BIOGRAPHY OF HUGH G. SMITH, HARRISON CO,
WEST VIRGINIA

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Submitted by Valerie Crook
(vfcrook@earthlink.net)


The History of West Virginia, Old and New
Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc.,
Chicago and New York, Volume II,
pg. 584-585
Harrison

HUGH GORDON SMITH, of Clarksburg, Harrison County, is
prominently identified with the coal production industry
in this section of West Virginia, and is a popular citizen
of the state that has represented his home from his boy-
hood. He was born at Stevenstone, Ayrshire, Scotland,
November 4, 1879, and is a son of David O. and Jane
(Kelso) Smith, both of the stanchest of Scottish ancestry.
In 1887 David O. Smith, in company with his wife and
their eight children, came to the United States, and on the
17th of April of that year the family arrived at Clarks-
burg, West Virginia. Soon afterward removal was made to
Rosemont, Taylor County, in which locality David O. Smith
worked two years at his trade, that of expert coal miner.
Removal was then made to Elk Garden, Mineral County,
and six years later the family home was established at Mid-
land, Maryland, where the father is now living retired, at a
venerable age, his wife having died while the home was
at Rosemont, West Virginia. All of the eight children sur-
vive the mother and all are now married and well estab-
lished in life.

Hugh G. Smith was seven years old at the time of the
family immigration to the United States, and he received
his early education in the schools of West Virginia, though
he was but twelve years old when he did his first work
in a coal mine. His experience extended until he became a
skilled miner, and at the age of twenty-one years he was
appointed mine foreman for the Davis Coal & Coke Com-
pany at Thomas, Kanawha County. Within a short time
thereafter he gained still more gratifying recognition, being
chosen manager of mines for the Consolidation Coal Com-
pany at Midland, Maryland. In 1907 Mr. Smith opened the
Harrison Mine at Rosemont, West Virginia, and this mine
he continued to operate until 1919, with residence at Rose-
mont. In that year he removed with his family to Clarks-
burg, where the home has since been maintained, as are
also his business headquarters, his offices being in the Union
Bank Building. He was associated with his brother, Alex-
ander G., and their father in the forming of the Harrison
Coal Company, of which he is vice president, as is he also
of the Smith Brothers Coal Company, of Lumberport, Har-
rison County. He is also a director and the general manager
of the Franklin Coal Company, is secretary of the Lau-
retta Coal Company, vice president of the Smith Big Vein
Coal Company, and president of the Percy Oil Company.
In addition to these important connections Mr. Smith is a
director of the Clarksburg Trust Company, the Liberty
Glass Company of Clarksburg and the Prunty Real Estate
Company of this city. He was formerly a director of the
Taylor County Bank, at Grafton. He has served two years
as chairman of the Clarksburg Coal Club. While the busi-
ness interests of Mr. Smith are many and varied, he has
given most of his time to the coal industry, and has found
opportunity also to give helpful manifestation of his un-
bounded civic loyalty and progressiveness. He is a valued
member of the Clarksburg Chamber of Commerce, and holds
membership in the Kiwanis Club, the Old Colony Club, the
Clarksburg Country Club and other representative local
organizations of business and social order. Since 1919 he
has served as commissioner of the Boy Scouts, in the affairs
of which organization he takes deep interest. He and his
wife are zealous members of the First Presbyterian Church
in their home city and the year 1922 finds him in earnest
service as superintendent of its Sunday school.  He is
affiliated with the Masonic fraternity, the Independent
Order of Odd Fellows and the Benevolent and Protective
Order of Elks.

The year 1900 recorded the marriage of Mr. Smith to
Miss Jean Kelso Gibson, who was born and reared in
West Virginia and who, like himself, is of Scotch lineage.
Mr. and Mrs. Smith have two sons, David K. and Thomas M.
He is also a versatile writer. The following verse is on
his native country:

"Scotland is a grand old place,
The land where I was born.
Its beauty and its grandness too - 
May it forever dawn.
The garden spot of peace and love,
And friendship with the land above.
Long may the thistle wave in peace,
The emblem of my country."