History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 3, Part 9

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Harry E. Flesher was about seven years old when his father died, and he had to develop a sense of personal respon- sibility very young. He had little more than a common- school education himself when he taught his first term of country school at the age of fifteen, and he continued teaching while attending the Fairmont State Normal School, and sometime after completing his work there was formally grad- uated in 1897. From rural schools he took charge as principal of the high school at Keyser for eight years, and for two years was superintendent of schools at Kingwood, just prior to becoming superintendent of the state institution at Prunty- town.

He is a republican voter without participation in politics, is a Scottish Rite Mason and Shriner, a past noble grand of the Odd Fellows and past chancellor of the Knights of Pythias, and is a member of the Methodist Episcopal Church. He presides at all the church, Sabbath School and chapel services at the school. February 13, 1912, in Middlesex County, Virginia, he married Miss Martha Johnston Glenn, who was born and reared in that county, daughter of Richard M. and Ann Maria (Blake) Glenn. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Flesher are: Martha Glenn, born in 1913; Harry Edgar, born in 1914; Bettye Games, born in 1917; and James Lakin, born October 15, 1921.

WALTER ELBERT LEACH, county superintendent of schools n Taylor County, made a conscious choice of educational work early in his career, and in a measure was directed into ;hat vocation through traditions of learning and schools nherent in his family. Mr. Leach has been identified with he educational activities of Taylor County now for nearly twenty years.

He was born in Pleasant District, Barbour County, Jan- mary 16, 1884. The Leach family belongs to a period of pioneering in the Shenandoah Valley of old Virginia. Grand- ather Enoch Leach left that valley and moved to Taylor County, West Virginia, was a farmer, possessed a fair educa- ion, and died in Calhoun County of that state. He reared wo sons and four daughters. His son Elias Leach was eight

years old when the family came to West Virginia and he served three years as a Union soldier, enlisting in Barbour County in the 17th West Virginia Infantry. He received promotion while in the army to captain. After the war he devoted his life to his farm, and died in 1911, at the age of seventy-four. He had served as a member of the County Board of Education, was a stanch republican, and member of the Methodist Church. He married Cinderella Gall, whose people were among the first settlers of Barbour County, their home being near Philippi, on farms. Mrs. Elias Leach is living at Webster, West Virginia. She was the mother of nine children, seven of whom reached mature years and five are living: Mrs. Margaret Felton, of Taylor County; Mrs. Elizabeth A. McNemar, of Taylor County; Mollie B., wife of Floyd Talbott, of Berryburg, West Virginia; Hollis D., of Wendel; and Walter E.

Walter E. Leach spent his boyhood near the hamlet of Pleasant Creek, and in the intervals of school attendance worked on the farm. He completed a high school course in Grafton and at the age of twenty-one began teaching in the country districts of Taylor County, and later attended the FairmontNormal School. From 1905 he kept steadily at his work in the schoolroom until elected county superintendent, and in that time had been principal of schools in the com- munities of Simpson, Wendel and Webster. On his highly creditable record as an individual school administrator ha made his race for office in 1918. He was nominated at the republican primaries and elected as successor of Roy J. Martin, taking office in July, 1919.

Mr. Leach began his administration with a substantial program for the securing of better buildings and better school equipment, and since then four new buildings have been erected and completely equipped. He has insisted upon teachers following out the course of studies adopted by the State Board of Education, has striven for better physical conditions, for better qualifications of teachers, and has done something toward encouraging common school graduates to continue their work in high school. Numerous teachers meet- ings are held for the discussion of practical subjects, and through two extension classes opportunities have been pro- vided for the teacher to advance and improve and prepare for credits in the State Normal Schools. Mr. Leach is a thorough school man, and the subject of education is at once his vocation and his hobby.

He is affiliated with the Modern Woodmen of America, the Loyal Order of Moose, and he has been a member of the board of the Methodist Episcopal Church, his wife being also a Methodist. December 31, 1905, in Taylor County, he married Miss Emma B. Haddix, a native of Barbour County, and daughter of John W. and Savanna (Keller) Haddix. Mrs. Leach graduated from high school in her native county, and after attending the Fairmont State Normal School began teaching and is still carrying some work as an educator in Taylor County. Mr. and Mrs. Leach have two children, Wauldron Dowden and Blaine Harold.

CLOYD M. CRANE, representing one of the oldest and best known families of Preston County, has given his best years to commercial work, chiefly as a commercial salesman, and as such he is known all over an extensive territory adjacent to the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad. Mr. Crane lives at Terra Alta and is proprietor of the Highland Cottage, one of the much frequented summer homes of the mountain city.

