History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 3, Part 49

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real estate auction and special sales, but in recent years their operations, involving a thorough and systematic organ- ization, have been in the sub-division field, supplemented by a general brokerage business and the building of houses.

Poteet & Woodroe was incorporated in 1921 with an authorized capital stock of $300,000. The purpose of the corporation was to develop more adequately the growing interest involved in the building of moderately priced homes. The facilities of the organization in this respect are probably not excelled by those of any similar firm in West Virginia. The officers of the corporation are L. E. Poteet, president, J. D. Woodroe, vice president aud treas- urer, and Hugh W. May, secretary.

Since its organization Mr. Woodroe has been one of the moving spirits of the Charleston Real Estate Board. He was the first secretary and vice president of the board, and has also served as president. He has been president of the West Virginia Real Estate Association and a member of the executive committee of the National Association of Real Estate Boards. He is a member of the Edgewood Country Club. Mr. Woodroe is a communicant of St. John's Episco- pal Church and also has charge of the affairs of St. Matthew's Church on the South Side. St. Matthew's was founded as a mission of St. John's, but is now an inde- pendent parish.

Mr. Woodroe married Miss Jane Welles May, of Savannah, Georgia, daughter of Dr. William F. and Cath- arine (Cohen) May, of that city. Their five children are Elizabeth, William, Clarence, Mary and Jane.

GEORGE E. MILLER, a resident of Charleston, came to West Virginia over twenty years ago, bringing with him a long and thorough experience in the oil industry, and in this state he has had a prominent share in the oil and gas production in the various fields.

Mr. Miller was born at Spartansburg, Crawford County, Pennsylvania, in the very heart of the original oil fields of America. His boyhood was spent in the atmosphere of oil production, and from that environment he undoubtedly discovered what has been his main business in life. As a boy he learned telegraphy. He was appointed agent and telegraph operator at Petroleum Center, Pennsylvania, in the heart of the old oil fields. Petroleum Center was a famous oil town and a large one in its early days, though now hardly anything remains to show its former glory. After two years as agent for the railway company there he entered the service of the National Transit Company on a pump station in Clarion County. From there he came to West Virginia in 1900, and since then has been continuously en- gaged in the oil industry here.

His first location was at Fairview in Marion County, where he was associated with the South Penn Oil Company of Pittsburgh. He was with that corporation ten years, and then engaged in the oil and gas business for himself. While his interests have included oil and gas production, for a number of years his chief activities have been the handling of royalties and oil and gas leases in the West Virginia field. He established his home in Charleston in 1916. He and his family have become prominent members of the social and business interests of the capital city. He is public spirited in all his attitudes and relationship and is a member of the Kiwanis Club, a thirty-second degree Scot- tish Rite Mason, a Knight Templar and a Shriner.

Mr. Miller married Miss Cordelia Griffith, of Maryland. Their two children are George E., Jr., and Miss Ruth. George E. Miller, Jr., is a graduate of the University of Wisconsin and is now an engineer with the State Road Commission of West Virginia. Ruth is a graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music at Boston, and is now instructor in music at Coker College, Huntsville, South Carolina.

LEWIS VAN GILDER GUTHRIE, M. D. While all medical men are nominally dedicated to the service of humanity, there are in every state a few outstanding men who have in a peculiar degree made their work truly a ministry of service. In the nature of circumstances such work cannot be broadly appreciated. Normal conditions are those of

health and well being, and the healthy and prosperous seldom know much of the unfortunate substratum of hu- manity. It is within the membership of the medical pro- fession itself, officials of the State Board of Control, inter- ested visitors from abroad, and the families of unfortunate patients who know and value properly the great and noble service performed by Dr. L. V. Guthrie for twenty-five years as superintendent of West Virginia's Hospitals for the Insane. For twenty years his work has been with the Hunt- ington State Hospital, and those who have observed his treatment of the unfortunate there have counted it a revela- tion. Possessing a scientific knowledge unsurpassed in his calling, Doctor Guthrie multiplies his value by a kindly sympathy and firmness that endcars him to all concerned with the success of such an institution as that at Hunting- ton.

