History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 3, Part 112

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Mr. Ware cast his first presidential vote for Major Mc Kinley, and for many years has helped hold the republican party organization together in Barbour County. He ha! attended several state conventions. One of these was the exciting convention which divided into two factions, eacl nominating a candidate for governor. Both these candidate subsequently withdrew and Governor Glasscock was chosen as the harmony candidate and elected governor. In 1920 Mr. Ware took an active part in building up support in Bar bour County for the present Governor Morgan. He believed in Mr. Morgan's qualifications for governor, and he alsd felt an additional interest in him since they were classmates together in law school. Mr. Ware's service as mayor al Philippi was rendered in 1910 and 1911, two terms. During his term a large amount of street paving was done.

During the several years he was a resident of Belingtor he was secretary of the Board of Education. At Philippi his efforts in behalf of education have been directed chiefly through his membership in the Kiwanis Club. He intro- duced the resolution before that club to memorialize the Legislature to pass a law permitting the city to vote a bond issue of 5 cents on the dollar to build a high school and

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grammar school combined. He prepared the bill, secured its passage by the Legislature, and the city is now enjoying the conveniences of this splendid building. Mr. Ware is a prominent factor in the local Kiwanis Club, is vice president and chairman of its committee on public affairs, and was representative of the club at the International Convention at Cleveland in 1921. He is affiliated with Grafton Lodge of Elks, the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, the Wood- men of the World, and is deputy grand chancellor and has attended the last five sessions of the Grand Lodge of the Knights of Pythias. He is also a member of the Pythian Sisters and the Rebekahs, and is a member of the D. O. K. K., social order of the Knights of Pythias. Mr. Ware is a prominent layman of the United Brethren Church, and at- tended two of the national conferences, one at Wichita, Kansas, and the other, in 1921, at Indianapolis. His active church work has been primarily in the direction of arousing interest in the Sunday School, and he has spoken at a num- ber of local conventions of Sabbath School workers.

At Parsons, Virginia, in March, 1901, Mr. Ware married Miss Tillie Glenn. She was born near Terra Alta, March 7, 1880, daughter of Rev. C. E. Glenn, still living at Terra Alta. Her parents have two daughters and six sons. Her sister is Mrs. Forrest Trickett, of Elkins, West Virginia. Her brothers are: Asa, of Clarksburg, Victor, of Terra Alta, Walter, of Fairmont, Karl Glenn, of Grafton, Frey Glenn, of Calloway, Ohio, and Jesse Glenn, of Belington.

The oldest of the children of Mr. and Mrs. Ware is Paul Blackburn, who has completed his sophomore year at the University of West Virginia. James Ralph, the second son, is a junior in the Philippi High School. Evelyn Glenn s a sophomore in high school, Ruth Elizabeth is in the eighth grade, and David Ray, the youngest, is in the sixth grade of the local grammar school.

CHARLES B. WILLIAMS, M. D. The distinction of Doctor Williams has been his devotion for more than a quarter of a century to the practice of medicine in the community of Philippi. He began practice with a superior education and training, and has sought opportunities since then to keep in touch with men of prominence and the growing knowledge in the profession of medicine and surgery.

Doctor Williams was born at Grafton, Taylor County West Virginia, October 1, 1872. His father, George Williams, was a native of Maryland, and his father was a native of Wales. George Williams died at Grafton in 1874, while master mechanic in the Grafton Shops of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. He was twice married. By his first wife he lad two sons and three daughters. The daughters all died n childhood. The sons were: George, who died at Grafton, and Chester, who died at Pittsburgh, both leaving families. The second wife of George Williams was Christina See, a laughter of Charles See, a farmer in Randolph County, West Virginia, where Mrs. Williams was born. They were married in Taylor County, and Doctor Williams was their only child. The mother of Doctor Williams subsequently married Moses H. Crouch at Lee Bell, West Virginia, and icd at the home of her son in Philippi in 1916.

