History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 3, Part 162

Author:
Publication date:
Publisher:
Number of Pages:

USA > West Virginia > History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 3 > Part 162

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

Ed G. Davisson grew up on a farm, attended the country schools and as a boy began learning business as clerk in his father's store. This was a general store, and he learned all the details of country merchandising. At the age of twenty-one he engaged in the hardware business, as a mem. ber of the firm Williams & Davisson, at Weston, and sub- sequently removed to Clarksburg, where he was active in the wholesale hardware business until he sold his interests in 1902.

Mr. Davisson became cashier of the National Exchange Bank of Weston in 1895, and has rounded out more than a quarter of a century of faithful service to that institution. now one of the strongest hanks in the state. From cashier he was promoted to vice president, and since 1904 has been president. The officers of the bank are E. G. Davisson, president; R. H. Harrison, vice president; J. W. Ross, cashier; J. B. Mitchell, assistant cashier; while the directors are E. G. Davisson, R. H. Harrison, J. W. Ross, George A. Hatzel, John Riley, Ira S. Hardman, Walter A. Edwards. The bank still keeps its capital at $60,000, but it has an earned surplus of $140,000, undivided profits of $80,000, while its total resources aggregate $2,000,000.

Mr. Davisson is also president of the public utilities at Weston supplying water, light and ice. He owns thirteen acres of farming land in Lewis County. He has been a .vestryman of the Episcopal Church since 1894 and is a democrat in polities. In Masonry he is a past master of Weston Lodge No. 10, A. F. and A. M., a member of Bigelow Chapter No. 4, R. A. M., St. Johns Commandery No. 8, K. T., and Osiris Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Wheeling. He served two years as district grand master of the Grand Lodge.

Mr. Davisson married Miss Anna Harrison, daughter of M. W. Harrison and member of one of the prominent families of the state. They have eight children: Emma, wife of T. J. Blair, Jr .; Elizabeth, wife of Ira S. Hard- man; George I., who graduated from the Shenandoah Academy and from the law department of the University of Virginia; Edwin, Jr., a graduate of the Weston High School and now in the West Virginia University; Dianna, a graduate of Weston High School; Fannie, also a high school graduate; Mary W., attending high school; and John G., in grammar school.

JULES A. VIQUESNEY, president of the Citizens National Bank at Belington, Barbour County, is one of the influential men who have played a prominent part in the development and upbuilding of this vital little city, and his influence has extended also far outside the boundaries of this, his native county, where he stands as a scion of one of the sterling pioneer families of this section of the state. He was born on a farm near Junior, this county, April 7, 1869, and is a son of Charles E. and Mary A. (Row) Viquesney, the former of whom was born in a suburb of the City of Paris, France, and the latter of whom was born .at Newmarket, Virginia, a daughter of Benjamin Row, who came to the present Barbour County, West Virginia, prior to the Civil war and who operated a grist mill near Junior, in which neighborhood he passed the remainder of his life. Charles E. Viquesney was a boy when he accompanied his parents to the United States, and the family home was established in the vicinity of the present City of Belington, Barbour County, his father, Charles E., Sr., having here

mey

491

HISTORY OF WEST VIRGINIA

come a farmer, though he and his wife eventually re- rned to France and passed the remainder of their lives their uative land. Charles E., Jr., was reared to anhood on the pioneer farm, and here he maintained s home until the elose of his long and useful life. is brother, Jules A., removed to Indiana, where he died, d'd also the brother Alfred. G. A., the next younger other, settled at Little Rock, Arkansas, but made many ips back and forth to France, in which country he now sides, at the age of eighty-four years (1922). Eugene, ungest of the brothers, returned to France with his rents.

In the Civil war period Charles E. Visquesney, Jr., is conducting a blacksmith shop in the present Belington ighborhood, and he was also identified with farm en- rprise in this county for many years. During the last teen years of his life he was a traveling salesman for e monument establishment of Fred A. Lang & Company Clarksburg, and in this connection he became well own throughout the state. He was a stanch Union an in the Civil war period and was a republican in lities. He died in 1896, at the age of seventy-two years, d his widow passed away in May, 1919, at the ven- able age of eighty-four years. They became the parents ten children: Virginia (Mrs. Shomo), of Junior, Bar- ur County; Benjamin F., a truck gardener at Elkins, indolph County; Sarab R., wife of Dr. U. S. Simon, a iropractie physician at Johnstown, Pennsylvania; Polly , wife of George Hayes, of Junior; Lewis N., a resident Junior and serving as deputy sheriff of Barbour County; lia F., wife of Edward W. Lee, of Junior; Laura B., e wife of William A. Simon, residing near Junior; Jules ugust, the immediate subject of this review; Lillie rd, who died at Junior, she having been the wife of arles Wilson, Jr .; and Charles E. Viquesney, who was e second in order of birth and died at the age of eighteen ars.

