Biography of Hon. Joe L. Smith - Raleigh Co. WV


The History of West Virginia, Old and New
Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc.,
Chicago and New York, Volume II,
pg. 602


HON. JOE L. SMITH. During a very busy and successful
career Hon. Joe L. Smith has been printer's devil, editor
and bank president, and in the meantime has found time to
devote to civic and public affairs. He was formerly state
senator, and at present is well known in financial circles of
Raleigh County as president of the Beckley National Bank
of Beckley. He was born at Marshes, in the Trap Hill
District of Raleigh County, May 22, 1880, and is a son of
Hulett A. and Angeline (McMillion) Smith, natives, respect-
ively, of Patrick and Carroll counties, Virginia.

Hulett A. Smith was reared to agricultural pursuits, and
as a young man moved to Raleigh County and settled at
Marshes, where he carried on farming until the outbreak
of the war between the states, when he enlisted in the
Thirty-sixth Regiment, Virginia Volunteer Infantry, and
subsequently fought under the leadership of Colonel Mc-
Causland. At the close of his military service he returned
to the Marshes, but about 1885 or 1886 took his family to
the locality of Beckley, and there rounded out the re-
mainder of his life, his death occuring in 1916, when he
was eighty-three years of age. Mrs. Smith, who was a
child when brought to this section by her parents, still sur-
vives her husband and resides at Beckley, at the age of
seventy-eight years. They were the parents of six sons and
three daughters.

The eighth in order of birth of his parents' children, Joe
L. Smith passed through the graded schools at Beckley and
finished his education at the age of seventeen years. How-
ever, prior to this time he had to start to work, and when
less than fourteen years of age, in 1893, became printer's
devil in the office of the Raleigh Register. While thus
engaged he learned the trade of printer, and eventually,
with E. L. Ellison, purchased the Register, which was the
first paper printed in the county, it formerly having been
issued as the Raleigh County Index, and the partnership
continued until 1905, when Mr. Ellison withdrew and Mr.
Smith remained as editor and publisher. He disposed of
his interest in 1911, and in 1914, with others, took over the
Winding Gulf Bank, which had been moved from Hotcoal to
Beckley, and effected its reorganization as the Beckley
National Bank. At the time of the reorganization Mr.
Smith became vice president, and since then has advanced
to his present position as president. He has contributed
materially to the success of this organization, and has made
the name of the institution an honored one in banking
circles.

Senator Smith is an ardent democrat, and has been inter-
ested in civic affairs from the time that the court house
was the only brick structure at Beckley, and when his
weekly stipend for work on the Register was fifty cents a
week. He was the first mayor of Beckley after the charter
was granted, and during the years of 1908, 1909 and 1910,
also served at different times as a member of the City
Council, and in 1908 was elected a member of the State
Senate, in which he acted from 1909 to 1913, serving on
numerous important committees and conscientiously serv-
ing his constituents. He and his wife are members of the
Presbyterian Church, in which he is president of the Bible
Class in the Sunday School, and as a fraternalist he holds
membership in Beckley Blue Lodge, Beckley Chapter, Hin-
ton Commandery, Lodge of Perfection at Huntington and
Beni-Kedem Shrine, A. A. O. N. M. S., at Charleston. He
likewise belongs to the Chamber of Commerce and the
Kiwanis Club of Beckley.

In 1914 Mr Smith married Miss Christine Carlson, a
daughter of L. P. Carlson, of Annapolis, Maryland, and to
this union there have been born two sons: Joe L., Jr., and
Hulett C.


Submitted by Valerie Crook <vfcrook@earthlink.net> 

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