Preston County, West Virginia          Biography of Miss Lynne WADDELL

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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, Page 378

     Miss Lynne Waddell, principal of the Grant District High School in
Preston County, is a native of that county and one of the best educated
of its native daughters. Miss Waddell has taught in some of the higher
institutions of education, but the service that has called out her
greatest enthusiasm has been the educational progress and uplift of her
home locality.
   
   Her grandfather, John Matthew Waddell, came from Frostburg,
Maryland, to Preston County in 1844 and established his home on the hill
overlooking the village of Bruceton. He remained there for the rest of
his life, continuing his trade as a shoemaker, He married Sophia Fogle.
They were the parents of two children, Richard B. and Rachel. The latter
died as the wife of Henry Myers, of Elliottsville, Pa.
   
   Richard Bonaparte Waddell was born at Frostburg, Maryland,
September 14, 1837, and was seven years of age when his parents moved to
Preston County. He acquired little or no schooling, but had practical
knowledge of affairs and was deeply interested in the progress of
schools and in later life served as president of the local Board of
Education. He learned the trade of carpenter, and at the age of
twenty-five went into the military service during the Civil war, being
commissioned by Governor Pierpont as captain in the One Hundred and
Fourteenth Regiment, Third Division, Tenth Brigade of the West Virginia
Militia. He was afterwards made third sergeant, Company L., Sixth
Regiment, West Virginia Cavalry, and subsequently quartermaster sergeant
of Company E., Sixth West Virginia Regiment. In the closing months of
his military duty he was with his command at Ft. Laramie, Wyoming, and
while there made the acquaintance of the old Indian chieftain Spotted
Tail, and a warm friendship sprang up between them. He remained on the
frontier on Indian duty until May 22, 1866. After the war he returned to
West Virginia, farmed and worked at his trade, and in 1894 was elected a
county commissioner and re-elected in 1898. He proved a thorough and
capable county official, and he was postmaster for six years at Clifton
Mills and was postmaster and merchant at Brandonville from 1889-1902.
The death of this good citizen occurred Feb. 24, 1907. Richard Bonaparte
Waddell married, April 11, 1858, Lucy Anne Weyant, who was born Jan. 13,
1835 at Somerset, Pa., where her parents, John and Susan ( Fichtner)
Weyant, settled when they came from Germany. She died Sept. 11, 1919.
Her children were: Mrs. Virginia Benson, of Uniontown, Pa., Mrs. N.J.
Chorpenning, of Mount Pleasant, Pa., Miss Lynne, of Brandonville, West
Virginia; and Dr. C.W. Waddell, of Fairmont West Virginia.
    
    Miss Lynne Waddell to the age of twelve lived in the village of
Clifton Mills and thereafter at Brandonville. She acquired a public
school education there. Miss Waddell was one of the first young women of
Preston Co. to go outside the state to complete her literary education.
She spent four years in the college preparatory course at Mount Carroll
Seminary in Illinois. After returning home she took up teaching,
subsequently taught three years in the Glenville Normal School, and from
there entered the University of West Virginia, where she specialized in
English and graduated A.B. in 1908.
   
   For five years following her graduation from university Miss
Waddell was in charge of the Department of English at Shepard College,
Shepardtown, West Virginia. On retiring from a work that entailed
specially heavy duties she took a years rest and resumed her profession
as principal of the high school at Albright, where she remained four
years, and for one year at Newburg. She then joined actively in the
crusade for better education advantages in Grant District, and her high
standing as an educator and long experience enabled her to give
convincing arguments in behalf of the establishment of a modern high
school for the district. She has been principal of the high school since
1919. For several years she was a member of the County Textbook Board of
Preston Co., representing Grant District. She also spent much time in
club work, boys and girls club work and camp fire work, being girls club
agent and instructor in sewing and supervisor in various branches of
school and home activities.
    
    With the constitutional amendment granting universal suffrage Miss
Waddell has accepted the opportunity to use her vote intelligently in
behalf of good government and clean candidates. She was reared in a
republican home and in 1920 voted for Harding for president. She is a
member of Shenandoah Junction Branch of the Eastern Star and is a member
of tthe Methodist Episcopal Church.