Doctor Williams was only two years of age when his father died. He attended his first school in Grafton, and vas a pupil of Miss Amanda Abbott, the venerable primary eacher of Taylor County, who is still active in the service of the schools at Grafton. When Doctor Williams was even years of age his mother removed to Lee Bell, Randolph 'ounty, and he lived there until he went away to college, ompleting his work in the public schools. Later he became student in the Augusta Military Academy at Fort Defi- ince, Virginia, and in June, 1895, graduated from the University of Virginia Medical School at Charlottesville. immediately after completing his medical course Doctor Williams located at Philippi, and with only brief interrup- ions has been steadily engaged in his private practice in hat city ever since. During 1911 he was absent for a time aking work in the New York Post-Graduate Medical School n New York City, and the following year he did post- graduate work in the University of Maryland at Baltimore. Outside his private practice he has served several terms as

county health officer and is now city health officer and county health officer. He is also Baltimore & Ohio Railway surgeon at Philippi, and is a member of the County, State and American Medical associations and of the Baltimore and Ohio Surgeons Association.

During 1918 Doctor Williams was commissioned as Cap- tain in the Medical Corps, and for six months was on duty at Camp Greenleaf, Georgia, until discharged there Decem- ber 24, 1918. He is a charter member of Barbour County Post No. 44 of the American Legion. Doctor Williams is a republican, and voted at all the national elections since casting his first vote for Major Mckinley. He took his Masonic degree in Bigelow Lodge No. 52, A. F. & A. M., at Philippi, has filled all the chairs in that lodge and been representative to the Grand Lodge, and is a member of Tygart Valley Chapter No. 39, R. A. M. He and Mrs. Williams are Presbyterians, and Mrs. Williams took a con- siderable part in the work of the local Red Cross Chapter during the war.

At Philippi June 30, 1898, Doctor Williams married Miss Annie Bosworth. Her father was the venerable Doctor J. W. Bosworth, who is still living at Philippi at the age of eighty- five, a pioneer physician of the city and also a former Con- federate soldier. Doctor Bosworth married Mattie Dold, of Waynesboro, Virginia, and Mrs. Williams is her only child. Mrs. Williams finished her education in the Mary Baldwin Seminary at Staunton, Virginia, and married soon after leaving that school. Doctor and Mrs. Williams have one son, George Woodbridge, who finished his preparatory education in Broaddus College at Philippi, and is now a student in the Augusta Military Academy at Fort Defiance, Virginia.

W. BRUCE TALBOTT had to pay his way while preparing himself for the bar, and that experience brought him to the practice with considerable more than the qualifications of the young law graduate, so that his subsequent advance- ment was rapid. Most of the time since his admission to the bar has been devoted to his duties as prosecuting at- torney of Barbour County.

Mr. Talbott was born in Pleasant District, Barbour County June 7, 1888. His people have lived in that sec- tion of the county for several generations, and farming has been their chief vocation. His grandparents were Silas and Sarah (Mckinney) Talbott. The father of the prosecuting attorney was the youngest of the twelve children of his parents and was born on a farm in Pleasant District in 1853. Farming has been the work of his life. He was educated in the country schools, and his success on the farm and elsewhere has shown him to be a man of good business judgment. He helped organize the Citizens National Bank of Philippi, and is a director of the People's Bank of that city. In politics he has been satisfied to cast his vote as a democrat, and is a member of the Mis- sionary Baptist Church, though his parents were old-school Baptists. Mr. Talbott married Edith Bartlett, daughter of Judson Bartlett. Their children are: Iva, wife of W. D. Corder, of Philippi; W. Bruce; Hazel, who died in infancy; Ruby, a teacher in Barbour County; E. Wayne, who grad- uated A. B. from the University of West Virginia and is now taking his law course there; and Ralph, a student in the Philippi High School.

Mr. Bruce Talbott had the old home farm as his environ- ment until he was about twenty years of age. He knows more about the practical side of farmiug than perhaps many other lawyers. The public schools near the old home gave him the foundation of his education, and subsequently he attended West Virginia Wesleyan College at Buckhan- non, where he graduated in 1908. He taught two terms of school before graduating and another term afterward, and then for three years worked as office man for the Con- solidation Coal Company. Through this employment he carned the money to complete his law course. Mr. Talbott graduated LL. B. from West Virginia University in 1915, was admitted to the bar at Philippi the same year, and began practice alone. He won his first case, though an unimportant one, in the Circuit Court, and he was soon

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in possession of a growing law practice. He had practiced about a year before he was elected to the important duties of prosecuting attorney.

His election to this office occurred in 1916. He had to contest his nomination in the primaries, but in 1920 he had no competition in the primaries. A distinction that is something out of the ordinary is the fact that Mr. Talbott is the first prosecuting attorney of Barbour County to be elected for two consecutive terms during the past thirty years. The basis of his hold upon the people at the time of his second candidacy was his strong enforcement of the law during his first term.

