Fayette County, West Virginia          Biography of William Thurmond HARVEY

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The History of West Virginia, Old and New
Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc.,
Chicago and New York, Volume III,
pg. 210

WILLIAM THURMOND HARVEY. An electrical engineer by
training and profession, Mr. Harvey is also a coal mining
expert, and for the past ten years has carried some im-
portant responsibilities in the mining district of Logan
County. He came to this field in 1913, and had the task
of opening Argyle Mine No. 1, and also the mine of the
Thurmond Coal Company in 1917. He is now general su-
perintendent for the Argyle Coal Company's Mine No. 1
on Rum Creek, and No. 2 on Dingess Run, and the Thur-
mond Coal Company's property at Dabney at the mouth
of Rum Creek.

Mr. Harvey was born April 16, 1888, in Fayette County,
West Virginia, on the farm of his parents, John W. and
Lucy A. (Thurmond) Harvey. His father was born in
Appomattox County, Virginia, and was a boy when his
people came to West Virginia. He was a farmer in Fay-
ette County, where he died in 1907, at the age of fifty-
four. In politics he was a democrat. His wife was born
in 1861 at Oak Hill in Fayette County, daughter of Capt.
W. D. Thurmond.

William Thurmond Harvey attended school in Fayette
County, including the Oak Hill High School, and he se-
cured his technical education in the Virginia Polytechnic
Institute at Blacksburg, where he graduated in the elec-
trical engineering course in 1911. He was one of the grad-
uates selected to an apprenticeship and practical course in
the shops of the General Electric Company at Lynn, Mas-
sachusetts, where he went through the shop routine and a
course of instruction as a student engineer. On account of
the proficiency he showed and his evident qualifications he
was selected for the purpose of performing the duties of
opening mines and acting as superintendent in the West
Virginia coal fields.

On October 6, 1920, Mr. Harvey married Helen Lindsay
Barger, daughter of Capt. David H. Barger, now of Shaws-
ville, Virginia, but who formerly was extensively inter-
ested in the Pocahontas coal fields. Mr. and Mrs. Harvey
have established connections with churches in Logan, Bap-
tist and Presbyterian, respectively. He is affiliated with
Aracoma Lodge No. 99, A. P. and A. M., at Logan, Logan
Chapter, R. A. M., Huntington Commandery, K. T., West
Virginia Consistory of the Scottish Rite at Wheeling, and
the Charleston Temple of the Shrine. In politics he is a
democrat.