Jules A. Viquesney gained his early education in the blie schools of Barbour County and later took a busi- ss course in the Methodist Episcopal Seminary at Buek- nnon. He made a record not only as a successful teacher the rural schools but also as a specially skilled teacher of nmanship. For a period of about five years he was legraph operator and assistant station agent for the iltimore & Ohio Railroad, and after leaving this service Belington be here engaged in the real estate business, sides serving as justice of the peace. He read Jaw with Blackburn Ware, his present law partner, and also ent a term in the law department of the State University. e was admitted to the bar in 1905, and has since been sociated with his former preceptor, Mr. Ware, in the actiee of his profession at Belington, though his law rvice is now principally in an advisory capacity, as a ell fortified counselor. He east his first presidential te for Gen. Benjamin Harrison, and has since continued leader in the local couneils of the republican party in irbour County. He has served as a member of the puhliean county and congressional committees and bas tended practically every state convention of his party in est Virginia from the time of his majority to the esent. Governor Dawson appointed him a member of e Board of Directors of the State Hospital for the sane at Spencer, and later appointed him forest, game id fish warden of the state, an office of which, by ap- intment under the administrations of Governors Glass- ek and Hatfield, he continued the incumbent nearly ten ars. Within this period he organized the Allegany and meat Mountain elubs, and instituted the lookout stations d patrols for the protection of West Virginia forests om damage by fire.

Mr. Viquesney was prominently identified with the unding of the now vital little city of Belington, and he as elected the second mayor of the place, he having there- ter been elected to this office six times, though his terms ere not consecutive, and his seventh term as mayor having sulted from his election in March, 1922, so that he is e present incumbent of this office. He was one of the

organizers and is president of the Citizens National Bank of Belington, is associated with many corporations con- tributing to the industrial and commercial advancement of Belington and other points in this section of the state, and for many years he has been actively identified with the timber and Inmber industry. He is a director of the Tygart Valley Orchard Company, representing one of the largest commercial orehard enterprises in the state, and at Junior he is the owner of a fine individual orchard. On his farmi in that locality he specializes in the raising of potatoes, and in 1915 he sent forth the first earload of potatoes ever shipped from Barbour County. Ile has since shipped in a single year as many as eleven earloads, representing the product on his own farm and those of neighbors.

Mr. Viquesney is a charter member of the Belington Lodge of the Knights of Pythias, and is affiliated also with the Woodmen of the World, the Modern Woodmen of America, the Loyal Order of Moose and the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, besides which he is a lead- ing member of the Business Men's Club of Belington.

In December, 1892, occurred the marriage of Mr. Viquesney and Miss Dora J. Yeager, daughter of William and Martha ( Arbogast) Yeager, of Bariour County. Mr. Yeager is now a resident of Belington and is eighty-eight years of age in 1922, and his wife is now in her eighty- fourth year. Mr. and Mrs. Viquesney have two children : Herman V., of Belington, married Miss Hazel, a daughter of M. L. llaller, and the one child of this union is a daughter, Joan Yvonne. llerman V. Viquesney volunteered in the Signal Corps of the United States Army when the nation beeame involved in the World war, and was in charge of Government telephones and other equipment at Tours, France, at the time when the armistice brought the war to a close and enabled him to leave the land of his paternal ancestors and return to that of his birth. Miss Winnie Marie Viquesney, the younger of the two children, was graduated in the Belington High School and in 1920- 2I was a successful and popular teacher in the publ e schools of this eity, where she is now serving as stenographer in her father's office.

HAROLD S. MATHEWS is president of the Tribune Printing Company of Charleston, the largest printing, binding and lithographing establishment in the state. It is a sueeessful business, and he and several of his brothers have engaged their activities therein during the life and since the death of their father.

