Greenbrier County, West Virginia Biography of GEORGE LYNN CLARK This biography was submitted by Sandy Spradling, E-mail address: 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 History of Greenbrier County J. R. Cole Lewisburg, WV 1917 p. 96-98 GEORGE LYNN CLARK. Neola is one of the active centers of Greenbrier county It took its start after the Civil war and became a place of conseotience in the time of Jacob Dysard and James Clark. both of this placc, and men of character. Mr. Dysard owned some five or six hundred acres of land in this vicinity, with dwelling house on the other side of Anthony's creek, about opposite the place where George Lynn Clark now lives. His daughter, Mary, was married to James Clark. Her father was a native of Pocahontas county. George Lynn Clark, son of James Clark and grandson of Jacob Dysard, added several improvements to the old homestead. He owns and operates a general store and a saw mill, and besides cultivating a large farm, manufactures six or seven hundred thousand feet of lumber every year for the general market. He is a woodsman of experience, having rafted logs on the Greenbrier for nearly a score of years. As a merchant of fifteen years' experience, he has been successful in building up an extensive trade for the people of that part of the county, and as a genial man and good citizen, he has many warm friends. He built his house in 1908. On April 18, 1900, Mr. Clark married Miss Bertie McHenry Beard, daughter of J. 0. Beard. They are the parents of one daughter, Marie Clark. Mr. Clark has long been identified as a member of the Board of Education. Joseph B. Clark, grandfather of George Lynn Clark, was a native of Virginia. He was born May 1, 1800, and died July 18, 1856. He married Christena Dressler, December 27, 1827. She was born January 14, 1808, and died January 31, 1869. To that union was born James F. Clark, May 15, 1843, one of the heroes of the Civil war. James F. Clark, father of George L., became a distinguished soldier in the Confederate army, and subsequently a member of the State Legislature, where he served his country and his constituency faithfully. By many he was regarded as the ablest and best representative the county ever had and was talked of as a suitable representative in Congress for the Third district. He was a representative of Greenbrier county in 1889 and again in 1891, serving two terms with sufficient ability to cope with the best legal talent in committee rooms or on the floors of the house, He was a man of great courage and of marked convictions, and had a reputation of never having swerved from a strict sense of duty. James F. Clark was born in Covington, Va., and was one of the few men who passed through the war without having a stain left on his character. His father having died when he was in his teens, a responsibility rested upon him while in youth which did much to mould his life in the right way afterward. On May 1, 1862, he joined Bryan's Battery and stood at his post a brave soldier in twenty-one engagements, never shirking duty in camp or on the battlefield. Three days after the surrender of Lee's armv his company was disbanded and he returned to Covington. During that same spring he was offered a collegiate course with all expenses paid if he would take the iron-clad oath, but he preferred a clear conscience, and worked his way to an education by his own efforts. Five years of his life were spent in the Methodist Episcopal church as a minister of the Gospel, and a number of years in teaching in private and public schools, and he never failed to give perfect satisfaction. As a preacher and teacher his services were of a great value, as they were also when serving his country as a lawmaker. Three children were born to Mr. and Mrs. James F. Clark George Lynn, before mentioned; Emma Grace Clark, and Ida Sue Clark, the wife of Lawrence Perry Wolfe. They were married August 21, 1907.