Mr. Crane was born about three miles from Albright, upon the mountain, June 21, 1868, son of John Calvin Crane, one of the successful farmers and stockmen of that region. Cloyd M. Crane is a brother of Frank Crane, of Albright, and under his name more of the particulars are given concerning this family in Preston County from the beginning of its settlement.

Cloyd M. Crane left the farm at the age of seventeen, after having acquired a public school education, and after teaching a term of country school near Albright he became a clerk at Bruceton Mills for Isaac Armstrong & Son. A short time later he returned to Albright and with James Posten bought a general merchandise store. He continued this business for two years and then established another store at Elkins of the same character. Finally the Albright store was burned, and after disposing of the plant at Elkins Cloyd M. Crane became

HISTORY OF WEST VIRGINIA

manager of a company store at Terra Alta. Later he went into Randolph County, where he was store manager for the McClure-Mabie Company, then for their successors, the Whitmer-Lane Lumber Company. It was from this service that Mr. Crane graduated into his career as a commercial salesman on the road. For two years he represented the Piedmont Grocery Company, opening up new territory along the Baltimore & Ohio between Piedmont and Grafton. Dur- ing that time he was under the management of the well known sales manager M. J. Crooks. Leaving that firm Mr. Crane returned to Terra Alta, and from this point travelled on the road for the Pugh & Beaver Grocery Company until their Terra Alta house was sold to the Whittaker Grocery Com- pany, and since then he has been one of the leaders on the sales force of that company.

For a number of years Mr. Crane has found both pleasure and profit in the business of accommodating the tourist traffic at Terra Alta. He has a generous home on top of the mountain, where he opened his doors to the friends and acquaintances who sought this beautiful spot for their summer vacations. Highland Cottage was built by William Kolk- horst, but he failed in the enterprize, and Mr. Crane bought the uncompleted property, finished it and at times bas en- larged it until the home and surrounding cottages now afford accommodations for seventy-five guests. The season here opens in June and continues until Labor Day.

Mr. Crane grew up in a republican home, cast his first presidential ballot for Benjamin Harrison, and has worked for his party without an undue degree of partisanship or exhaust- ing himself as a campaigner. In 1912 he was nominated and elected to the House of Delegates, and in the session beginning in January, 1913, he was under Speaker George and his house colleague was Senator Cobun of Masontown. He was made chairman of one committee, was a member of the labor com- mittee and was particularly interested in securing the election of a man from his section of the state for the United States Senate and also in securing some legislation upon the hotel question, and concerning the prohibition law of the state. Mr. Crane, to the best of his judgment, performed his duties for one term, and that satisfied bis aspirations as a legislator. He was reared a Methodist, and is president of the Board of Trustees of the Terra Alta Church. He is affiliated with the Masonic Lodge and Chapter, the Commercial Travelers and several other fraternal orders.

In Preston County Mr. Crane married Miss Lona Feather, daughter of Michael E. and Mary (Albright) Feather, both representing some of the prominent family names of Preston County. Her maternal grandfather was Michael Albright. Mrs. Crane was boru near Cranesville, one of three children, the other two being Bert C. Feather, of Pittsburgh, and Pearl, wife of Ed Harner, a farmer near Greensburgh, Pennsylvania. Mr. and Mrs. Crane have two accomplished daughters. Jessie is the wife of Russell L. Smith, of Pittsburgh and has two children, Billie and Barbara Lee. Miss Willard Crane is a graduate of the Pittsburgh College for Women and is a teacher in a private school at Stamford, Connecticut.

WILLIAM HUBERT PENTONY. The people of Tunnelton know and respect William H. Pentony for the industry and faithfulness that have carried him through younger years of considerable struggle, for the success he has made as a mer- chant and business man, and his true citizenship at all times.

Mr. Pentony was born in Lyon District of Preston County, between Reedsville and Gladesville, March 28, 1875. His father, Thomas Pentony, was born in Ireland in 1842. As a young man he came to the United States, and in Preston County he married Matilda Jane Snider, whom he first met in Pennsylvania. Her parents were John S. and Susan (Fast) Snider, the former a farmer in West Virginia who lived in Taylor County until moving to the Lyon District of Preston County. Thomas Pentony died in 1898 and his widow on January 1, 1921. Of their children the only two now living are William H. and Lena, the latter the wife of Luther Helms, of Birds Creek, or Irish Ridge, Preston County.

William H. Pentony spent his early youth on the home farm and left there at the age of seventeen with only a com- mon school education. Away from the farm his first employ- ment was with the Watson Coal Company. For four years he was employed by that and other mining companies in the

vicinity of Fairmont. Day labor furnished him a wage of a dollar and a quarter a day, and in 1898 he returned to Tunnel- ton, still depending upon day wages and frequently working for $1.15 per day. For one year he was also one of the proprietors of a livery business. For ten years Mr. Pentony continued as a worker in the local mines and in 1909 became associated with A. H. Halbritter, under the firm name of Halbritter & Company, and they bought the mercantile business of T. R. Shay. In April, 1917, Mr. Halbritter retired and since then Mr. Pentony has been the sole proprietor of what is now a very prosperous and well stocked establishment, one that has been developed from a small enterprise, its suc- cess being chiefly due to Mr. Pentony's concentrated energies as a merchant and his personal integrity. Mr. Pentony acquired his original capital for this business by borrowing a thousand dollars on some property he owned. That was his only source of credit. He has improved the corner where his business is located, is now one of the stockholders of the Tunnelton Bank, also a director in the same, was one of the organizers of the Raccoon Valley Coal Company, and he owns farming land in Lyon District, including part of the place where he was born and reared, and owns one of the best pieces of residence property in Tunnelton. He is also a stock- holder in the Glass Casket Company at Altoona, Pennsyl- vania.

Through his property management and business Mr. Pentony has contributed his services in a public way to the development of Tunnelton. He has not been in politics for office but some years ago, during the coal miners strike, he consented to serve as chief of police, and rendered valuable service in combating the general disorder that prevailed for a time. He is a stanch democrat, cast his first presidential vote a quarter of a century ago, and has attended congressional conventions. He helped nominate Junior Brown for Congress, and he was the first democrat to represent this district since the days of Willis L. Wilson. Mr. Pentony is a charter mem- ber of Tunnelton Lodge, Knights of Pythias, and during the twenty-one years since its organization he has missed only two meeting nights when possible to be there. He is also affiliated with Aurora Lodge, No. 43, F. & A. M., at New- burg, has taken the Perfection degree in Clarksburg, and the other Scottish Rite degrees at Wheeling.

At Tunnelton in April, 1903. Mr. Pentony married Miss Irma Maud Ashby, who was born at Austen, Preston County, August 15, 1883, daughter of Frank and Elizabeth (May) Ashby. Her parents were born near Fellowsville, Preston County, and her father was a Union soldier with a West Virginia regiment and was wounded while on duty. The children of Mr. and Mrs. Ashby were: Della, who married Henry Wright and is deceased; Minnie, wife of Clinton Stevens, of Hiora, West Virginia; William D. and Albert R., of Tunnelton; Pearl, who died in young manhood; Charles, of Hiora; Mrs. Pentony; and Elizabeth, wife of H. D. Zinn, of Tunnelton.

Mrs. Pentony was reared at Austen, Newburg and Tunnel- ton and acquired a public school education. Their home circle of children comprise six: Hilda Vivian, a student in the State University of West Virginia; Justus M., a sophomore, and Thelma C., a freshman, in the Tunnelton High School; Thomas D., John F. and Blanche Eleanor.

JOSEPH FRANK SMITH, who is more familiarly known by his second personal name, is successfully conducting a hotel in the Village of Cowen, Webster County, and is also the owner and operator of a well improved farm in this local- ity. He was born in Pleasants County, West Virginia, August 4, 1866, and is a son of George L. and Margaret E. (Frink) Smith, both natives of what is now Preston County, this state, where the former was born in 1842 and the latter in 1841, each having been reared on a pioneer farm in that county. After their marriage the parents re- mained on a farm in Preston County until their removal to Pleasants County, where George L. Smith purchased a farm, and he and his wife passed the remainder of their lives on this homestead, he having accumulated and developed a val- uable farm estate of 285 acres and his prosperity having represented the results of his own energetic and well or- dered activities. He and his wife were zealous members

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HISTORY OF WEST VIRGINIA

of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and he was specially ictive in the work of its Sunday school. Mr. Smith was a stalwart republican in politica, and was loyal and public- spirited as a citizen, he having served as a member of the school board of his district. He survived his wife by many years and was about fifty-six years of age at the time of is death. Of their seven children there are living at the ime of this writing, in the spring of 1922: Joseph F., of his sketch, the youngest of the number; William H., a prosperous farmer near Cleveland, Ohio; and Mary, who is he widow of James Riggs and resides at St. Marys, Pleas- ints County, West Virginia .. All of the other children at- ained to maturity.

The home farm on which he was born was the stage of he youthful activities of Joseph Frank Smith, and his early educational discipline included that of the high school at St. Marys. He initiated his independent career when he was but sixteen years of age. He was employed in connec- ion with the construction of the railroad line from Parkers- urg to Kenova, where he served as superintendent of the work, and he continued his association with this line of railroad development about eight years. He purchased a ot in Buckhannon, erected a house on the same and finally sold the property at a distinct profit. After severing his connection with railroad construction he purchased the Summit Hotel at Cowen, and later he purchased a tract of imber land. He cut and manufactured the timber on this and, made development on the tract and eventually sold the same for farm usages, his financial returns from the va- ious activities and the sale having been very appreciable. He is now the owner of the oldest farm in this section of the county, and has made the same one of the model places of this part of the state, the while he has here become a eader in the breeding and raising of Hereford cattle, im- proved Duroc-Jersey hogs, Shropshire sheep and White Leg- jorn poultry. His landed estate in Webster County com- prises 300 acres. His original hotel at Cowen was destroyed oy fire, and he then purchased the Central Hotel, which he las since successfully conducted. In connection with farm industry and business activities Mr. Smith has stood expo- ment of progressiveness, and the same may be said of his ittitude as a citizen, for he is always ready to lend co- operation in the furtherance of measures and enterprises projected for the general good of the community.

Mr. Smith has had much of leadership in connection with the councils and campaign activities of the republican party in Webster County, and has served as chairman of its executive committee for this county. When he was made the party nominee for county sheriff he was defeated by only thirty-two votes, in a county that at that time gave a normal democratic majority of 400 votes. In the Masonic fraternity Mr. Smith is affiliated with Camden Lodge No. 107, A. F. and A. M .; Sutton Chapter No. 29, R. A. M .; Sutton Commandery No. 16, Knights Templars; and Osiris Temple of the Mystic Shrine in the City of Wheeling.

In 1894 Mr. Smith wedded Miss Dora E. Vance, who was reared and educated in Webster County. They have three children: Hosea A. is a graduate of the University of West Virginia; Ruth K. graduated from the State Normal School at Fairmont, and is, in 1922, in the extension department of agriculture in connection with the University of West Vir- ginia at Morgantown; and Joseph F., Jr., is a student in Augusta Military Academy at Fort Defiance, Virginia. Mr. and Mrs. Smith are active members of the Methodist Epis- conal Church, of which he is serving as a member of the official board.

MOUNDSVILLE PUBLIC LIBRARY. The Moundsville Public Library is an institution of which the progressive little City of Moundsville. Marshall County, is justly proud. It was estab- ished in 1917 by the Teachers' Club, under the leadership of Mrs. Frank T. Fulton, to whose initiative and zealous efforts, s an organizer and later as president of the Library Board, he success of the institution is largely due.

In addition to the Teachers' Club various other organiza- ions have given moral and financial aid to the library, espe- ially the Woman's Club and the Tuesday Arts Club, both of which have made annual donations to the institution from ita

inception, and are still lending their support, the Woman'a Club being the first organization in the city to promise en- couragement and a definite aum to the promoters.

Through the efforta of the Library Board several hundred dollars have been subscribed annually by generous citizens, these last mentioned donations making by far the most im- portant source of income to supplement the fund raised by a city tax levy which is now imposed for library purposes.

The library now has a collection of 3,000 volumes, in the assortment of which especial attention is given to the needs of young people, while the general service is of excellent order. Mra. Ida Hankins is the loyal and efficient librarian, ever working to make the library play its proper part in the com- munity life of the city. The library ia open daily from 2:30 to 9 P. M., and is the center of much of the cultural life of Moundsville and Marshall County.

REV. WILLIAM GOTTLOB ULFERT. As head of one of the large congregations in Wheeling and the examplar of exalted ideas of Christianity, perhaps no one has done more in a con- structive way in organizing and promoting the essential in- fluences of the Christian Church in that city than Rev. Mr. Ulfert, pastor of St. John's Evangelical Proteatant Church.

Rev. Mr. Ulfert was born at Landsberg, Brandenburg, Germany, May 18, 1854, son of William G. and Ida (Wilski) Ulfert. His father died in Germany in 1888, and his mother at the age of eighty-two. William Gottlob Ulfert had a broad and liberal training, attending college at Landsberg, and at the age of twenty-four graduated from the University of Berlin, where he studied theology, philology and oriental languages. For one year he was a private preceptor on the island of Rugen, and he also taught a year in his home college at Landsberg.

