Cabell County, West Virginia Biography of Frank Parsons SLACK 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. 268 Frank Parsons Slack, secretary and treasurer of the West Virginia & Kentucky Insurance Agency, with offices at 531 1/2 Ninth Street in the City of Huntington, is one of the prominent representative s of the general insurance business in this city and state. The company of which he is thus an executive is incorporated under the laws of both West Virginia and Kentucky, his father being vice president of the corporation and George I. Neal, of Huntington, being its president. Mr. Slack was born at Elizabethtown, Hardin County, Kentucky, July 16, 1886, and is a son of John W. and Sallie (Dent) Slack, the former of whom was born at Bardstown, Kentucky, in November, 1851, and the latter at Louisville, that state, July 23, 1855, their marriage having been solemnized in that city, and their home being now maintained at Huntington, West Virginia. John W. Slack was reared and educated at Elizabethtown, Kentucky, where eventually he became successfully established in the mercantile business. In 1891 he removed to Owensboro, that state, where he was identified with the distillery business until 1896, when he engaged in the wholesale liquor trade in the City of Louisville. In 1902 he engaged in the general insurance business in the City of Cincinnati, Ohio, and in 1907 he established himself in the same line of business at Charleston, West Virginia, whence he removed to Huntington in 1914, he being now vice president of the West Virginia & Kentucky Insurance Agency. He is a stalwart advocate of the principles of the republican party, and he and his wife are communicants of the Catholic Church. Of their three children the subject of this sketch is the youngest; Ella Grace is the wife of Paul T. Monarch, who is connect with the Jeffrey-DeWitt Manufacturing company of Kenova, this state, their home being at Huntington. John D. is engaged in the general insurance business at Huntington. In the public schools of Louisville Frank P. Slack continued his studies until he had completed the work of the sophomore year in the high school. At the age of fifteen years he became associated with his father's insurance business, which he represented through Southeastern Kentucky with residence at Pineville, that state. In 1913 he established his headquarters at Georgetown, South Carolina, where he remained two years, as representative of the same insurance agency throughout that state. Thereafter he passed one year in New York City, and on the 1st of January, 1916, he assumed his present dual office, that of secretary and treasurer of the West Virginia & Kentucky Insurance Agency, which under his vigorous and well directed directions and progressive policies has developed the largest exclusive payroll insurance business in the United States. The agency insures employees of coal companies in health and accident indemnity, the coal operators collecting the insurance fees from the payrolls of their corporations. Mr. Slack is a stockholder in the Consolidated Insurance Agency of Huntington, and also in the W. E. Deegan Realty Company of this city. He is a member of the Huntington Kiwanis Club, is a progressive and public-spirited citizen and is independent in politics, his support being given to men and measures meeting the approval of his judgment. He owns his attractive home property at 617 Trenton Place, Huntington. November 29, 1914, recorded the marriage of Mr. Slack and Miss Elizabeth Ann Scobee, daughter of James W. Scobee, who is engaged in the wholesale lumber business at Winchester, Kentucky, his wife being deceased. Mr. and Mrs. Slack have a winsome little daughter, Sarah Hedrick, who was born May 10, 1917. James Slack, grandfather of the subject of this review, was born at Slack's Landing, Pennsylvania, became a pioneer settler at Bardstown, Kentucky, and later owned and operated a tannery at Elizabethtown, that state, where he remained until his death. The family name of his wife was Scott, and she was a kinswoman of Gen. Winfield Scott, the doughty American warrior. John Dent, maternal grandfather of James P. Slack, passed the greater part of his life in the City of Louisville, Kentucky, where he was a leading merchant for many years and where he served during the Civil war as United States provost marshal.