Doctor Guthrie inherited traditions of honorable service and grew up in a home atmosphere calculated to arouse in him high ideals. His father was the late Judge Francis Asbury Guthrie, who died at Point Pleasant, West Virginia, in 1904, after forty years of honorable professional and public service for the state. He was born in Tyler County, West Virginia, April 12, 1840, son of Francis Guthrie, grandson of Dr. Nathan G. Guthrie and a descendant of John Guthrie, who came from Edinburg, Scotland, to Boston, Massachusetts, in 1682. Francis Guthrie was a native of New York State, and for forty years was a min- ister of the Methodist Episcopal Church in West Virginia, where he died at the age of eighty-four. Judge Francis A. Guthrie left the college at Meadville, Pennsylvania, to enlist as a private in the Union army, September 10, 1861, in November, 1862, was promoted to first lieutenant and in March, 1863, to captain of Company E, One Hundred and Eleventh Pennsylvania Infantry. At the close of the war he entered the University of Michigan, graduated in law, and thereafter practiced his profession at Point Pleasant. He served as state prosecuting attorney, and in 1880 was elected judge of the Seventh Judicial Circuit, and twice re- elected, his death occurring at the close of twenty-four years of consecutive service on the bench. Judge Guthrie married Clara Van Gilder, and their only child is Lewis Van Gilder Guthrie.

Doctor Guthrie was born at Point Pleasant, West Vir- ginia, January 8, 1868. He was educated in the free schools, in the Virginia Polytechnic Institute at Blacksburg, in Roanoke College at Salem, Virginia, and in 1889, at the age of twenty-one, graduated from the College of Physicians and Surgeons at Baltimore, where as an undergraduate he was assistant resident physician at the Maternity Hospital. For nine years Doctor Guthrie enjoyed a successful private practice at Point Pleasant. On June 1, 1897, he was ap- pointed superintendent of the second hospital for the insane at Spencer, now known as the Spencer State Hos- pital. On June 4, 1901, Doctor Guthrie accepted his first office as superintendent of the Huntington Hospital. This institution had been established in 1897 as the West Vir- ginia Asylum for Incurables, but in 1901 the scope of its service was modified so that it has since been an institution for epileptics and other incurable mental defectives. It was Doctor Guthrie who eventually succeeded in getting the change of name, eliminating the word asylum, to Hunting- ton State Hospital.

In and for this state hospital Doctor Guthrie has labored with unflagging zeal now for twenty years and, including his previous service at Spencer, he has been under seven different governors, a fact that to persons understanding the fluctuations of politics is peculiarly significant of Doctor Guthrie's splendid abilities and consecration to his task. While the great work of treatment, restoration of mind and character, recovery to good citizenship of many pronounced incurable, and the amelioration of conditions surrounding those permanently afflicted might properly be considered in any personal sketch of Doctor Guthrie, it will be rather the purpose of this article to indicate some of the distinctive honors paid Doctor Guthrie by his profession and his in- dividual contributions to the growing body of knowledge that will be used by future generations of those entrusted with the guardianship and care of the mentally defective.

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On November 9, 1918, Doctor Guthrie volunteered for the Medical Reserve Corps, but owing to his official position his services were retained in this country. He acted as a member of the Medical Advisory Board of the Third Dis triet, and volunteered as a private in the Home Guards dur- ing the active period of the war. He was appointed acting assistant surgeon of the United States Public Health Serv- ice, of which he is now consulting neuro-psychiatrist. He is consulting psychiatrist of the United States War Risk In- surance for West Virginia, is medical examiner of the Cabell County Lunacy Commission and chairman of the advisory committee of the State Conference of Charities and Corrections. He is a Fellow of the American Medical Asso- ciation, a Fellow of the American Psychiatrist Association, of which he is auditor and member of the Council, is a member of the West Virginia State and Cabell County Medical societies, and is chairman of the West Virginia Mental Hygiene Commission. In July, 1921, Doctor Guthrie was appointed medical advisor for the State Board of Control.

Besides his various official reports Doctor Guthrie is author of papers and addresses and pamphlets that are in- cluded in permanent medical literature. He is author of "Insanity more Preventable than Curable," published in 1914; "Dementia Praecox-Observation and Treatment," read at the fiftieth annual meeting of the West Virginia Medical Association in 1917; the "Feeble Minded, with special reference to Juvenile Delinquency and Venereal Diseases," a paper read at a Red Cross Home Conference at Morgantown in 1918; "Maniac Depressive Psychosis, " read at the fifty-third annual meeting of the State Medical So- ciety in 1920; "The Mental Defective in West Virginia, as Found by a Recent Survey," read at the fifty-fourth an- nual meeting of the State Medical Association, Charleston, West Virginia, May 24, 1921, and "The Mental Defective in Relation to the Commonwealth," read at the annual meeting of Woman's Club, held at Huntington in 1921. He was chairman and author of the "Report of the Committee on Nursing," presented at the seventy-sixth annual meeting of the American Medico-Psychological Association at Cleve- land in 1920.