Mr. Talbott cast his first vote for president in 1912 for Mr. Taft, and was a delegate from Barbour County to the Judicial Convention at Huntington in 1916. He is a member of the College Fraternity Beta Theta Pi and in Masonry has taken both the York and Scottish Rite degrees and is a member of Osiris Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Wheeling. He is a member of the Baptist Church.

In Barbour County July 9, 1909, he married Miss Mabel Right, who was born at Belington, March 13, 1893, daugh- ter of James and Martha (Bennett) Right. She was one of ten children. Mr. and Mrs. Talbott have a family of four children, named Lucille, Rex, Robert and William.

H. FOSTER HARTMAN, a former sheriff of Preston County, has for many years been one of the keen and resourceful business men of that section of the state. He was a merchant before reaching his majority and is now pro- prietor of a prosperous lumber and planing mill business at Kingwood.

Mr. Hartman was born on a farm near Tunnelton in Preston County December 25, 1880. His grandfather, Henry Hartman, was a farmer at Craborchard in the same county, and was buried in that locality. He was twice married and had two sons and four daughters. George W. Hartman, father of the Kingwood business man, was born in the Whetsell settlement of Preston County, grew up on a farm and acquired a common school education, and was a Union soldier in the Civil war, being in Company F of the Sixth West Virginia Infantry. He saw some of the fighting within the borders of his native state, and at the end of the war he came out of the army, and thereafter his chief interests were centered on farming, though he also in- vested some of his capital in merchandising as a means of getting his sons in business. He was without ambi- tion for public office, voted as a republican, and was a leader in the Camp Chappel Methodist Church, and is buried in the churchyard there. George W. Hartman, who died December 7, 1917, married Susan Bonafield, daugh- ter of Thornton and Sarah Bonafield. Her father was a life-time farmer, and was probably horn in Preston County. Mrs. George W. Hartman died February 9, 1913, and her children, besides H. Foster, were: Edward Thornton, of Boston, Massachusetts; Arnold W., of Tunnelton; Mabel, wife of B. T. Gibson, of Masontown, West Virginia; L. Bert, of Tunnelton; Alice, wife of Bruce Falkenstine, of Mountain Lake Park, Maryland; and Lessie, of Kingwood.

H. Foster Hartman grew up on the old farm near Tun- nelton and acquired a common school education there. At the age of nineteen he went to Lenox and took charge of the mercantile business known as George W. Hartman & Son, owned by his father and brother. He was conducting this store when he reached his majority, and subsequently bought the stock and altogether was a merchant there three years. When he sold out this business he moved a portion of the stock to Terra Alta, but after a time closed out his line of general merchandise and made the candy and ice cream feature his line. About three years later he sold to Ezra B. Hauger, and then went on the road as a traveling salesman for the Rowlesburg Wholesale Grocery Company. He had been on the road about a year when he decided to make the race for sheriff. It was an inter- esting campaign before the primaries, and there were five candidates, so that Mr. Hartman's qualifications and pon- ularity were thoroughly tested. He was elected sheriff in the fall of 1912. Mr. Hartman had cast his first vote for President in behalf of Colonel Roosevelt in 1904. The

year 1912 was the year of the great split in the republican party, and the division extended to Preston County, where however, Mr. Hartman succeeded in defeating his com- petitor by a good margin. He entered the office as suc- cessor to Charles Spindler, and served the legal limit for sheriff, four years.

On retiring from the office of sheriff Mr. Hartman turned his attention to business interests he had already acquired, a garage and planing mill. He soon sold his garage, but the planing mill is still a prominent factor of his enter- prises. This factory is located at Albright, near King- wood. In April, 1921, he purchased the old site and building of the Kingwood Glass Company, and now uses that for handling a large stock of lumber and builders' supplies.

Besides this substantial participation in the commercial life of Kingwood, Mr. Hartman is a stockholder in the Bank of Kingwood, is a stockholder and director of the Englehart Woolen Mills Company, and a director and stock- holder in the Rowlesburg Wholesale Grocery Company, which he formerly represented as a traveling salesman.

At Lenox, Preston County, April 23, 1901, Mr. Hartman married Miss Belle Kelley, who was born and reared in the Lenox community, daughter of Winfield Scot and Sarah Elizabeth (Feather) Kelley. Mrs. Hartman was past nine- teen when she married. They have three children: Ruby Beatrice, attending the Martha Washington Seminary at Washington, D. C .; Donald Kelley, a student in Kingwood High School; and Harland Spencer.

