Mingo County, West Virginia Biography of William YORK, M. D. ************************************************************************** USGENWEB NOTICE: Material may be freely used by non-commercial entities, as long as this message remains on all copied material, AND permission is obtained from the contributor of the file. These pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by other organizations. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material for non-commercial purposes, MUST obtain the written consent of the contributor. Submitted by Valerie Crook, , April 1999 ************************************************************************** The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume II, pg. 648 WILLIAM YORK, M. D. A very successful physician and surgeon and also a highly respected citizen of Williamson, Dr. William York has had his professional and business interests in that community for the past fifteen years. He was born at Glen Hayes in Wayne County, West Vir- ginia, September 10, 1880, and comes of rugged stock of mountain people who have been in this country for sev- eral generations. His paternal grandparents lived to a good old age, were natives of Ohio, and in search of tim- ber and mineral lands his grandfather emigrated to the Tug Fork of the Big Sandy River in early times. He ac- quired timber and mineral lands on a large scale. Doctor York's maternal ancestors were natives of Kentucky. His father John Y. York, was a pioneer of Wayne County and a man of prominence in that locality, serving on the county court and for several years was State Senator, 1901-05. He had a very successful business as a lumber and timber- man, and was also extensively interested in agriculture and merchandising. He was a lifelong republican and he and his wife devout church people. For the greater part of his life he was associated with the Christian Church. He died at his home in January, 1917, at the age of seventy- one. His wife, whose maiden name was Fanny S. Keyser, was a daughter of Martin Keyser, an old Kentuckian, and she died in 1891 at the age of forty-three. Their family consisted of seven sons and four daughters. William York acquired a common school education in Wayne County, and in 1907 was graduated M. D. from the Eclectic Medical College of Cincinnati. In the mean- time as a boy he had worked on the farm and he was also associated with his father in the timber industry. Soon after graduating in medicine he established his home at Williamson and has been a resident of that town since June, 1907, and his work has been accorded high recogni- tion so as to rank him among the ablest physicians and surgeons of this county. Outside the activities of his profession Doctor York is president of the Mud Lick Coal Company of Sharrondale, Kentucky, secretary and treasurer of the Victor Coal Com- pany of Pinson Fork, Kentucky, and has some large inter- ests in Kentucky oil fields and real estate holdings in both Mingo and Wayne counties, West Virginia. Doctor York has been a member of the West Virginia State Senate since 1918, and is an influential worker in some of the most important committees including finance. He is the present clerk of the City Commission of Williamson, being first elected to that office in the spring of 1919 and again elected in 1921. A lifelong republican he has directed his efforts in every appropriate way to promote the success of the party and its program. Doctor York is a member of the Kiwanis Club of Williamson and is a Royal Arch and Knight Templar Mason, a member of the Beni Kedem Temple of the Mystic Shrine at Charleston and is affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, Moose, Knights of Pythias and Improved Order of Red Men. While not an active member he is a firm supporter of the Christian Church. Opposite the old home where he was born and reared and on the Kentucky shore of Tug River, Lawrence County, March 2, 1902, Doctor York married Elva H. Hughes, daughter of John W. and Bettie Lola Hughes. Her family originally came from Fluvanna County, Virginia. Doctor and Mrs. York have one son, William Edward York, born in 1911, now attending public school at Huntington.