Mineral County, West Virginia Biography of JOSEPH W. STAYMAN This file was submitted by John "Bill" Wheeler, 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 Historic Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume ll., pg. 111-112 JOSEPH W. STAYMAN. The president of the Potomac State School at Keyser is Joseph W. Stayman, who for more than a quarter of a century has been actively associated with the educational interests in West Virginia. The first year he was in the state he taught a country school, but for the greater part of the twenty years his work has been at Keyser, either in the city schools or what is now the State College. Mr. Stayman was born at Carlise, Cumberland County, Pennsylvania. His parents were Joseph B. and Mary A. (Shelley) Stayman, the latter a daughter od Daniel Shelley. Joseph B. Stayman was born in Cumberland County on a farm, secured a college education in Dickinson College, and began his business career as a forwarder, with headquarters at Mechanicsburg. He was in that business until late in life, then retiring, and he lived for some years at Carlisle where he died in 1898. During the Civil War he was a Union Soldier as a private in a company commanded by his father. This company saw its chief duty within the state, but had some more serious service during the Confederate invasion which terminated in the battle of Gettysburg. The widow of Joseph B. Stayman died in July, 1914. They reared four children: Daniel, of New York City; William, of Pottsville, Pennsylvania; Mrs. Garrett Stevens, of Cleveland, Ohio; and Joseph Webster. Joseph W. Stayman lived until he was sixteen with his maternal grandparents near Harrisburg. he was among country people of Pennsylvania Dutch stock and had some excellent intellectual influences. His grandfather, Daniel Shelley, was a well know educator and was the first county superintendent of Cumberland County schools and established the Normal School at Newville, an institution since moved to Shippenburg. After teaching for a number of years, Daniel Shelley entered the service of the Cumberland Valley Railroad Company, and was in that work until he finally retired. Joseph W. Stayman attended school at Shiremanstown, Pennsylvania, where his grandparents lived, graduated in 1890 from the Dickinson Preparatory School at Carlisle, and in the same fall entered upon his regular collegiate work in Dickinson College, where he received his Bachelor's degree in 1894. Dickinson College gave him the Master od Arts degree in 1897, and during his individual career as an educator he has taken post-graduate work in the University of Chicago, in Columbia University of New York, and has recently completed the work leading up to the Doctor's degree in Pitt University in Pittsburgh. In 1896, soon after leaving college, a matter of business brought him to West Virginia, and while here he accepted a proposition to teach a county school at the mouth of Geeenland Gap in Grant County. He taught there one term, the following year he was principal of the three room school at Moorefield, and in 1899 came to Keyser to teach the ninth grade in the local schools. After a year he was called to Terra Alta as principal of the town schools, where he remained three years. Since then his work has been in Keyser, where for nine years he was superintendent of the city schools, and resigned that office to become principal of what was then known as the Keyser Preparatory Branch of the West Virginia University. By act of the Legislature in 1921 the name of the institution was changed to the Potomac State School, with Mr. Stayman as its first president. He has completed ten years of work as head of this institution. From a secondary school designed as a feeder to the State University, it is now rapidly building up to the status of a Junior college. The school suffered a great handicap in 1917 by the loss of its building by fire. Since then a second year of college work has been added to the curriculum, and graduates from the school are entitled to enter the junior college class of any standard college or university in the United States. The teaching force has been improved both in number and in qualifications, and in the way of equipment Mr. Stayman has witnessed the building of two dormitories, the acquisition of a farm where vocational education is taught and the institution of vocational departments, home economics and commerce. During his many years of residence at Keyser Mr. Stayman has acquired some substantial business interests, and his enthusiasm is especially directed in the line of fruit growing. he first acquired an interest in the alkire orchard, and in association with four others purchased that property, now known as the Potomac State Orchard, one of the large orchards in this section of the state. There are 15,000 apple trees of bearing age in condition, and under the new management of the property has been greatly improved. Mr. Stayman is also a director of and had a part in the organization of the Potomac farm and Orchard Association, doing a general fruit packing and sales business at Keyser. Plans are now being formulated for the construction of a by-product plant for using the lower grade fruit and converting it into food products. Mr. Stayman took the initiative and was made chairman of the organizing committee of the Keyser Rotary Club in 1921. In Masonry he served three years as Master of Davis Lodge No. 51, A.F.& A.M., was for twelve years secretary of Keyser Chapter, R.A.M., has been captain general of Damascus Commandery, Knight Templar, and is a member of Osiris Temple of the Mystic Shrine in Wheeling. He is a republican, and is an active member of the Methodist Episcopal Church, serving fifteen years on its board of stewards. At Keyser, November 19, 1941, he married Miss Margaret Liller, daughter of William A. and Martha (Kalbaugh) Liller. Her father was a contractor and builder who spent most of his life in the eastern part of the state. Mrs. Stayman was born at Keyser, is a graduate of the local public schools and the Keyser Preparatory School's music department and completed her musical education in National Park Seminary at Washington. She has been a teacher of music in Keyser and is active in music circles. The only son of Doctor and Mrs. Stayman is Joseph Webster Jr., born in 1915 and one daughter, Martha Shelley, born in 1921.