His father was J. M. Mathews, a native of Philadelphia, and for many years active in the oil industry of Pennsyl- vania. He came to Charleston in 1897, being influenced to do so largely through his aequaintanee with former Governor Dawson of this state. A few years later he became inter- ested in some of the printing and publishing concerns of the city. One of these was The Mail-Tribune, jobbers and publishers, owned by A. B. White, and former Governor Dawson. The management of the old Tribune Company had been under a receiver for some time, and in 1903 the prop- erty was acquired hy J. M. Mathews and associates, and at that time the Tribune Printing Company was incorporated. The newspaper was sold, but they retained the name Tribune for the new company, which throughout has been a print- ing plant rather than an auxiliary of newspaper publica- tion. The company was incorporated with a capital of $50,000, with J. M. Mathews, president ; S. C. Butler, see- retary; and M. A. Kendall, treasurer. J. M. Mathews was the directing spirit of this enterprise through its initial stages, and saw it prosperously established before his death, which ocenrred in 1910. He was succeeded as president by his son H. S. Mathews. In 1914 H. S. Mathews and his two brothers, M. R. and R. L. Mathews, bought Mr. Kendall's interest, and in 1916 they bought the interest of Mr. Butler, thus becoming sole owners, and incorporated for $100,000. In 1918 R. L. Mathews sold his stock to H. S. and M. R. Mathews, who are now actively associated as managers and owners of the business.

The company does a general line of printing and edition work, has binding, lithographing and other mechanical de-

492

HISTORY OF WEST VIRGINIA

partments, employs from 100 to 140 people, and the business is conducted in a four-story building 50 by 110 feet, which was built by James M. Mathews in 1907 at a cost of $60,000.

H. S. Mathews came to Charleston from Philadelphia in 1899. In 1900 he went into the coal fields, but in 1907 returned to Charleston, and on his father's death succeeded to the presidency of the company. He has served as treas- urer of the County Republican Committee, as a member of the City Council, and is a Rotarian and a past exalted ruler of the Elks Lodge. He is a member of St. John's Episcopal Church. Mr. Mathews married Irene Taylor, of Parkersburg, and they have two children, Harold S. and Elizabeth I.

ARTIMUS W. Cox. Under the corporate title of the A. W. Cox Department Store is conducted one of the most important general mercantile enterprises in the City of Charleston, Mr. Cox having been the founder of the business, of which he is the executive head and chief stockholder, all other stockholders being active employes in connection with the establishment. Mr. Cox, the president and general man- ager of the company, has made a splendid record that places him well to the front in the ranks of the progressive and influential business men of the capital city of West Virginia.

The A. W. Cox Department Store was incorporated in 1914, with a capital stock of $20,000, and assumed owner- ship and control of the department store formerly conducted by George Ort. The business has shown a record of splendid expansion, and operations are now based on a capital stock of $140,000, while the corps of employes averages fifty persons. The sales for the first year aggregated $82,000, and the record for 1921 was total sales amounting to more than $600,000, the jobbing department of the enterprise being held as an independent feature, and its accounts being entirely separate from that of the general retail business. The company owns its substantial and modern building, a five-story and basement structure that is 36 by 120 feet in dimensions. The entire building is occupied by the com- pany, which likewise maintains a large separate warehouse for the reception and storage of surplus stocks. The sub- stantial financial success that has attended this well ordered business in indicated significantly in the fact it has paid large dividends to the stockholders.

A. W. Cox was born and reared in Roane County, West Virginia, and has found in his native state ample oppor- tunity for the achievement of large and worthy success in connection with normal business enterprise. In 1908 he came to Kanawha County and established a general store at Clendenin, where he built up a prosperous business and where he continued operations until 1914, when he removed to Charleston and became the executive head of the now large and important department store which bears his name. He has had no time or desire for political activity or public office, but is essentially loyal and progressive as a citizen, ever ready to lend support to measures and enterprises tend- ing to benefit the community in which he lives. He is a member of the Odd Fellows, the Masons, the Chamber of Commerce, the Lions Club, and of the First Methodist Epis- copal Church, South. He married Miss Narcie Payne, of Roane County, and they have three children: Sybil, Wilbur and Mildred.

WILLIAM CASPER SHANKLIN. The record of W. C. Shank- lin as a railroad man covers a period of nearly thirty years. His service began with the Chesapeake & Ohio, and he finally returned to this company, and for the last three years he has been its agent and representative at South Charleston.

