Biography of Charles H. Gilmer - Mercer Co. WV


The History of West Virginia, Old and New
Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc.,
Chicago and New York, Volume II,
pg. 541


CHARLES H. GILMER is a business man of wide experience
throughout the district of the Big Sandy and Kentucky
rivers, and for a number of years has had his interests more
centrally located at Matoaka in Mercer County, where he is
president of the Matoaka Wholesale Grocery Company, vice
president of the First National Bank, and manager of the
Matoaka Hardware Company.

Mr. Gilmer represents an old and prominent family of
Virginia and was born at Lebanon in Russell County, Vir-
ginia, June 13, 1881, son of E. T. and Ida (Vermillion)
Gilmer, who are still living on their farm in Russell County,
his father at the age of sixty-two and the mother at fifty-
six. His father has always been a loyal democrat, served
on the school board, and the family are Methodists.

Charles H. Gilmer, third in a family of eight children,
attended Russell College, but at the age of seventeen left
school and home and came to Bluefield, West Virginia,
where he entered the Bluefield Hardware Company as order
clerk. He remained in the local offices and warehouses
of the company for three years, gaining a thorough knowl-
edge of the business, at the end of which time he entered
the manufacturing business for three years and then be-
came a traveling salesman to look after the business of a
wide territory along the Big Sandy and Kentucky rivers,
including portions of the three states of Virginia, West
Virginia and Kentucky. At that time the Louisville &
Nashville Railroad was extending its line to Fleming, Ken-
tucky, and in the absence of railroad facilities Mr. Gilmer
covered his territory frequently on horseback and in wagons.

In the meantime, in 1906, his brother, M. G. Gilmer, had
started the Matoaka Hardware Company. In 1916 Charles
H. Gilmer came to Matoaka to take the active manage-
ment of the business, since his brother had been appointed
postmaster. Since then Mr. Gilmer has rapidly extended
his local commercial interests, and in addition to the man-
agement of the hardware company he became one of the
organizers of the First National Bank, of which he is vice
president, and helped organize the Matoaka Wholesale Gro-
cery Company, of which he is the active head. His abili-
ties and capital have identified him with a number of other
local concerns.

Mr. Gilmer in 1910 married Melcinnia Hatcher, and they
have one daughter, Ida Gray. They are members of the
Methodist Church and Mr. Gilmer is chairman of its board
of stewards. He is affiliated with the Masonic Lodge at
Rock, the Royal Arch Chapter at Bramwell, is a Knight of
Pythias, a democrat and a member of the Mercer County
Country Club.



Submitted by Valerie Crook <vfcrook@earthlink.net> 

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