Tucker County, West Virginia Biography of JOHN H. SQUIRES This biography was submitted by Valerie Crook, E-mail address: The submitter does not have a connection to the subject of this sketch. 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 The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 588-589 Tucker JOHN H. SQUIRES. A resident of Parsons nearly thirty years, John H. Squires is a retired business man, and for upwards of half a century was in the milling business as a manufacturer of flour and feed, operating mills in a num- ber of localities in Preston and Tucker counties. Mr. Squires was born near Reedsville, Preston County, September 17, 1848. The family has been represented in Preston County for fully a century. His grandfather, Samuel Squires, was an early settler in the Reedsville locality, where he owned the Mount Phoebe farm, the high- est point of land in all that section. He died during the Civil war, when about seventy-five years of age, and is buried at Bethlehem Church near his own home. His chil- dren were: Alexander, who died a few years ago near Piedmont, West Virginia; Samuel Poling, whose record follows; Dudley, who died near Reedsville; James, who died near Independence; and Maria, who married John Shaffer and died on Bird's Creek in the Newburg locality of Preston County. Samuel P. Squires, father of the Parsons business man, spent his life from birth in Preston County, and died in 1902, when about seventy-four years of age. He was a miller, and for a number of years was proprietor of the old Conley Mill on Docker's Creek and also of the Fortney Mill at Independence in Preston County. He conducted milling in addition to farming. He was never in a public office, was a republican in politics, a Methodist, and an active Union man at the time of the war, though he had no sons of military age. He married Ann Conley. Her father, John Conley, was a farmer near Reedsville, and is buried on the Conley farm. Mrs. Ann Squires was the mother of the following children: John H.; Lucien, of Independence, West Virginia; William S., living in Ohio; Bolton, of Mor- gantown; and Charles, an Ohio man. John H. Squires received much of his early education in a subscription school near Reedsville., and he was out of school and engaged in the practical work of life before the first free school was established in Preston County. For many years his home and business activities were in Independence in Preston County. He remained with his parents until reaching his majority, and for a time he operated a stationary engine in the mines and in sawmills in the Newburg and Scotch Hill localities of Preston County. Then after several years of association with his father in the mill business he became an employe of J. R. Smoot in the Smoot Mill, the first mill to be equipped with the "roller process" in all that section. The mill was at Independence, and he continued his business there until he came to Parsons. At Parsons he became associated with his brother W. F. Squires in the operation of a feed mill, and when that partnership was dissolved three years later he joined George Mayer in connection with another milling enterprise, known as the Parsons Milling and Mercantile Company. When Mr. Mayer retired from this Mr. Squires continued the busi- ness and developed the milling property and the other in- terests of the firm until he was ready to retire from active life. For two or three years after leaving the mill he was a merchant. He is a stockholder in the Tucker County Bank. Mr. Squires cast his first vote for president in 1872. for General Grant, and has not missed voting the republican ticket at a national election in fifty years. He has never been interested in office holdings, and his time has been quite equally divided between business and home. He is a member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and Knights of Pythias. In Fayette County, Pennsylvania, in 1871, Mr. Squires married Abigail Pickenbaugh. Her father, Reason Picken- baugh, was a farmer in Monongalia County, West Virginia, where Mrs. Squires was born in 1849. She died at Parsons soon after the family moved here, on October 15, 1895, the mother of the following children: Florence, wife of J. N. Lang, a Baltimore & Ohio engineer living at Newburg; Minnie, wife of Thomas Turnley, of Newburg; Melvin C., a coal miner at Masontown; Gertrude, wife of Hyland Ketzner, of Cumberland, Maryland; Lula, Mrs. Albert Fel- ton, of Parsons, and mother of a son, John Albert; Guy Olin, who married Goldie Peterson, lives at Parsons and has two children; and John D., of Morgantown, who mar- ried Frances Imbaugh and has a daughter. John D. Squires is a corporal in charge of the detachment of State Police at Morgantown, West Virginia. Besides the grandchildren mentioned, Mrs. Minnie Turnley has one daughter. Melvin Squires is the father of five children, and Mrs. Ketzner has two daughters and one son. For his second wife Mr. Squires married Mrs. Burnett Ryan, whose father, Ward Parsons, was the original owner of the townsite of Parsons and one of the very successful farmers and stockmen of Tucker County. It is said that he introduced the first pedigreed live stock into the county, and for many years was a successful cattle man. Mr. Squires lost his second wife by death in August, 1920.