The Hartman family are Methodists, and Mr. Hartman is one of the Official Board of the Kingwood Church. His home is one of the very modern and attractive ones in the county, and in other ways he has contributed to the sub- stantial improvement of the city.

JOHN F. HEWITT. The clerk of the County Court of Barbour County is one of the most popular and efficient members of the Court House circle at Philippi. The dis- tinctive feature of his career has been his determination and ability to rise above his environment and find the work for which he has unique talent and qualifications.

Mr. Hewitt was born on a farm in Valley District of Bar- bour County July 12, 1872. His grandfather came to West Virginia from Pennsylvania, settling in Barbour County. He was one of the early teachers in that locality. His family consisted of three sons and three daughters. The sons were: John, Joel and Hiram. The daughters were: Margaret, who married Benjamin Tallman, Mrs. Jane Phillips and Purdy.

Joel Hewitt spent his life in Barbour County as a farmer and died in Valley District in 1917, when past eighty-three years of age. He secured only a limited education, was a republican voter, and a member of the United Brethren Church. He married Hulda Hayes, whose father, Isaac Hayes, was a shoemaker and farm owner in Barker District of Barbour County. Mrs. Hulda Hewitt died in 1918, when almost eighty years of age. Her children were: John Franklin; Perry, connected with a lumber mill in Randolph County; and Hayes, a farmer in Valley District.

John F. Hewitt grew up in a community where work in the field or in the woods was regarded as the maximum qualification for earning a livelihood and achieving one 's destiny. He had only such advantages as the country schools offered. When he was about twenty years of age he left the farm to become a teacher, and for nine years had charge of country schools and during the summer vacations at- tended school himself. His last work as a teacher was done at Junior in Barbour County. He left the schoolroom to establish and conduct a barber shop at Junior and learn the trade from his employe. For fifteen years he had a shop at Belington and later at Philippi. While conducting his shop he was a student in the West Virginia Business College at Clarksburg, where he graduated.

Mr. Hewitt's great gift and talent is skill in penmanship. Few penmen have acquired the art or mastery of the pen to such a high degree. This talent manifested itself during his childhood, but was never encouraged at home. "John is a good writer" was the common remark about home

If. Foster Hartman

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it his writing was regarded as something of a curiosity freak and not as a means by which he could render culiar service to the world. Therefore, the talent lay rmant until he was a man of nearly middle age, when he vakened it himself through correspondence courses with veral schools. Mr. Hewitt made his first penholder out a stick, which he split at one end so as to insert a pen d secured it by wrapping the end with thread. He also ade his first ink out of pokeberries. In penmanship Mr. ewitt holds diplomas specifying to his skill and proficiency om the Francis B. Courtney School of Penmanship of etroit, from F. W. Tamblyn of Kansas City, Missouri, and om the Sexter Business College of Worcester, Ohio.

About the time he graduated from business college he came a clerk with the Consolidated Coal Company at erryburg, West Virginia, but before the end of a year turned to Philippi and was elected and served two years city clerk. He then became deputy under Sheriff Ken- dy, and held that office four years. In 1920 he was elected unty clerk, and entered upon his duties January 1, 1921, the successor of S. F. Hoxman. He defeated his pred- essor for the office in the primary, and in the election ceived a majority of 1,310 votes.

While a resident of Belington Mr. Hewitt married, on arch 21, 1896, Miss Margaret Monahan, who was born in alley District, Barbour County, daughter of Andrew and nily (Wiseman) Monahan, farmers. Mrs. Hewitt, who ceived a public school education, is the second in a family ten sons and three daughters, the other children surviv- g being Henry, William, Simon, Irvin, Archie, Ray, Mrs. ssie Perkins of Richmond, Virginia, and Ethel, who is arried and lives in Chicago. Mr. and Mrs. Hewitt have ree children and two grandchildren. Their oldest daugh- r, Lillie May, is the wife of Charles Leary, of Richmond, rginia, and they have a son, called W., Jr. The second ughter, Ella Pearl, is the wife of Charles Marple, of afton, and has a son, Charles Lee. The only son of Mr. d Mrs. Hewitt is Andrew Archie, who is now in the United ates Navy.

