History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 3, Part 48

Author:
Publication date:
Publisher:
Number of Pages:

USA > West Virginia > History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 3 > Part 48

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).

142

HISTORY OF WEST VIRGINIA

Sydney Herbert Davis spent his schooldays at Farmville and Prospect, and at the age of twenty years commenced his railroad career as an employe of the Norfolk & Western Railroad Company. Like his father, he had learned teleg- raphy early, and in addition to serving as an operator also worked as relief station agent. For two years he was located at Lynchburg, Virginia, and for a like period at Suffolk, that state, being in the freight office at both places. Mr. Davis then transferred his services to the Vir- ginian Railroad, being agent at Victoria, Virginia, for two years, and in 1912 was sent to Woodbay, Raleigh County, where he remained two years, his next location being Maben, Wyoming County, West Virginia. 1n 1918 he came to Mullens, and since then has acted as station agent and has taken a leading and important part in the public life of the community, the advancement of which he has aided in many ways. He has been a member of the city council, where he has worked constructively and to good effect in securing civic improvements and other benefits, has helped education as a member of the board of school directors, and in other directions has been a contributor to the general progress and welfare of the community. As a fraternalist he is a member of the Masonic Blue Lodge and Chapter at Lynch- burg, Virginia, the Commandery at Mount Hope, West Vir- ginia, and the Shrine at Charleston, and is also affiliated with the Knights of Pythias and the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, in both of which he has many friends. His business connections include the presidency of the Wyom- ing Baking Company, a successful concern of Mullens, of which he was one of the founders.

On January 2, 1907, Mr. Davis was united in marriage to Miss Nan Katharine Poindexter, daughter of John Poin- dexter, of Bedford County, Virginia, and to this union there have been born three children: Mildred, Dexter and William.

EMERSON V. ROMIG. In the twenty years of his residence at Keyser Mr. Romig has made for himself and has been drawn into, through the votes of the people and by his public-spirited enterprise, a most vital relationship with the community. He is the present mayor, is the leading drug- gist of the town, and has devoted money and personal effort to the development of the fruit industry in this section of the state.

Mr. Romig is a native of Ohio, born in Tuscarawas County, October 4, 1875. His grandfather, Edward Romig, was of Pennsylvania-Dutch ancestry, but was perhaps a na- tive of Tuscarawas County, Ohio, where the family settled between 1800 and 1803. Edward Romig married Elizabeth Auld, of a family of Harrison County, Ohio, of English ancestry. Their children were: Mrs. Sarah Welfley, who spent her life in Tuscarawas County; Elizabeth, who mar- ried Philip Myers and died in the same county; Isaiah, who was a Union soldier during the Civil war, and spent his last years in Texas; Aaron, mentioned below; Miss Mary, still living in Tuscarawas County; and Theophilus, who died at the old parental homestead.

Aaron D. Romig, father of the Keyser business man, was born in Tuscarawas County, and is living, at the age of seventy-five, on his farm at Warwick Township, that county. He married Melissa E. MeCreery, daughter of James Mc- Creery, whose ancestor came into Tuscarawas County on horseback when all the country was in the woods. The children of Aaron Romig and wife are: James S., of Pitts- burgh; Emerson V .; Otto V., of Dover, Ohio; and Grace, at home.

Emerson V. Romig grew up on a farm and had the ex- perience and training of an Ohio farm boy. From the country schools he entered the high school at Gnadenhutten in his native county, and gained his first knowledge of pharmacy as clerk in the drug business at Gnadenhutten. A year later he began the study of pharmacy in Scio College, a school since combined with the Pittsburgh College of Pharmacy. He graduated in 1899, and at once came to West Virginia, locating at Thomas in Tucker County, where he managed the drug store of Dr. O. H. Hoffman. Leaving Thomas, he went to Elkins in Randolph County, and for Que year was clerk and pharmacist for William Nydegger.

In 1903 he came to Keyser, purchasing the drug business of Dr. J. W. Hall. In 1904 he organized the Romig Drug Company, capitalized at $10,000, but the capital has since been increased to $15,000. The company in 1905 bought the drug business of L. L. Kimes & Brother. Doctor Romig is secretary, treasurer and manager of this prosperous busi- ness, while R. G. Richardson is president of the company. Their store is one of the best equipped and stocked retail drug stores in this part of the state. Mr. Romig is a mem- ber of the West Virginia State Pharmaceutical Association and the National Association of Retail Druggists, and has participated in the program of discussions at various meet- ings of these bodies.