Mr. Shanklin was born in Greenbrier County, West Vir- ginia, August 25, 1874, son of John H. and Amanda (Mor- gan) Shanklin, the former a native of Monroe County and the latter of Greenbrier. John Shanklin was a farmer, and was accidentally killed in middle life. W. C. Shanklin there- fore came to manhood without the care and direction of a father, and early learned to depend upon himself. It was in 1894, when he was twenty years of age, that he began railroading, as a telegraph operator at Talcott, West Vir- ginia, for the Chesapeake & Ohio. He remained in the

service of this company five years. After that he was wi several other companies, and for three years he was Nebraska as a station agent of the Chicago, Burlington Quincy. Out of twenty-nine years of railroad duty, nin teen years had been devoted to station work.

Mr. Shanklin resumed service with the Chesapeake & Oh about seven years ago, and on August 21, 1919, was a pointed agent at South Charleston. This growing al prosperous industrial city is now one of the promine sources of traffic for the Chesapeake & Ohio. Eight m are required to handle the business of the station in add tion to Mr. Shanklin. The freight receipts here for t. year 1920 ran over $1,000,000, and the business for 19: was nearly as much.

Mr. Shanklin is a member of the Order of Railw: Telegraphers and belongs to several other organization He is a thirty-second degree Mason and Shriner. He is nc serving as a member of the City Council of South Charle ton. At Ironton, Ohio, he married Miss Bessie Frazie They have six children, Lester, Mildred, Edith, France Aileen and Madeline. The son Lester is an employe of tl Chesapeake & Ohio.

FRANK E. SHANNON, is the present proscouting attorne of Wyoming County, West Virginia, having been elected ( the republican ticket in 1920 to serve a term of four year

He is a son of Albert Shannon and Sallie (Justice Shannon. His father is still living, his mother having die when he was but one year old.

His family was one of the first settlers of the count having come to this county from Tazewell, Virginia, lon before the Civil war. He and all of his people are repul licans and Methodists.

JAMES W. THORNHILL is owner and active propriet( of the J. W. Thornhill planing-mill at Belington, a industry not excelled in mechanical efficiency and manag ment in this section of West Virginia. The variol processes of lumber manufacture from the trees in th forest to the finished product are intimate by almo: life-long experience to Mr. Thornhill, and he is the typ of business man who thoroughly loves the material wit which he works.

His father was Frank Thornhill, who was born in o] Virginia, was a Southerner in sentiment and sympath on the issues of the Civil war, and at one time was mad prisoner and put in Camp Chase, Ohio. He spent his activ life as a farmer, and died at Belington in Barbour Count' in 1873, at the age of fifty-two. He was a strong demt crat, and both he and his wife were loyal and active mien bers of the Presbyterian Church. His wife was Elizabet Jane Willis, who came from Rappahannock County, Vi ginia, daughter of Francis Willis. She was horn January ' 1829, and died at Sutton, West Virginia, March 10, 189. aged sixty-eight. Frank Thornhill was born September 2: 1821, and died November 19, 1873. They began lif without special education, were good workers, had hig ideals, and reared a family of useful children. The chi dren were: Mary, who married the late Albert Rohrbough of Belington; Martha Ann, who died at Philippi, wifs 0 S. H. Morrall; Elizabeth Jane, wife of Monroe Phillip: of Belington; and James William.

James William Thornhill was born July 31, 1866, i Barker District, Barbour County. When he was a chil his parents moved to Belington, where he had the privileg of attending a few brief terms of the common school: He worked in the fields on the home farm, and as youth of eighteen found employment in handling lumber i a lumber yard at wages of 10 cents an hour. From com mon labor he was promoted to inspector, at $35 a month and for seventeen years he was in the service of the widel. known lumber and timber firm of Pardee and Curtin & Sutton, West Virginia.

Mr. Thornhill left this firm in 1907 and returned t Belington and took the contract for filling the lumber prod ucts of the Belington Planing Mill Company. When thi firm became financially involved he bought the plant, i 1912. The plant was then of very small dimensions, em

JA Thomhill.

