Cabell County, West Virginia Biography of Rev. William M. LISTER This file was submitted by Joyce Vickers, E-mail address: The submitter does not have a connection to the subject of this sketch. This file may be freely copied by individuals and non-profit organizations for their private use. All other rights reserved. Any other use, including publication, storage in a retrieval system, or transmission by electronic, mechanical, or other means requires the written approval of the file's author. This file is part of the WVGenWeb Archives. If you arrived here inside a frame or from a link from somewhere else, our front door is at http://www.usgwarchives.net/wv/wvfiles.htm The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume II, pg. 264-265 Rev. William M. Lister. The ordinary individual whose years are prolonged beyond middle age sees a future ahead wherein ease and a competency may await him and patiently or otherwise performs his duties until the appointed time, when he sinks more or less into oblivion. There are extraordinary men, however, who have already achieved distinction and won merited rewards before this middle age is reached, and when retirement comes in one direction just as efficiently prove their vitality in other fields, and, in fact, never find lack of interest to inspire or duties to gladly perform to family, church or country. With a splendid record to his credit as a clergyman of the Methodist Episcopal church, Rev. William M. Lister, one of Huntington's most valued citizens, has been equally successful in the real estate business, and for the past five years has devoted his interest to the development of an expanding enterprise. Reverend Lister, realtor, has succeeded Reverend Lister, minister of the Gospel, whose long career in the latter capacity has not only been fruitful of results, but had brought him the affection and esteem of people over a wide territory. Reverend Lister was born July 21, 1866, in Caroline County, Maryland, a son of James Edward and Mary Elizabeth (Cain) Lister. His grandfather, Joshua Lister, was of English-Irish descent and belonged to a family which had immigrated to America in Colonial days and settled in Delaware, in which state he was born in 1776. He spent his entire life in his native state, engaged in agricultural pursuits, and died in 1846, aged seventy years, while his wife, Anna, also a native of Delaware, died when eighty-three years of age. James Edward Lister, who now resides in Caroline County, Maryland, was born June 13, 1837, and has resided in his present community all his life. As a young man he learned the trade of carpentry, which he followed for about thirty years, and then turned his attention to agriculture, becoming a practical farmer, a field of labor in which he gained a wide and well-deserved reputation for general ability, industry and progressive ideas. He is now retired from active pursuits. Mr. Lister is a democrat in politics, and his religious faith is that of the Methodist Episcopal Church, in which he has always been a willing worker and generous contributor. He married Miss Mary Elizabeth Cain, who was born December 27, 1840, in Sussex county, Delaware, and died August 22, 1919, in Caroline county, Maryland. They became the parents of the following children: Martha Jane, who married John L. Reed, of Camden, New Jersey, a stationary engineer; Hester Ann, who died in Caroline County, age twenty-six years, as the wife of George L. Harris, who is still engaged in farming in Caroline County; Mary Etta, who also died in that county at the same age, as the wife of John O. Pippin, a farmer, who is likewise deceased; Joshua L., a practical farmer and accounted one of the best in Caroline County, where he died at the age of forty-three years; William M., of this record; Laura Elizabeth, who died in Queen Anne County, Maryland, age twenty-five years, as the wife of the late Arnold Butler, who was an extensive farmer; Ida May, who died age eighteen years of age; Emma, who died aged seventeen years; Georgia Luvinia, the wife of Louis Butler, one of the progressive and practical agriculturists of Caroline County, Maryland; and Blanche, who died at the age of six months. William M. Lister received his early education in the rural schools of his native community and then attended the high school at Denton, Maryland. This was followed by a course at the Wilmington Conference Academy, Dover, Delaware, where he pursued a classical course of three years. During 1894 he began his career as a pastor of the Methodist Episcopal church when he preached at Pinny Neck, Kent County, Maryland, under the supervision of the Wilmington Conference. Following this he further prepared himself for his chosen calling by a year's attendance at the College at Wilmington, Delaware, and was then pastor for a year at Lumberville, Bucks County, Pennsylvania. Following this he held three pastorates: Woodruff, Cumberland County, New Jersey, three years; Green Creek, Cape May County, New Jersey, three years; Derailed, Cumberland County, New Jersey, one year; Tabernacle, Camden County, New Jersey, one year; In 1904 he was transferred to the West Virginia conference, and preached at Friendsville, Garrett County, Maryland, three years; Aurora, Preston County, West Virginia, one year; and Webster Springs, Webster County, West Virginia, on year. Reverend Lister was then transferred to the Erie (Pennsylvania) Conference, and held the following charges: Wesley, Venango county, Pennsylvania, one year; Wattsburg, Erie County, Pennsylvania, one year; West Monterey, Marion county, Pennsylvania, one year; and Brockport, Elk County, Pennsylvania, one year. He was next returned to the West Virginia Conference, but did not preach during the years 1913 and 1914, being a resident of Sisterville, West Virginia, where he engaged in the manufacture of gasoline as a foreman in the gauging department of the Riverside-Carter Oil Company. In 1915 he resumed preaching at Hamlin, Lincoln County, West Virginia, where he remained one year, and at the end of that time took a retired relationship in the West Virginia Conference, locating at Huntington in 1917. Reverend Lister still preaches occasionally and is holding his local church relations with the First Methodist Episcopal Church of Huntington, taking an active part in all church work. Since taking up his residence in this city he has been engaged in the real estate business, in which he has built up a prosperous and flourishing rental agency, his offices being situated at No. 1040 1/2 Fourth Avenue, Huntington. Reverend Lister is a member of Friendsville (Maryland) Lodge, I. O. O. F., and is an apprenticed Mason. In 1896, at Doylestown, Pennsylvania, Reverend Lister married Miss Jennie Black, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Black, of Lumberville, Pennsylvania. Mr. Black being a retired stone mason. Three children have been born to Reverend and Mrs. Lister. Lawrence Claude, a mail dispatcher at the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad station, Huntington, for the United States Government, who received three months' training at Camp Purdue, Indiana, during the World war and acted as assistant postmaster for the camp. He married Hazel Lunsford and they have one daughter, Lucille Lunsford Lister. Edward Lee is an operator of the machine in a motion picture theater of Huntington. Wilbert Samuel is a clerk for the Miller Supply Company of Huntington.