Reference has already been made to Mr. Romig's interest in the horticulture of this section. He is a stockholder and director of the Knobley Mountain Orchard Company, the Buckhorn Peach Company and the Park Orchard Company. These three companies have done some important develop- ment work in planting and maintaining commercial orchards, and the properties now owned by these companies constitute an imposing aggregate in the horticultural enterprise of this part of the state, though the maximum profits from the business have not yet been realized. The Knobley Mountain project embraces 700 acres, almost altogether in apples, there being 30,000 bearing trees. The Buckhorn Peach Company has some 200 acres, with 10,000 bearing peach trees. The Park Orchard is also given over to peaches, and is somewhat larger than the Buckhorn.

Mr. Romig was a member of the first council of Keyser under the commission form of government, and was elected and assigned to the department of finance. He served in that capacity four years. Then, after a lapse of several years, he was elected mayor, and began his term in 1921 as the successor of Mayor Pifer. In addition to the routine of municipal administration the chief concern of Mayor Romig is to increase the water supply at Keyser. He is a republican in politics, casting his first vote for Major Mc- Kinley. He has taken the Masonic degrees at Keyser in the lodge and chapter, and is a steward in the Methodist Episcopal Church.

At Keyser, October 4, 1905, he married Miss Catherine Grove, a native of Grant County, West Virginia, and daugh- ter of John and Angie (Clark) Grove. Mrs. Romig is a graduate nurse of the Western Maryland Hospital at Cum- berland, and was oue of the first staff of nurses at the Hoffman Hospital at Keyser. Mr. and Mrs. Romig have three sons: Grove, David and Richard.

During the World war Mr. Romig was a "Dollar-a-Year Man" designated to solicit recruits for the Merchant Marine. He personally registered under the last draft, but had not received his questionnaire when the armistice was signed.

STEPHEN D. FRANTZ. As the demand for only sound banking institutions increases and the value of such institu- tions to the community is more and more appreciated, the character of the men who administer their affairs receives closer attention, and when these individuals have been found efficient and worthy confidence in their financial concerns is solidified. One of the sound and conservative institutions of this character in Wyoming County is the Bank of Mul- lens, the cashier of which, Stephen D. Frantz, has been identified with this banking house for ten years.

Mr. Frantz was born on a farm at Maywood, Fayette County, West Virginia, September 12, 1887, a son of Noalı D. and Mattie (Hedrick) Frantz. His father, born in Franklin County, Virginia, died at Huntington, West Vir- ginia, in 1921, aged sixty-seven years, while his mother, a native of Greenbrier County, West Virginia, survives her husband as a resident of Huntington, being sixty-five years of age. Noah D. Frantz was sixteen years of age when his parents moved to West Virginia, and as a young man he was employed by the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad Company at Stretcher Neck Tunnel. His first employment was as a mule driver, but before the tunnel was completed he had been advanced to the position of stone mason. Later he de- veloped into a contractor, and as such built a bridge on the Sewell Valley Railroad, but finally turned his attention to

Danglas UBroun.

143

HISTORY OF WEST VIRGINIA

Farming, a vocation in which he won a gratifying success. n 1919 he retired from active labor and moved to Hunting- on, where he spent the rest of his life. He was a democrat n politics and was. reared in the religious faith of the Dunkards, while his widow is a member of the Methodist Church. Of their children six survive: L. N., who is vice resident of the American Bank and Trust Company of Huntington; Elsie, who is the wife of W. L. Bailey, of Mount Hope, West Virginia; Stephen D., of this review; Edna, who is the wife of H. K. Miles, of Clifton, West Virginia; L. E., who is engaged in the insurance business t Mullens; and Truma, who is unmarried and makes her ome with her mother at Huntington.

Stephen D. Frantz attended school in the vicinity of his irthplace in Fayette County, following which he supple- mented this training with a commercial course at Dens- more's Business College at Staunton, Virginia, which he ompleted in 1910. Previous to this he had worked on the arm at home, but then felt qualified for other employment nd accepted a position in the office of the New River Colliery Company at McDonald, West Virginia. Later he zas employed in the office of the P. M. Snyder Lumber Company at Mount Hope, where he remained until 1912, at hat time joining the Bank of Mullens. This institution was rganized in 1909, opening its doors for business January , 1910. Its first officers were: John Faulkner, president; V. E. Deegans, vice president; and L. N. Frantz, cashier. The present officers are: W. E. Deegans, president; L. N. 'rantz, vice president; and Stephen D. Frantz, cashier. He 3 also a member of the board of directors of the Corine 'oal Company.