During the World war Mr. Hewitt was deputy sheriff, d much of his time was devoted to assisting the selective rvice men in filling out their questionnaires. Fraternally is affiliated with the Junior Order United American echanics and the Knights of Pythias, and is a member the Missionary Baptist Church.

JUDGE WILLIAM T. ICE. In the annals of pioneer settle- ent in West Virginia one of the first family names to pear is that of Ice. Many branches of the old family ve been conspicuous in different parts of the state. The llowing is a brief sketch of the late Judge William T. e, who conferred additional honors upon the name through s long and active career as a lawyer and judge in Barbour unty.

He was born in Marion County in March, 1840, one of the veral sons and daughters of Andrew Ice, who lived in arion County, where he was a farmer and surveyor. Wil- m T. Ice grew up on a farm, attended rural schools and is mainly self educated. He probably taught in early 'e, read law at Fairmont, and was admitted to the bar Philippi, where he established his practice and where cept for his official work he was continuously engaged in profession until his death.

Judge Ice was elected and served as prosecuting attorney Barbour County, was for several years a member of the ouse of Delegates, and in 1880 was elected judge of the rcuit Court, composed of Barbour, Tucker, Randolph, eston and Taylor counties. He was a judge with a wide arning in the law and a sound knowledge of human nature. e was dignified, impartial, and made a splendid record the bench. After retiring he resumed private practice, id continued it until his death in February, 1908. Judge e was a democrat, was affiliated with the Independent .der of Odd Fellows and was a member of the Missionary iptist Church.

He married Miss Columbia Jarvis. They were the parents 'five daughters, and the only son is William T. Ice, Jr.

EDMOND WHITEHAIR, though past the age of three score and ten, still bears a part in the business affairs of Philippi. He was a boy soldier of the Union in the Civil war, and for the greater part of his active career lived in Preston County, where the Whitehairs are one of the oldest and most prominent families. The family history is given with more detail on other pages of this publication.

Edmond Whitehair was born near Terra Alta in Preston County, January 19, 1848, son of Daniel and Sarah (Mes- senger) Whitehair. His mother was a daughter of Edmond and Louisa (Hardesty) Messenger. Edmond was one of a family of eight sons and four daughters, and his boyhood was spent on the farm close to the little city on the moun- tain top. At that time country schools were poorly equipped and conducted only a few months of each year, and it was from such schools that Edmond Whitehair acquired his education. He worked with his father, and though only thirteen years of age when the Civil war broke out, he was eager to get into the service, and after being rejected on account of his age he was finally accepted in February after his fifteenth birthday. At Grafton he enlisted in Company I of the Seventeenth West Virginia Infantry, under Captain Samuel Holt and Colonel Day. He joined his company at Wheeling, did some training there, was in training at Clarksburg, and during the remainder of the war was on scouting duty. There were many Confederate prisoners gathered in, some of them being deserters from the Confederate Army while others were bona fide soldiers. The Seventeenth Regiment was ordered back to Wheeling and Company I was discharged in July, 1865.

After his return to Terra Alta Edmond Whitehair joined Senator Jones in the "shook" business, making shooks for molasses and sugar barrels. This was an industry with which he was identified about eight years. Mr. Whitehair then returned to farming, and was an active factor in the agricultural community near his birthplace for many years. On leaving the farm he retired to Terra Alta, and about twelve years later, in 1904, came to Philippi, where he purchased the marble business of Mr. Joseph Crim, acquiring the plant and goodwill. He took charge and has since con- ducted this local industry, known as the Tygart Valley Marble Works, a corporation of which Sylvanus Talbott is president, Ira H. Byers, secretary, and Mr. Whitehair, treasurer and general manager. The company is capitalized at $5,000, and it does a business over a large adjacent sec- tion of West Virginia and extending into Pennsylvania and Maryland.

Mr. Whitehair was one of the promotere and stockholders of the First National Bank of Terra Alta, and is also a charter member and one of the stockholders of the Peoples Bank of Philippi. He is a republican, having cast his first vote for General Grant, and has supported the national ticket for half a century. He was a member of the City Council of Terra Alta and president of the Board of Educa- tion of Portland District, Preston County, for fourteen years, resigning that office when he came to Philippi. In this city he has served two terms as a member of the council, but after his second term declined to serve longer. Mr. Whitehair has been a member of the United Brethren Church for half a century and has been superintendent of the Sunday School. He is affiliated with the Grand Army of the Republic.

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History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 3, Part 112

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