Ohio County Schools, West Virginia This file was submitted by Valerie Crook, E-mail address: 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 History of Education in West Virginia Prepared under the direction of the State Superintendent of Free Schools 1904, Charleston: The Tribune Printing Company, 1904 pgs. 229 - 230 Ohio County BY SUPT. GEO. S. BIGGS The first free school of Ohio county was founded in the year 1848. Ohio county was among the first of the State to adopt the free school system. This county now has sixty-seven schools and the most of them are well provided with libraries, maps, charts and the other requisites for successful teaching. The school term is being extended and the School Fund is becoming larger and Ohio county has as intelligent looking a corps of teachers as you would find anywhere on the globe. The West Liberty State Normal School and the county and district institutes are great helps to the Ohio county teachers. The Elm Grove Graded School is the largest in our county, having six teachers and an enrollment of over two hundred pupils. The other large schools of our county are: The Triadelphia Public School, Park View Public School, Edgington Lane Public School, Leather- wood Public School, Fulton Public School and The Valley Grove Public School. The first county superintendent of schools was S. G. Stevens and the present one is Geo. S. Biggs, West Liberty, W. Va. Ohio county has nearly three thousand pupils of school age, most of whom attend the public schools and the remainder attend Catholic and other private schools. The principals of the graded schools receive fifty-five dollars per month and the assistant teachers forty dollars per month. The most of our school houses are frame with the exception of a few brick buildings. The most of them are heated with coal and the remain- der are lighted and heated with natural gas. Ohio county contains one hundred and twenty square miles. The hills and valleys of Ohio county are dotted with these school houses and every boy and girl has easy access to obtain a good education. Wonderful progress and advancement is being made and the boys and girls of ten years of age know more than those of twenty years, when they had the log school house with puncheon doors and floors, goosequill pens and soapstone pencils.