Mingo County, West Virginia Biography of Hon. Wells GOODYKOONTZ 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 III, pg. 317 HON. WELLS GOODYKOONTZ began the practice of law at Williamson in 1894. The range and importance of his law practice, his substantial interests in the community, were the solid foundation for his public and political career, and for all his varied and active service in the State Legislature and in the halls of Congress he is still actively connected with his profession and his business at Williamson. Mr. Goodykoontz was born near Newbern, Pulaski County, Virginia, June 3, 1872, son of William M. and Lucinda K. (Woolwine) Goodykoontz. His paternal ancestor, Hans Georg Gutekunsh, immigrated to this country in 1750 and fought through the Revolution. His grandfather on his mother's side, Robert McCrum Woolwine, was born near Beverly in Randolph County. He attended good schools and had the fortune of coming under the supervision of some very able educators. At Oxford Academy in Virginia he was under John K. Harris, a graduate of Williams College and a Presbyterian minister. At Floyd, Virginia, he read law under Judge Z. T. Dobyns, and in Washington and Lee University he came under the instruction of John Randolph Tucker and Charles A. Graves. Mr. Goodykoontz was licensed to practice June 9,1893, and established himself at William- son February 23, 1894. He began his career as a lawyer at Williamson when the great coal industry of that section was just being developed. At the present time he is a senior member of the law firm of Goodykoontz, Scherr & Slaven. Mr. Goodykoontz became a member of the bar of the Supreme Court of West Virginia on April 1, 1896, and was admitted to practice as "an attorney and counsellor" in the Supreme Court of the United States, December 13, 1909. His standing and popularity with the profession are indicated by the fact that he was chosen president of the West Virginia Bar Association in July, 1917. Since its founding he has been president of the National Bank of Commerce of Williamson. It was one of the first banking institutions founded in that region. It was started as a state bank. Since 1911 the same has operated under a national charter and under the above name. The pros- perity of this section is reflected in the comparative bank deposits. Its deposits aggregated about $450,000 in 1915 and at the beginning of 1921 were over $1,400,000. Mr. Goodykoontz is the president of the Kimberling Land Com- pany and the Burning Creek Land Company, and a director in several other corporations engaged in local enterprises. Mr. Goodykoontz had been a successful lawyer nearly twenty years before he became a candidate for public office. Mingo County sent him to the House of Delegates in the sessions of 1911-12, and in 1914 he was nominated without opposition by the republican party for the State Senate. He was chosen to represent the Sixth Senatorial District, comprising McDowell, Mingo, Wayne and Wyoming coun- ties, and led the ticket in each of these counties by a plur- ality of 3,009. In the session of 1915-16 in the Senate, Mr. Goodykoontz was majority floor leader, and January 10, 1917, was elected president of the Senate, thus becoming ex-officio lieutenant governor of the state. He held that office until December 1, 1918. Harris' Legislative Hand- book, 1918, gives him the distinction of being the first presi- dent of the Senate from whose rulings no appeal was ever taken. November 5, 1918, as candidate of the republican party, he was elected to the Sixty-sixth Congress, over W. M. McNeal, democrat, by 2,936 majority. November 2, 1920, he was reelected as a member of the Sixty-seventh Congress —again over Mr. McNeal—by a majority of 6,799. The Fifth District, which he represents covers the Pocahontas coal field and is composed of the nine counties of Lincoln, Logan, McDowell, Mercer, Mingo, Monroe, Summers, Wayne and Wyoming. Mr. Goodykoontz entered Congress when the republicans resumed control of the House, and he has been one of the active members during the protracted sessions of that body. He is a member of the Judiciary Committee, the lawyers committee of the House, having been assigned to this committee upon his entering Congress. It is seldom that a new member is permitted a membership on this major committee. During the World war, Mr. Goodykoontz was chairman of the Central Committee of Lawyers that headed the West Virginia bar in assisting registrants and aiding, by advice and otherwise, soldiers and sailors, their families and de- pendents. In this connection Mr. Goodykoontz was author of the "Legal Booklet," of which 30,000 copies were dis- tributed, giving information as to the more important laws, State and Federal, affecting soldiers and sailors. Mr. Goodykoontz is a past master of the Williamson Masonic Lodge. On December 22, 1898, he married Miss Irene Hooper, of New Orleans.