Mr. Frantz has also been prominent in public affairs and as rendered efficient service to his community. He was ity recorder of Mullens for three successive years, following which he refused to accept a re-election, and was also post- master of Mullens for six years, during the administrations f President Wilson. His political tendencies make him a tanch democrat. A thirty-second degree Mason, Mr. Frantz 3 a past master of Mullens Lodge, A. F. and A. M., a member of Beckley Chapter, R. A. M., Mount Hope Com- andery, K. T., and Wheeling Consistory. He also holds membership in Beni-Kedem Temple, A. A. O. N. M. S., in he Independent Order of Odd Fellows and the Knights of 'ythias, in which latter he is a past chancellor.

DOUGLAS W. BROWN is a member of a Huntington Jaw rm that handles perhaps as large a corporation and general ractice as any other firm in the state. Mr. Brown has elped earn the high reputation and prestige of this firm, nd his abilities have earned him wide popularity in the rofession, which accounts for his present dignified honor of eing president of the West Virginia Bar Association.

Mr. Brown was born in Western Virginia, at Hillsville, arroll County, August 11, 1877. His ancestors were Scotch eople and early sought a home in the western portions of ld Virginia. The Huntington attorney has good reason to herish the memories of both his grandfathers. His grand- ather Rev. Lee C. Brown was born in Virginia in 1813, as a minister of the Presbyterian Church, preaching in Vythe and Carroll counties and located in Carroll County 1 1852. In Carroll County he settled in the Pine Creek icinity, becoming pastor of the Bethesda Presbyterian hurch, and at the same time he opened a school of the igher grades for young men, a school he named "Stu- ium." A few years later he removed to Hillsville, where e became pastor of a Presbyterian congregation and also a member of the faculty of the noted Ben Thompson Academy. 'ev. Lee C. Brown died in Carroll County in 1888. He married Pauline Hoge, a native of Virginia, who also died 1 Carroll County.

Their son, Douglas B. Brown, was born at Mechanicsburg, iles County, Virginia, September 16, 1840, and was about welve years of age when his parents removed to Carroll ounty. He acquired a very thorough academic training t the Studium and at the Ben Thompson Academy, and 1 1859 began the study of law in the office of Col. A. J. teadman, diligently prosecuting his studies until the spring € 1861. He volunteered with the first company of soldiers

that went out from Carroll County under Capt. W. R. Jennings. This company became part of Kemper's Brigade, in Pickett's famous division, and Douglas B. Brown was one of the soldiers who participated in that immortal charge up the long hill at Gettysburg. He continued in the service until his command was surrendered at Appomattox in April, 1865. After the war Douglas B. Brown devoted his time largely to educational work, though he was always a news- paper publisher and for a number of years was principal of schools at Dover, Delaware. Then returning to his home county in Virginia, he was county superintendent of schools of Carroll County twelve years. From 1885 until 1892 he was a proof reader in the Government printing office at Washington. He spent his last years at Hillsville, where he died October 26, 1916. He was a democrat and a very devout Presbyterian. The crowning success of his life was his influence upon others, particularly the young. He was noted for his promptitude, punctuality and devotion to duty, and as a teacher he was distinguished as much by the in- spirational qualities of his leadership as by the facts of learning. He was an instructor of rare tact and ability, and as father of a family it was his chief purpose and ambition to train and educate his children for real usefulness, and it was his good fortune that he lived to see them all fully embarked upon such careers, performing the part of in- telligent and virtuous citizens, and earning both the esteem and respect of society.

Douglas B. Brown married Miss Mary L. Lindsey, who was born in Carroll County, September 13, 1841, and is still living, at the age of eighty years, at Hillsville. Of their children the oldest is Robert Lee, a teacher in the public schools at Hillsville. Charles H., the second son, is general agent at Columbus, Ohio, for the Norfolk & Western Rail- way Company. Bessie is the wife of Jesse H. Fugate, a merchant of Radford, Virginia. William H. lives at Nor- folk and is tidewater manager of the New England Coal & Coke Company.

