Mingo County, West Virginia         Biography of Wiley Marion HALE

This biography was submitted by Kerry Armour,
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The History of West Virginia, Old and New
Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc.
Chicago and New York, Volume II
pg.61

WILEY MARION HALE. One of the substantial and well ordered financial
institutions of Mingo County is the Kermit State Bank, at Kermit, of which
Mr. Hale was one of the organizers and of which he has served as cashier
from the time of its incorporation. The first president was D. E. Hewitt,
who continued the incumbent of this office until his death, in the winter
of 1921-2. Floyd Brewer is vice president.
Mr. Hale was born on his father's farm ten miles east of Inez, Martin
County, Kentucky, and the date of his nativity was February 21, 1873. He is
a son of George W. and Sallie (Parsley) Hale, the former of whom died in
1904, at the age of sixty-one years, and the latter of whom died in the
following year, at the age of fifty-six. The father was born in Floyd
County, Kentucky, and in addition to becoming one of the progressive
farmers of his native state he was also identified with the timber business
and was associated with M. H. Johns in the conducting of a general store on
Wolf Creek in Martin County, Kentucky. In 1888 he was elected county clerk
of Martin County, was re-elected at the close of his first term, and thus
held the office eight years. As a gallant young soldier of the Union in the
Civil war he was a member of Company K, Fourteenth Kentucky Volunteer
Infantry, and he took part in many engagements. He was with General
Sherman's army in the historic Atlanta campaig!
n and subsequent march to the sea, and at the battle of Kenesaw Mountain he
was wounded, though not seriously. He was a republican, was affiliated with
the Grand Army of the Republic, and he and his wife were earnest members of
the Methodist Church at Inez, Kentucky, which he served as superintendent
of the Sunday School. Of their five children, all sons, John W. is now
serving as assessor of Martin County, Kentucky; Robert L. is cashier of the
Deposit Bank at Inez, that county; Wiley M., of this sketch, was next in
order of birth; Julius C. is a merchant at Pilgrim, Martin County, a
village near the old home of the Hale family; and Wallace B. is associated
with a coal company at Burch, West Virginia.

Wiley M. Hale completed his early school work in the public schools at
Barbourville, West Virginia, under the tutorship of G. W. F. Hampton, and
for twelve years thereafter he was a successful and popular teacher in the
schools of his native county, where his final pedagogic service was in the
village schools at Inez. He became assistant to his father in the office of
county clerk, and in 1904 was elected circuit clerk for Martin County. In
the following year he there became cashier of the Inez Deposit Bank, and of
this position he continued the incumbent fifteen years, his resignation
taking place when he became one of the organizers of the Kermit State Bank,
of which he has since continued the cashier. In his native county he was
active and influential in securing leases for those who there carried
forward oil and gas development, and the same progressive and loyal civic
spirit has animated him since he established him home in West Virginia.

Mr. Hale is a staunch republican, he and his wife are members of the
Methodist Episcopal Church, South, and in the Masonic fraternity he has
received the thirty-second degree of the Scottish Rite as a member of the
Consistory at (Covington, Kentucky. In connection with his York Rite
affiliations he served ten years as master of the Blue Lodge at Inez, that
state, besides having been for one year the noble grand of the local lodge
of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.

The year 1894 recorded the marriage of Mr. Hale and Miss Nickotie
Spaulding, daughter of John K. Spaulding, of Warfield, Kentucky. Of the
children of this union the eldest, George W., is assistant cashier of the
Kermit State Bank; Maude is the wife of Elmer Stepp, a member of the West
Virginia State Police, their home being at Madison; and the younger
children, still of the parental home circle, are Rudolph, Wallace M. and
Lewis D.