he iught successfully in the schools of his native state, and here he and his wife continued to reside until their deaths. James W. Peters attended the schools of his native town atil he was fourteen years old, when, owing to the ill health f his father, who also had given earnest service as a local reacher of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, he be- ame the main support of the family and assumed active harge of the home farm. The ambitious youth applied imself diligently to getting out timber and firewood on the

home place, hunting game, and otherwise worked vigorously to support the family and also to gain advancement. He gained excellent reputation as a woodsman and guide, and this led to his being employed as guide and pilot in con- nection with the first or reconnoisant survey for the con- struction of the line of the Norfolk & Western Railroad from Virginia through to the Ohio River, he having been but sixteen years old at the time. le aided also in the final location of the line and also as guide to the English engineer who represented the English capitalists who were interested in the promotion and construction of the new railroad. To Mr. Peters is thus due much credit for the work he did in connection with the defining of the line of this railroad through Virginia and West Virginia. As an expert rifle shot he was retained as guard in charge of convicts who were employed on the construction work, and after the road was completed he acted as mail carrier at the general offices of the company at Parisburg, Virginia. Finally he learned telegraphy, and thereafter he served as operator and station agent for the Norfolk & Western Rail- road at Bramwell, Elkhorn and Richland, West Virginia. In 1892 Mr. Peters left the employ of the railroad and en- gaged in the hotel and mercantile business at Gray, West Virginia. Seven years later he sold his business at that place and purchased the hotel known as the Esther Arms at Williamson. After successfully conducting this hotel five years he sold the property and turned his attention ex- clusively to the real estate business, in which he had become interested at the time when he established his regi- dence at Williamson. He has since continued a leading representative of this line of enterprise in this city, and his operations, always fair and constructive, have done much to further the progress of the city and county. When Mr. Peters began work for the railroad he received $16 a month and board, and considered his compensation adequate. Later the railroad company paid him a salary of $200 a month. He has advanced to substantial prosperity, and that entirely through his own ability and efforts. He owns and occupies one of the finest residences at Williamson, is the owner of coal property of valuable order, and is spe- cially interested in the promoting of coal properties, the while he still retains his fondness for hunting and general outdoor recreation. He and wife are democrats in politics and are members of churches. In 1888, in Washington County, Virginia, Mr. Peters married Miss Lettie Thomas, daughter of the late John L. Thomas, who was born in Vir- ginia, as was also his wife, her family name having been Winn. Mr. Thomas was one of the prosperous farmers of Washington County. He served under General Lee in the Civil war, was captured at the battle of Gettysburg, and thereafter was held a Union prisoner until the close of the war. Mr. and Mrs. Peters have three children: Ethel is the wife of S. D. Stokes, of Williamson, who is (1922) prose- cuting attorney of Mingo County; Gladys is the wife of Richard Dreschler, superintendent of the foreign-exchange department of the Buffalo Trust Bank, Buffalo, New York; and Clarence E., the only son, remains at the parental home and is associated with his father in the real estate business.

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History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 2, Part 194

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