Ohio County, West Virginia Biography of George B. HERVEY ************************************************************************** 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 Suzie Crump , April 2000 ************************************************************************** The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume II, pgs. 258-259 GEORGE B. HERVEY is superintendent of the Wheeling plant of the La Belle Iron Works, one of the largest industrial organizations in the Ohio Valley and one for many years a substantial element in Wheeling’s prosperity as a manufacturing center. Mr. Hervey has been connected with the La Belle Company for a number of years. He represents a family whose earlier generations were chiefly distinguished by professional connections, his father having been one of the noted educators of West Virginia, while his grandfather was a distinguished minister of the Presbyterian Church. The founder of the family in the Northern Panhandle of West Virginia was the great-grandfather, who came to Brook County about 1800. He was of Scotch-Irish descent. He reared his family in West Virginia, consisting of ten children and several of his sons became ministers of the Presbyterian Church. One of these was Rev. David Hervey, who was born in 1795, and for many years was devoted to his work as a Presbyterian Minister. He died at Wellsburg in Brook County in 1877. John C. Hervey, father of George B. Hervey was born in Brook County in 1822, was reared there, graduated from a college at West Alexandria and devoted his life to teaching and school administration. He taught in Brock (sic) County, this state, Greene County, Pennsylvania, and in 1867 removed to Wheeling, where for twelve years he was superintendent of city schools, holding that office at the time of his death, in 1881. He was a thorough classical scholar, a cultured gentleman, and left a deep impress upon the educational history of his time. He was a republican, served for many years as an elder in the Presbyterian Church, and was also a Mason. John C. Hervey married Letitia Alexander, who was born in Greene County, Pennsylvania, in 1825, and died at Wheeling in 1918, at the advanced age of ninety-three. She was the mother of six children: Dorothy, who died at Wheeling at the age of fifty-two, was the wife of Andrew H. Patterson, a farmer and real estate broker who died in Cuba; John A., who became an oil operator and died at Findlay, Ohio, at the age of fifty-three; Lee, whose home is at 19 Virginia Street in Wheeling; Ella, wife of John R. Clark, a retired farmer living at Woodlawn, near Wheeling; Jennie M., who died at Wheeling in 1918, unmarried, at the age of fifty-four; and George B. George B. Hervey, who was born in Ohio County, West Virginia, July 24, 1867, began his education in the Wheeling public schools while they were still under his father’s supervision. He graduated from Frazier’s Business College at Wheeling in 1888, and for the following five years was connected with R. G. Dun & Company, mercantile agency. Following that for one year he was paymaster for the Wheeling Steel & Iron Company, then a year as bill clerk with the Aetna Standard Iron & Steel Company, and for two years was in the mercantile business. His service with the la Belle Iron Works began in March, 1899, as weighmaster. He successively filled the office of paymaster, assistant superintendent and in 1907 was promoted to superintendent of the Wheeling plant, situated at the east end of Thirty-first Street. Mr. Hervey has under his immediate supervision 340 employes. The Wheeling plant is equipped with 140 cut nail machines, one skelp mill and one tack plate mill. Mr. Hervey was a thorough patriot and leader in war activities, encouraging men in the plant to do their best for the cause, aiding those who joined the colors, and brought a high degree of working efficiency to the plant as a unit in the Government’s industrial activities. During a part of the war this plant was devoted to the manufacture of plate for depth bombs and plates for heel nails for army shoes. Mr. Hervey is a republican, a member of the Episcopal Church and affiliated with Wheeling Lodge No. 28, B. P. O. E. He owns a modern home at 5507 North Front Street. Mr. Hervey married at Wheeling in 1892 Miss Gertrude Woodward Hughes, daughter of Jacob and Caroline (Woodward) Hughes, now deceased. Her father was in the real estate business at Wheeling. Mrs. Hervey was a granddaughter of Mr. Woodward founder of the La Belle Iron Works in 1852. Mr. Hervey lost his first wife by death in January, 1899. She was the mother of two children, Helen, the younger, dying at the age of three years. Margaret Woodward, the only surviving child, lives in the Howard Apartments in Pleasant Valley. June 14, 1904, at Bellaire, Ohio, Mr. Hervey married Miss Emma S. Miller, daughter of Morris V. and Emma Miller. Her mother is still living at Bellaire. Her father was a locomotive engineer with the Pennsylvania Railroad. Mrs. Hervey is a graduate of the Bellaire High School and was a teacher in that city until her marriage. She is a direct descendant of Robert Morris, the distinguished financier whose aid to the Continental cause during the Revolution is a subject taken up in every American history. To the marriage of Mr. and Mrs. Hervey were born five children: Helen Elizabeth, on April 7, 1905; Virginia Miller, in 1909; Robert Morris, on July 10, 1913; George Burdette, twin brother of Robert; and Anne Lee, born December 27, 1915.