While at Spencer Doctor Guthrie was president of the Bank of Spencer and in Huntington is vice president of the First National Bank and interested in a number of other corporations. He is a republican, and his first political appointment came from President Harrison, who made him local pension examining surgeon. Doctor Guthrie is a Knight Templar and thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason. On June 15, 1889, at Point Pleasant, he married Margaret Lymm English, daughter of Judge John W. and Fannie (Lewis) English. Her father was a distinguished West Virginia jurist, at one time a member of the Court of Appeals. Doctor and Mrs. Guthrie have two daughters: Kathleen Lewis, wife of Frank W. Mccullough, and Fannie Elizabeth.

W. A. DRIEHORST. Two attractive residential districts on the National Road, now included within the corporate limits of the City of Wheeling, are Fulton and Birch Lynn, and he whose name initiates this paragraph is vice-president of the Bank of Fulton, besides being engaged in the grocery business at Birch Lynn and Edgewood, all of these places being attractive suburbs of Wheeling.

Mr. Driehorst claims Wheeling as the place of his nativ- ity, his birth having here occurred January 4, 1851, and he being a representative of an old and honored family of this section of the state, as data on other pages of this publication clearly indicate. He gained his early educa- tion in the schools of his native city and as a young man became identified with the retail grocery business, in which he eventually became one of the principals in the Albert Stolze Company, with which he continued his connection twenty-five years, he having been in the employ of the con- cern fifteen years and having then been admitted to part- nership. Eventually he became the sole owner of the busi- ness, which he incorporated under the title of the W. A. Driehorst Company. Thereafter he continued the enter-

prise at the same location until about 1915, when he erected his present store as a branch establishment. About three years later he sold the store and business in the city and has since concentrated his mercantile interests in the suburban stores. The establishment is one of large capacity, with the best of stock at all times, aud commands a sub- stantial and prosperous business, in the conducting of which about fifteen employes are retained. Mr. Driehorst is presi- dent of the company, is a director of the Wheeling Whole- sale Grocery Company, and is vice-president of the Fulton Bank & Trust Company. For the past five years he has been treasurer of St. John's German Evangelical Church, of which he and his wife are zealous communicants. Mrs. Drie- horst, whose maiden name was Nellie Leonhardt, is a daughter of the late Adam Leonhardt, who was a tailor by trade and who came to Wheeling from Marietta, Ohio, at which latter place Mrs. Driehorst was born. Mr. and Mrs. Driehorst have four sons: Leonhardt is now an inter- ested principal in the grocery company of which his father is the executive head; Howard is employed in the Dollar Savings & Trust Company's offices at Wheeling; and Robert and William A., Jr., are attending the public schools. Mr. Driehorst is affiliated with the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks and the Ancient Order of United Workmen.

JOHN S. NAYLOR COMPANY. Up and down the Ohio Val- ley and over portions of the several states that regard Wheeling as their wholesale and distributing center, there is perhaps no organization more suggestive of permanence, the bed-rock principles of commercial integrity, and effi- ciency of the service implied in a wholesale, jobbing and importing firm than the John S. Naylor Company. There are merchants who regard it as a distinction that they have had uninterrupted dealings with this concern since they started in business, and there are not a few wholesalers who acknowledge the great value of their foundation experience as employes or traveling representatives of this old house. A brief sketch of the business will therefore be generally appreciated.