Donglas W. Brown, youngest of the family, received most of his early education in Washington, D. C., attending high school there until the senior year. He graduated in 1893 from the Wytheville Male Academy at Wytheville, Virginia. He then entered the law office of Frank S. Blair, former attorney general of the State of Virginia, at Wytheville. Mr. Brown was admitted to the Virginia bar in 1898. His professional career has been entirely in West Virginia. After his admission he practiced at Williamson in Mingo County until 1909, and in the latter year came to Hunting-

ton and formed a partnership with C. W. Campbell, and Cary N. Davis, under the firm name of Campbell, Brown & Davis. In 1919, there was a merger of the firms of Enslow, Fitzpatrick & Baker (Mr. Herbert Fitzpatrick he- ing the sole survivor of such firm, and Campbell, Brown & Davis under the firm name of Fitzpatrick, Campbell, Brown & Davis. On March 1, 1922, Mr. Campbell retired from the practice of law, and the present firm of Fitzpatrick, Brown & Davis was formed.

This law firm is state counsel for the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway Company. Other prominent corporate interests represented by them as attorneys are the Western Union Telegraph Company, American Railway Express Company, Columbia Gas & Electric Company, American Car & Foun- dry Company, C. & P. Telephone Company, Huntington Na- tional Bank, First National Bank of Huntington, Hunting- ton Development & Gas Company, Fidelity & Casualty Com- pany, Standard Accident & Insurance Company, and Hunt- ington Water Company. The firm is also financially in- terested in many business affairs.

Mr. Brown besides the honor he enjoys as president of the West Virginia State Bar Association is a former presi- dent of the Cabell County Bar Association, former vice president for West Virginia and member of the American Bar Association. He is a democrat, a member of the Pres- byterian Church, Huntington Rotary Club and Guyandotte Club. During the war he was one of the "Four-Minute" speakers in Cabell County, and was ready with his time and means to further every patriotic drive.

On October 2, 1902, at Williamson, Mr. Brown married Miss Mary G. Williams, daughter of John E. and Flora

144

HISTORY OF WEST VIRGINIA

A. G. (Glidden) Williams. Her father was a leading coal operator at Williamson, where he died, and her mother is still living there. Mrs. Brown is a graduate of the Chicago Conservatory of Music and a proficient violinist. Six chil- dren have been born to their marriage: Walter L., born in 1903, is a graduate of the Huntington High School and now a sophomore in the University of Virginia. John E., born in 1905, is a student in the Augusta Military Academy at Fort Defiance, Virginia. Flora, born in 1907, is in the Huntington High School. The three youngest children are Charlotte, born in 1909, Douglas W., Jr., born in 1912, and Campbell, born in 1915.

HON. LEE DANIEL NEWMAN. Some individuals seem destined from the start to leave a strong impress upon their age and community and to become responsible for much that tends toward the highest possible form of general locality interests. Such men, of necessity, possess dominant per- sonalities and trenchant characteristics, and through them guide others along paths of usefulness and successful and constructive operations. In this class undoubtedly stands Hon. Lee Daniel Newman, police judge of Huntington aud city commissioner of health and charity, whose entire self- made career has been one well worthy of emulation.

Judge Newman was born February 14, 1882, at Sao Paulo, Brazil, South America, a son of Junius E. and Eugenia (Daniels) Newman. Isaac T. Newman, the grand- father of Judge Newman, was born in England, and in young manhood immigrated to the United States, settling in Mason County, West Virginia, where he became a success- ful agriculturist and extensive land owner, he and two others at one time owning practically the entire county. He died there prior to the birth of his grandson. In Mason County he married Mary Elizabeth Elliott, who was born in England and died in Mason County.

Junius E. Newman was born in 1819, in Mason County, Virginia (now West Virginia), where he was reared and educated, and where he early became a minister of the Methodist Episcopal Church. During the Civil war he served as a chaplain in the Confederate army, and following the close of that struggle he became a missionary and as such went to Brazil. There he met Eugenia Daniels, who was born in 1849, at Birmingham, Alabama, hut whose parents, losing all they had in the great struggle between the North and South, had moved to Brazil. Because of failing health and advancing years Reverend Newman gave up his mission- ary labors in 1891 and returned to Point Pleasant, Mason County, West Virginia, where his death occurred in 1892. His widow survived him until November 25, 1921, when she passed away at Huntington. Reverend Newman was a democrat in politics and a member of the Masonic frater- nity. He and his worthy wife were the parents of four children: Alfred E., a construction engineer of San Fran- cisco, California; Lee Daniel, of this notice; Junius E., a newspaper publisher of Dayton, Ohio; and Kate, the wife of Frank McDoney, a train dispatcher at Huntington for the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway.