493

HISTORY OF WEST VIRGINIA

loying perhaps ten men. Mr. Thornhill at once injected ew energy and new possibilities into the business. The lant at the beginning of 1922 has three times the machin- ry it had when Mr. Thornhill took charge, and its drying ilns have a capacity of 100,000 feet. The planing mill pecializes in the manufacture of interior trim and finish rom West Virginia wood, including poplar, chestnut, oak nd basswood. Much of the output finds market as far way as Cleveland, Ohio and New York City. The bass- wood nearly all goes East, while the oak is marketed in he West, showing that Western people have a higher ppreciation and demand for superior wood finish than Castern people. The business is both wholesale and retail. The principal retail business is done at Zanesville, Ohio, under the name of the F. L. Israel Lumber Company. The lant at Belington is capable of furnishing all the lumber products and finishing required in the building of an entire ouse. Fourteen acres of ground situated along the Weaver Branch of the Western Maryland Railroad furnishes space or the plant and yard.

Mr. Thornhill plans for 1922 a new mill, with a capacity , third larger than the present one, and with greatly im- roved facilities, including four new heavy finishing ma- hines and with power available for its operation.

A year after Mr. Thornhill became owner of the old lant an enemy set fire to the lumber yard and everything ut the mill was destroyed. The loss entailed was greater han the resources that remained, but with the insurance nd the credit he had established he restocked his plant nd pushed the business even harder than before. Grad- ally his energy found fruit in the extending stacks of lum- er and the great quantities of finished material in their zarehouses and shipped out by the car loads. The buzz nd hum of the planers and saws has been sweet music to he loyal men who make up the force of from thirty to orty-five who handle the extensive business of the plant. One of the important departments is that in which the ools are made and dressed and adjusted to do lumber rimming and finishing. In charge of this department Mr. Mikes, tool maker and dresser, foreman of the mechanical department and an expert in the art of condi- ioning tools. The planing department is almost dustless, ince the machines are all equipped with blower pipes, 'hich suck all dirt and shavings into the boiler-room, where his by-product is utilized at great saving for fuel. A ater plant equal to a fire emergency is installed, and an lectric system of wiring carries light to any part of the lant and yard. In the new plant the equipments will be ach as to supersede the cruder processes of handling prod- ct now in use, and these facilities will represent the limax of achievement in ten years under the practical eye f Mr. Thornhill, the owner and manager.

The Belington community regards Mr. Thornhill as one f its permanent citizens, and he in turn has made use f his growing prosperity for the benefit of the little ity. In 1917 he finished his own home, a spacions and enerous residence, the planning and arrangement being the esult of the joint co-operation of himself and Mrs. Thorn- ill. All the finish and much of the other material enter- ig into this home came from his planing mill.

Mr. Thornhill was reared in a democratic family and as voted that ticket beginning with Grover Cleveland. e has always been loyal to the Presbyterian Church of his other, and for a number of years he was an elder in e church of Sutton, while he lived there. Outside of these iterests his life has been in his business and in his home, ad he has not been attracted into fraternal organizations. On April 11, 1889, Mr. Thornhill married Miss Cora Dunham, daughter of John C. Dunham and grand- aughter of Rev. R. F. Dunham, a Baptist minister. She as a niece of R. J. Dunham, of Phillipi.

Mrs. Thornhill, who died May 17, 1908, was the mother E three children. The oldest, Mary Leoline, born January 3, 1890, is the wife of W. E. Coffman of Keyser, West irginia, and her three children are William Eugene, obert Thornhill and Mary Frances. The only son of Mr. hornhill by this union is W. Frank Thornhill, who was born

September 10, 1892, and is now superintendent of the Thornhill Planing Mill at Belington. He married Flora Griffin, daughter of Rev. Mr. Griffin, and they have two children, Josephine Ann and Catherine Lee. Evelyn Ruth Thornhill, the youngest of the three children, was born December 31, 1898, and is the wife of H. Sherwood Shinn, of Belington, who is now finishing his education in West Virginia University at Morgantown.

November 29, 1911, Mr. Thornhill married Miss Grace Margaret Boyd. She was born in Harrison County, August 21, 1891, daughter of Robert Calvin and Jocasta (Good- win) Boyd, being the fourth among their five children. The others are: Bessie May, wife of J. R. McHenry, of Centralia, West Virginia, Benjamin Thomas, of Weston; Robert Coy, of Denver, Colorado; and George Dewey, of Buckhannon. Mrs. Thornhill had a public school educa- tion and was married at the age of twenty at Oakland, Maryland. Mr. and Mrs. Thornhill have two children, Margaret Lee, born May 11, 1913, and James William, Jr., born May 29, 1916.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.

History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 3, Part 162

Author: Publication date: Publisher: Number of Pages:

Author:
Publication date:
Publisher:
Number of Pages: