Marion County, West Virginia Biography of REV. WILLIAM DELBERT REED 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. 566 Marion REV. WILLIAM DELBERT REED has not only gained prestige as one of the able and honored clergymen of the Methodist Episcopal Church, but has shown also much constructive power in connection with practical business affairs. He is actively identified with the coal industry as an operator, and has also been successful as a dealer in real estate. He is now associate pastor of the Diamond Street Methodist Episcopal Church in the City of Fairmont, Marion County. Mr. Reed is a native of West Virginia and is a represent- ative of two of the old and honored families of the state. His paternal grandfather, Benjamin Reed, was born in Barbour County, West Virginia, as the state is now consti- tuted, and was of English parentage, his parents having been very early settlers in that county. Ananias Gasto, maternal grandfather of the subject of this review, was born in what is now Upshur County, West Virginia, his parents, of Irish lineage, having become pioneers of that county. Levi D. Reed, father of him whose name initiates this sketch, was born in Barbour County in 1853, and his death occurred in 1916. He was for many years numbered among the successful exponents of farm enterprise in Harrison County, and since his death his widow has continued to reside on the old home farm near Janelew, that county. She was born in Upshur County. On the farm of his father near Janelew, Harrison County, William Delbert Reed was born, May 7, 1876. After having profited fully by the advantages of the public schools he was for three years a student in the West Virginia Wesleyan College at Buckhannon. In 1897 he was ordained a clergy- man of the Methodist Episcopal Church, and he has since continued an honored member of its West Virginia Con- ference. He held pastoral charges in turn at Moundsville, Grafton and Fairmont, and for six years he was presiding elder of the Oakland District of the West Virginia Confer- ence. In 1915 he was pastor of the Diamond Street Metho- dist Church at Fairmont, and he is today an associate pastor of this church, with his zeal in all departments of church work shown in effective service and gracious stewardship. In 1912 he was a delegate to the General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church at Minneapolis, Minnesota, and in 1916 he was again a delegate, the conference being held on that occasion at Saratoga Springs, New York. In 1921 he was a member of the Ecumenical Conference of Methodism, held in the City of London, England. In 1916 Mr. Reed virtually retired from the active work of the ministry as a vocation, and at that time he initiated his association with the coal industry at Fairmont, where he became secretary and treasurer of the South Pittsburgh Coal Company, the Fairmont & Masontown Coal Company, and the North Fairmont Coal Company. He is still continu- ing his executive service with each of these corporations and has his office headquarters in the American Building at Fairmont. Mr. Reed is affiliated with Acacia Lodge No. 157, A. F. and A. M.; Grafton Chapter No. 12, R. A. M.; Crusade Commandery No. 6, Knights Templars; Osiris Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Wheeling; the Knights of Pythias; the Independent Order of Odd Fellows; and the Modern Woodmen of America. He is a loyal and valued member of the Fairmont Chamber of Commerce. In 1897 was solemnized the marriage of Mr. Reed and Miss Attie Reed who was born near Clarksburg, this state, a daughter of William B. and Olive (Cottrill) Reed. Mr. and Mrs. Reed became the parents of four children: Foster Dale, William Cranston (died at the age of six months), William Arbuthnot and Ruth Beatrice. Foster D. Reed, who completed a course in the Pennington Military Acad- emy in the State of New Jersey, is now associated with his father in business. He married Miss Clauda Layman, of Fairmont, and they have one child, Patricia Ann.