Lee Daniel Newman received his early education in the rural schools of Mason County, West Virginia, and this was later supplemented hy a correspondence course in civil en- gineering in the International Correspondence School of Scranton, Pennsylvania, and a course in law with Putnam & Sons of New York City. In the meantime, at the tender age of eleven years, he had commenced to work on a farm in Mason County, and when he was seventeen years old secured employment with the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad Company at Huntington, in the service of which he worked his way up to the position of supervisor of electrical equip- ment. He resigned his position in 1916 and from January of that year until June, 1918, was the representative of organized labor for thirteen railroads in the southeastern part of the United States, his work necessitating the spend- ing of much of his time at Washington, D. C. In May, 1918, Mr. Newman was elected commissioner of health and charity and police judge of Huntington, the duties of which positions he assumed in the following month. His offices are situated in the City Hall. Judge Newman has brought to the discharge of his duties a conscientious effort to bring

about movements for the general welfare, and his sincerity zeal and energy have won him countless supporters and admirers.

Politically Judge Newman is a democrat, and hie religious connection is with the Methodist Episcopal Church, South He is a member of Marshall Lodge No. 121, I. O. O. F., of Huntington; Huntington Lodge No. 313, B. P. O. E., and the Guyan Country Club of Huntington. He has a business interest in the Enterprise Garage of this city. Judge New man's modern home is situated at No. 1619 Tenth Avenue in one of the desirable residential districts of the city.

CLARENCE AUBREY BROCKMAN. Circumstances turned C. A. Brockman when a youth into a career associated with the great coal industry of West Virginia, and in the pas. twenty years he has risen high in the ranks of the leading coal operators of the state.

Mr. Brockman, whose home is in Charleston, was born in Louisa County, Virginia, in 1881, and was reared and educated in his native county. In 1900 he came to Wes Virginia and entered the service of the Victoria Coal & Coke Company at Caperton, Fayette County. During the next succeeding two years he filled practically every posi tion in the coal mining industry, including that of min superintendent. So well did he acquit himself in his servic for others that he was admirably qualified to become a coa operator on his own account.

Mr. Brockman established his home in Charleston in 1914 and from that city he conducts his coal operations. He i president of the Stone Cliff Collieries Company, which wa incorporated in December, 1921, with a capital stock o $50,000. The company mines are at Stone Cliff, in Fayett County, on the main line of the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway The production in normal times runs about 60,000 ton annually.

An interesting and perhaps unique distinction is accorde Mr. Brockman among West Virginia coal operators. H was the first operator in West Virginia to establish a prof sharing system in his mines and among his men. The prop erties are operated on this basis, and with a degree c. satisfaction and profit that has put the system beyond a experimental stage, and in one form or another it has bee widely copied and is undoubtedly one of the most munificer principles introduced into American industrial management

Mr. Brockman is also receiver of the Beury Brothers Co: & Coke Company of Charleston. Outside of business inte; ests he is very deeply concerned with Sunday school wor. For several years he has been prominently connected wit the Kanawha County Sunday School Association. He Sunday school superintendent of his home church on th south side of Charleston, the Elizabeth Memorial Methodi. Episcopal Church.

In 1907 Mr. Brockman married Lucy Morton Watt daughter of Rev. Charles E. Watts, of Virginia. They ha' four children, Clarence A., Jr., Winnie Preston, Willia Watts and Lucy Virginia.

JAMES D. WOODROE is a lawyer by profession, and was a active member of the Charleston bar for about five year hut since then has been husily and extensively engaged : real estate operations as a member of the incorporation e Poteet & Woodroe, of which he is vice president ar treasurer.

Mr. Woodroe was born at Waco, Texas, in 1875. His pa ents, both of Scotch ancestry, were Joseph I. and Elizabe (Foyles) Woodroe, natives of North Carolina. In the ear '70s they removed to Texas and lived in Waco until 187 when they returned to Wilmington, North Carolina. Jam D. Woodroe was reared and educated in the City of Wi mington. He studied law in the National University Washington, and, coming to Charleston in 1903, was a mitted to the bar in that city in 1904. Thereafter ] practised as a law partner of W. L. Ashby until ahor 1909. But after 1908 he became associated with Mr. L. 2 Poteet, another Charleston lawyer, in the firm of Poteet Woodroe, real estate. Their first important achievement the real estate field was marketing the new townsite South Charleston. They also did a considerable business

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 48

Author: Publication date: Publisher: Number of Pages:

Author:
Publication date:
Publisher:
Number of Pages: