Jules A. Viquesney Biography Barbour County, WV ********************************************************************** USGENWEB NOTICE: These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by any other organization or persons. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material, must obtain the written consent of the contributor, or the legal representative of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. ********************************************************************** Submitte by: Valerie Crook The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 490-491 Barbour 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 become a farmer, though he and his wife eventually re- turned to France and passed the remainder of their lives in their native land. Charles E., Jr., wag reared to manhood on the pioneer farm, and here he maintained his home until the close of his long and useful life. His brother, Jules A., removed to Indiana, where he died, as did also the brother Alfred. G. A., the next younger brother, settled at Little Rock, Arkansas, but made many trips back and forth to France, in which country he now resides, at the age of eighty-four years (1922). Eugene, youngest of the brothers, returned to France with his parents. In the Civil war period Charles E. Visquesney, Jr., was conducting a blacksmith shop in the present Belington neighborhood, and he was also identified with farm en- terprise in this county for many years. During the last fifteen years of his life he was a traveling salesman for the monument establishment of Fred A. Lang & Company of Clarksburg, and in this connection he became well known throughout the state. He was a stanch Union man in the Civil war period and was a republican in politics. He died in 1896, at the age of seventy-two years, and his widow passed away in May, 1919, at the ven- erable age of eighty-four years. They became the parents of ten children: Virginia (Mrs. Shomo), of Junior, Bar- bour County; Benjamin F., a truck gardener at Elkins, Randolph County; Sarah R., wife of Dr. U. S. Simon, a chiropractic physician at Johnstown, Pennsylvania; Polly A., wife of George Hayes, of Junior; Lewis N., a resident of Junior and serving as deputy sheriff of Barbour County; Julia F., wife of Edward W. Lee, of Junior; Laura B., the wife of William A. Simon, residing near Junior; Jules August, the immediate subject of this review; Lillie Bird, who died at Junior, she having been the wife of Charles Wilson, Jr.; and Charles E. Viquesney, who was the second in order of birth and died at the age of eighteen years. Jules A. Viquesney gained his early education in the public schools of Barbour County and later took a busi- ness course in the Methodist Episcopal Seminary at Buck- hannon. He made a record not only as a successful teacher in the rural schools but also as a specially skilled teacher of penmanship. For a period of about five years he was telegraph operator and assistant station agent for the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, and after leaving this service at Belington he here engaged in the real estate business, besides serving as justice of the peace. He read law with J. Blackburn Ware, his present law partner, and also spent a term in the law department of the State University. He was admitted to the bar in 1905, and has since been associated with his former preceptor, Mr. Ware, in the practice of his profession at Belington, though his law service is now principally in an advisory capacity, as a well fortified counselor. He cast his first presidential vote for Gen. Benjamin Harrison, and has since continued a leader in the local councils of the republican party in Barbour County. He has served as a member of the republican county and congressional committees and has attended practically every state convention of his party in West Virginia from the time of his majority to the present. Governor Dawson appointed him a member of the Board of Directors of the State Hospital for the Insane at Spencer, and later appointed him forest, game and fish warden of the state, an office of which, by ap- pointment under the administrations of Governors Glass- cock and Hatfield, he continued the incumbent nearly ten years. Within this- period he organized the Allegany and Cheat Mountain clubs, and instituted the lockout stations and patrols for the protection of West Virginia forests from damage by fire. Mr. Viquesney was prominently identified with the founding of the now vital little city of Belington, and he was elected the second mayor of the place, he having there- after been elected to this office six times, though his terms were not consecutive, and his seventh term as mayor having resulted from his election in March, 1922, so that he is the 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 lumber industry. He is a director of the Tygart Valley Orchard Company, representing one of the largest commercial orchard enterprises in the state, and at Junior he is the owner of a fine individual orchard. On his farm in that locality he specializes in the raising of potatoes, and in 1915 he sent forth the first carload of potatoes ever shipped from Barbour County. He has since shipped in a single year as many as eleven carloads, 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 (if Belington. In December, 1892, occurred the marriage of Mr. Viquesney and Miss Dora J. Yeager, daughter of William and Martha (Arbogast) Yeager, of Barbour 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. Haller, and the one child of this union is a daughter, Joan Yvonne. Herman V. Viquesney volunteered in the Signal Corps of the United States Army when the nation became 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- 21 was a successful and popular teacher in the public schools of this city, where she is now serving as stenographer in her father's office.