In 1880 Rev. Mr. Ulfert came to the United States and on May 22, 1880, was ordained as an Evangelical minister. In August of that year he took his first pastorate at Aetna, Pennsylvania, and on November 1, 1884, was installed as pastor of St. John's Evangelical Protestant Church at Wheeling. His ministry here is now approaching its fortieth anniversary, and these four decades have represented a re- markable progress and material prosperity in the church and constant and unremitting duties on the part of the pastor, whose life has been to a singular degree a great conaecration to the ministry of service.

St. John'a Church ia an historic institution of Wheeling. Some of the old German settlers of that city organized it in 1835, the first services being held in North Wheeling. In 1836 the building on Eighteenth, near Jacob Street was erected and was in use until 1869. This old building is still standing, now being used as a mission house for the First Presbyterian Church. In 1871 their church on the aite of the present Baltimore & Ohio passenger atation was finished, and waa the home of the congregation just forty years. When they gave up this place of worship at the request of the railroad com- pany, ground was aecured at the northwest corner of Chapline and Twenty-second streets, where the beautiful new church and parsonage were erected at a cost of $120,000.00. The church auditorium has a seating capacity of six hundred, and there are also auitable office, choir, Sunday School and lecture rooms, and ample kitchen and dining room facilities in the basement. The auditorium is handsomely and richly furnished, containing beautiful memorial windowa. The services of the church alternate in the English and German languages. Many of the elders of the congregation still prefer to listen to God's word associated with the recollec- tions of their youth. The greater part of the active members today are descendants of the original congregation. In 1884, when Rev. Mr. Ulfert became paator, the congregation was comparatively weak in numbers, but for a number of years past it has been one of the strongest congregations in the city. Its communicanta now represent 550 families, besides about 200 single persons not included in the family enumeration. The loyalty of the membership ia a source of constant inspiration to the pastor. One of the prominent ministers of Pittaburgh, Rev. William K. Geese, received hia early religious training as a boy in St. John's Church.

Rev. Mr. Ulfert is an honored member of the Evangelical Protestant Church of North America, affiliating with the branch having headquarters at Pittsburgh. He is a thirty-

HISTORY OF WEST VIRGINIA

second degree Scottish Rite Mason and is chaplain of Wheeling Lodge No. 5, F. & A. M.

January 18, 1883, he married Miss Marie Heinrici, who came to Wheeling as a child with her parents, Rev. Charles and Emma Heinrici. Her father for some years waa pastor of St. Paul's Church in Wheeling. Mr. and Mrs. Ulfert have two children: William Karl Ulfert, a Wheeling physician and surgeon, and Martha, wife of Dr. William Elmer Hodgson, of Mckeesport, Pennsylvania.

JAMES HENRY BOWMAN grew up in the industrial life of the Wheeling District, as a boy was a glass worker, and is now engineer of the Wheeling Corrugating Department of the Whitaker-Glessner Company.

Mr. Bowman was born at Wheeling January 25, 1888. James Bowman, his father, was born near Greggsville in Ohio County, West Virginia, in 1839, and has spent all his active life as a coal miner. He retired in 1917 and since 1889 his home has been at Bridgeport, Ohio, across the river from Wheeling. He is an independent in politics and is a loyal and faithful member of the Church of God. James Bowman married Susan Ann Peyton, who was born in West Virginia. They became the parents of eight children. Jessie, the oldest, is the wife of John Dunfee, lives at Bridge- port and has a daughter, Ethel, born in 1904. The second child, Atha Virginia, was first married to Everett J. Stead, by whom she has a daughter, Virginia, born in 1911, and she is now the wife of John Roberts and lives at Cleveland, Ohio. The third of the family is James Henry Bowman. The fourth, John, a hot mill worker living at Bridgeport, married Catherine Burgman, and their three children are, Elaine, Ruth and John. Mina, is the wife of Ralph Roan, chief draughtsman for the General Electric Company at Huntington, West Virginia, and their three children are Donnas, Theoan and Theodore. Glenna, the sixth child, is the wife of Albert Prince, but has no children. The two youngest of the family, both unmarried and at home, are Andrew, chief clerk in the Construction Department of the Whitaker-Glessner Company, and Mabel, cashier of the Better Store at Wheeling.

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History of West Virginia old and new, Volume 3, Part 9

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