Historically the present company is a continuation of the enterprise started during the decade of the '30s hy two brothers, T. and H. Hornbrook, who conducted a little notion jobbing house at Wheeling when that city derived its chief importance from its location on the Ohio River and the national road. The John S. Naylor Company, there- fore, can claim a history of nearly ninety ears. The Horn- brooks were succeeded a few years before the Civil war by George K. Wheat. About 1869 the late John S. Naylor acquired a fourth interest in the business, the firm being known as Wheat, Isett & Naylor. Some half a dozen years later Mr. Naylor bought the Isett's interest, and the firm, Wheat & Naylor, continued until about 1889, when, with the retirement of Mr. Wheat, the business was continued as John S. Naylor and Company. In 1907 John S. Naylor, with three of his sons, A. G., Joseph R. and Wilson, and Mr. H. L. Henderson, as officers and principal stockholders incorporated the business as the John S. Naylor Company. These successive changes are a very brief historical com- ment upon a business that has rendered service from the time of the administration of President Andrew Jackson to that of President Harding of the present day. The trade territory of the modern firm is a large part of West Vir- ginia, Western Pennsylvania and Eastern Ohio, and the house is represented by fifteen traveling salesman. The present officers of the company are Joseph R. Naylor, presi- dent; H. L. Henderson, vice president; Wilson Naylor, treasurer; and George J. Eberts, secretary.

The late John S. Naylor, who was actively associated with the business for nearly half a century and was the leading spirit in its modern development, was born in Morgan County, Ohio, in 1843. His father, Joseph R. Naylor, was a teacher in early life, and for some years was a merchant at Wellsburg, West Virginia. He died at the age of sixty- seven. John S. Naylor acquired a common school educa- tion, during his boyhood and early youth worked at farm. ing and as clerk in a general store, and in 1865 came to Wheeling and for about a year was a salesman in the whole

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ale business of George K. Wheat. Subsequently he ac- uired an interest in the partnership, and for nearly thirty ears was the real head of the business.

John S. Naylor, who died November 25, 1916, at the age f seventy-three, was one of the incorporators and a director f the Wheeling Title & Trust Company, subsequently merged with the Dollar Savings & Trust Company. While ever aspiring to political office, as a democrat he was ctive, serving as chairman of the County Committee, as a lelegate to the National Democratic Convention and as a residential elector. He was one of the three West Vir- inia Commissioners to the World's Columbian Exposition at Chicago in 1893. He was a trustee of Bethany College, and vas an earnest member of the First Christian Church at Wheeling. He was a successful business man with high deals of citizenship.

At Marietta, Ohio, in 1868, lie married Miss Anna Wen- lelken. They were the parents of four sons: R. B., A. G., Joseph R. and Wilson.

NORMAN GARRISON. The home and farm of Norman Gar- ison are located on Pedlar Run, a mile south of Core Post Office, Clay District of, Monongalia County. Mr. Garrison las lived there practically all his life, but his influence and activities have not altogether been confined to the farm. He has been one of the efficient citizens of Monongalia County, and the people of the county particularly remember is work as deputy and chief assessor of the county.

Mr. Garrison was born in this vicinity, August 18, 1869, on of Captain Alpheus and Charlotte (Henderson) Garri- on, who moved to the farm where Norman lives when the atter was an infant. Captain Garrison was born in Greene County, Pennsylvania, February 26, 1833, son of David and Catherine (Ingal) Garrison. David Garrison was one of everal brothers who came from Ireland, was reared in Greene County, Pennsylvania, in carly life moved to Guern- ey County, Ohio, and subsequently to the Pedlar Run sec- ion of Monongalia County, West Virginia. He finally went o Tyler County, West Virginia, where he died when old. Japt. Alpheus Garrison was still a lad when his parents ame from Ohio to West Virginia, and as a youth in Monon- alia County he taught four winter terms of school. At he outbreak of the Civil war he was chosen provost marshal nd served one year and then became second lieutenant of Company E of the Seventeenth West Virginia Infantry. He elped raise that company and subsequently was promoted ver a first lieutenancy to captain, and had command of is company during the remainder of the war. Most of he time he was stationed in the southern part of the state, nd had charge of scouting detachments and frequently ame in contact with details of the enemy, involving much ghting and danger. He was mustered out at Wheeling t the end of the war, and about 1870 he settled on the resent farm of Norman Garrison. In connection with arming he established in 1873 a general store, known as he Pedlar Run or Garrison Store, and was also postmaster f Pedlar Post Office. He continued his store and his other usiness there for twenty-seven years. Pedlar Run ac- uired its name from the fact that during one extreme win- er in the early days two pack pedlars were found frozen o death along its banks. Captain Garrison lived retired or a number of years and died January 21, 1917. His ridow, Charlotte, is still well preserved, though in her nine- ieth year. She was born in this locality, daughter of David nd Elizabeth (Morris) Henderson. Captain Garrison and rife reared six children: Marion Simon, a former sheriff nd prominent public leader in Monongalia County, now etired at Morgantown; Celina Ann, who died at the age f twenty-three, wife of Philip Michael; Elizabeth Cath- rine, wife of Perry M. Johnson, of Pentress; Narcissus 'rudence, wife of William F. Blair, of Waynesburg, Penn- ylvania; David Luther, of Morgantown, and Norman.

