Lincoln County, West Virginia Biography of ARTHUR W. MCLEAN This biography was submitted by Valerie Crook, 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. 564-565 Lincoln ARTHUR W. MCLEAN is one of the active factors in the commercial development of Lincoln County, and a man whose efforts, always successful, have not only given him a fortune and high standing, but have also brought about many desirable changes in the several localities in which he has labored, and brought into affluence more than one person who has been associated with him. It is such men as he who are the real leaders, for through them come the chances in business life which mark the difference between mere existence and a proper manner of living. At present Mr. McLean is devoting much of his time and attention to the management of the West Hamlin Mercantile Company and the Lincoln Feed & Produce Company, of which he is one of the owners. Born at Wilkesboro, North Carolina, November 12, 1866, Arthur W. McLean is a son of Isaac and Harriet (Perkins) MeLean, both of whom were born in North Carolina. Isaac McLean was a farmer and took a very active part in church and school work, and served for years as a trustee of his school district. The paternal great-grandfather was Dun- can McLean, and he and his son, David McLean, the grand- father of Arthur W. McLean, were very early settlers of Wilkes County, North Carolina, and closely connected with much of its pioneer history. Growing up in his native city, Mr. McLean attended its public schools and a private school conducted by Rev. R. W. Barber, which institution, for boys only, was located two miles outside of Wilkesboro. It was a very high-class school, and Mr. McLean remained a student of it until he was eighteen years of age. At that time he went just across the state line into Virginia and worked in a saw-mill, his duties being firing the engine that furnished the power, and he remained on this job for six months, and then went to Cranberry, North Carolina, to run the steam drill in the iron mine. Leaving the mine after a year, he obtained em- ployment on the construction of a tunnel at Alban, near Birmingham, Alabama. This tunnel begins near Leeds, and he worked on it for nine months, but then left for Point Pleasant, West Virginia, to help build the Baltimore & Ohio bridge across the Kanawha River. After four months on this construction job he began steamboating on the Kanawha River, towing coal barges, and this occupied him for two years. He then began railroading, and for eight years was a brakeman for the Chesapeake & Ohio Railroad. During all of this time Mr. McLean was gaining an experi- ence of men and affairs which was to be very valuable to him later on in life, but it was not until he entered the mercantile field that he found the work for which he was eminently fitted by nature and inclination. It was upon leaving the Chesapeake & Ohio that he formed connections with Charles Love, of Barboursville, West Virginia, which he maintained for fourteen months, in that time acquiring a knowledge of merchandise that enabled him to take a position as traveling salesman for Blake, Bell & Company of Huntington, West Virginia, and he remained with this concern for a year, leaving them to occupy a similar posi- tion with the Newberry Clay Shoe Company. After three years on the road as this company's representative he went into the hotel business at Logan, West Virginia, where he opened and placed upon a paying foundation the popular Buskirk Hotel, but subsequently sold it. In the meanwhile he organized the Logan Laundry and Bottling Works, of which he was president for eighteen months, and retained his interest in it for some time after he sold his hotel, but eventually he disposed of it also. In 1907 he came to West Hamlin and organized the West Hamlin Mercantile Com- pany, which has been developed into the leading establish- ment of its kind in Lincoln County. In 1893 Mr. McLean married at Barboursville, West Vir- ginia, Miss Nellie Blake, and they had three children: Birdie, Mary and Virginia. Mrs. McLean died in 1911. In 1917 Mr. McLean married Mrs. Nettie Davis, of Barbours- ville, and she died in 1919, of influenza. In November, 1920, Mr. McLean married Miss Matilda Craig, of Yates, West Virginia, a daughter of Joseph and Lucy Craig. For a number of years Mr. McLean has been a zealous member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, South. He belongs to the Junior Order of American Mechanics. His interest in West Hamlin is a strong one, and he has displayed his faith in the future of his home by supporting its best develop- ment in every way. As a high-class merchant he is giving his fellow citizens a service, and placing within their reach timely stocks of the best goods at prices uniformly as low us is consistent with market quotations. While he has not cared to go into politics, he gives a hearty support to those measures and candidates he believes best suited to the needs of the community, and in every way proves his good citi- zenship.