JOSEPH E. ROBINS

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

pg. 69-70
Kanawha County
JOSEPH E. ROBINS, M. D. A resident of Charleston since
1886, Doctor Robins for a quarter of a century performed
an invaluable and extensive service as a physician and
and surgeon, largely as company physician for coal corpora-
tions, directing and attending to the medical care, sanitary
safeguards provided for mining towns and districts. Doctor
Robins has since retired from the active business of the
profession, but is still prominently identified with the coal
industry and with financial affairs at Charleston.

He was born at Elysbnrg, Northumberland County, Penn-
sylvania, in 1861. He represents an old line of solid Eng-
lish ancestors. One of his forefathers was a Colonel Robins,
on the staff of Cromwell. Prior to the Revolutionary war
the Robins family settled in Northumberland County, Penn-
sylvania. His great-grandfather, Aaron Robins, was a land
owner and merchant in that county, while the grandfather,
Dr. Joseph C. Robins, was a graduate of the University of
Pennsylvania and a physician. Three of his sons followed
the same profession, though Harvey S. Robins, father of
Dr. Joseph E.. was a merchant in Pennsylvania.

Joseph E. Robins graduated from Jefferson Medical Col-
lege in Philadelphia in 1883. and for several years prac-
ticed at Mount Carmel, Pennsylvania. On coming to
Charleston, West Virginia, in 1886, he became surgeon for a
number of the coal companies in the New River coal fields.
Subsequently he represented several large coal corporations,
and during a busy twenty-five years had thousands of miners
and their families under his care. Doctor Robins is one of
the distinguished men in his profession in the state. Tor
nineteen years he was a member of the State Board of
Health and for several years its president. Tor thirteen
years he was a member of the National Guard of West Vir-
ginia, and was chief surgeon during the period of martial
law, 1912, on Paint and Cabin creeks, serving with the rank
of major. He has been retired from medical practice now
for several years.

His connection with the coal industry of West Virginia
and Kentucky involves large financial interests. He is a
stockholder or director in a number of coal companies. He
was formerly president of the National City Bank of
Charleston, which was merged with the present Charleston
National Bank, of which he is vice president. This is the
largest National Bank in the state.

During the war with Germany Doctor Robins was a mem-
ber and examining surgeon for the Charleston Draft Board.
The duties of this office kept him busy for many months,
literally day and night. The tremendous volume of work
accomplished by the board, and its generally high record
of efficiency, were due not only to the individual exertions
of the three members but to the extra help employed by
them, an employment made possible chiefly through sub-
stantial contributions of money on the part of Doctor Bob-
ins and his two associates.

The outstanding civic interests of Doctor Robins is his
work in behalf of education in Charleston. He has been a
member of the Charleston Board of Education since 1915.
He was elected president of the board in 1919 and reelected
in 1921. The half dozen years of his membership have been
coincident with a remarkable degree of progress in the
material and educational equipment of the Charleston
schools. The city now has a magnificent high school and
many grade schools, and the board now has a building pro-
gram involving the expenditure of more than half a million
dollars in 1922 and for two or three years following.
Doctor Robins has three children: His daughter Madge
is the wife of Mr. Kemp Littlepage, of Charleston. His
older son, Dr. Joseph E. Robins, Jr., pursued a literary
coarse in the University of West Virginia and graduated
in the medical department of the University of Cincinnati,
is now practicing medicine. The younger son, Hugh Barbee
Robins, was a literary student of the University of Penn-
sylvania and now is a student of medicine in the University
of Cincinnati.

Submitted by:  vfcrook@trellis.net (Valerie F. Crook) 

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