Norman Garrison grew up on the farm, acquired a com- ion school education and has found in farming an agree- ble and profitable outlook for his business energies. He rst became acquainted with the responsibilities of com- aring the assessment rolls of the county as deputy under

County Assessor, Peter W. Core, after four years he was reappointed deputy under E. W. Griffith, and after eight years as deputy he was elected county assessor in 1913, being the regular republican nominee. Mr. Garrison dis- tinguished his incumbency of the assessor's office by mak- ing some changes in the interests of efficiency, simplifying the office routine, reducing the working force, and particu- larly created a stir in official circles at the Court House by introducing a typewriting machine, which the County Court refused to pay for the first year, though they allowed it as an item of expense the second year, after Mr. Garrison had thoroughly demonstrated its value. After retiring from the office of county assessor Mr. Garrison was defeated for nomination for county sheriff. He is still active as a party worker, but since leaving Morgantown has given careful attention to his farm. He has an oil well on the farm, but the coal resources have not yet been developed. Mr. Gar- rison is a member of the Dolls Run Christian Church.

At the age of twenty-two he married Ettie Barrickman, daughter of John C. and Barbara (Michael) Barrickman. Her father, who is still living, was a deputy sheriff four years during the eighties. Mr. and Mrs. Garrison have nine children: Robert Rex, an oil man at Core; Charlotte Cath- erine, wife of Arthur Shiveley, of Weston; John Irad, an oil operator who lives at home; Alpheus Link, an oil man in Harrison County; Alma Cecil, wife of Harry M. Davis, an oil man at Core; while the four younger children, all at home, are Freda Bess, Mary J., Mildred Irene and Vir- ginia Ruth.

CHARLES HILLEGAS CORE is a factor in the continuation of farming, merchandising and other activities that have been carried on in the Clay District of Monongalia County at Core Post Office for a long perid of years.

His birthplace was a farm a mile from his present home, where he was born March 14, 1875, son of Edgar Wilson and Landora Olive (Sturgeon) Core. Edgar W. Core was born in the same vicinity February 16, 1837, and died April 23, 1919, in his eighty-third year. His father, Michael Core, was also a native of Monongalia County, born near Cass- ville. The first generation of the family in this part of West Virginia was represented by Stoffle, another name for Christopher Core, who came from the Shenandoah Valley and located in a wilderness still infested by Indians. Stoffle Core lived here and died at good old age. Michael Core lived out his life in that vicinity, dying when past sev- enty, and his wife, Christinia Shriver, also died when old. They had six sons in all: Asa, who became a pioneer in Nebraska, where his descendants still live; Christopher, who died in middle life in Monongalia County; Isaac, who had operated a grist mill on Dunkard Creek and in old age moved to Tyler County, West Virginia; Abe, who lived most of his life in Tyler County, where he still has de- scendants; and Benjamin, who, like the other brothers, followed farming and lived at the old homestead at Core. There was also a daughter, Mrs. Wash Tennant, who died, leaving no children.

Edgar Wilson Core grew up in the Clay District and mar- ried a neighbor girl, Landora Olive Sturgeon, daughter of William Sturgeon. She died in 1885, when ahout thirty- eight years of age. Edgar W. Core early in his married life established his home where his son Charles now lives, owning about three hundred acres and engaging in general farming. His farm was also developed for oil, and there are two small wells producing today and paying royalties. About twenty years ago the Pittsburg vein of coal under- neath the farm was sold, but has not yet been developed. Edgar W. Core never sought the honors of public life, was a republican, a member of the Home Guard during the war, and a working member of Dolls Run Christian Church. Core Station was named in his honor, and for thirty years previously a star route post office had also been designated Core. Edgar W. Core in early life was a cattle drover, assisting his father in taking many droves over the moun- tains to Philadelphia, and they were in that business until the building of railroads gave an improved means of trans- portation. The family of Edgar W. Core consisted of three

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History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 3, Part 49

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