Tucker County, West Virginia Biography of JAMES B. WILT This file 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. 487-488 Tucker JAMES B. WILT is one of the well known men in the pulp industry of West Virginia. He is superintendent of the Parsons Pulp & Lumber Company, and has been con- nected with that plant nearly two decades. His name is one that carries great weight both in business and civic circles in Tucker County. He was born at Texas in Tucker County, June 18, 1881. His grandfather, Peter Wilt, was a native of Maryland and of German ancestry. He founded the family in Bar- bour County, West Virginia. During the Civil war he became a private soldier, served three years as a volunteer, and in one of the battles in which he took part was wounded in the leg, a wound that necessitated his retirement from the service at the end of three years. He married Cath- erine Wilson, and they reared nine children: John H., Mary, Wilson, George, Abbey, Sarah, Thomas, Violena and Enzina. John H. Wilt, father of James B. Wilt, was born in Barbour County, and spent his active life in that and in Tucker County. He was also a volunteer soldier at the time of the Civil war, going out with the Second Virginia Infantry, Company K. He was in the three days fighting at Gettysburg, the seven days fighting in the wilderness, and in many other battles. He was three times wounded, twice by bullets and once by a piece of shell. These wounds permanently injured him and did much to shorten his life. He was a color-bearer of his regiment. John H. Wilt, who died on his farm in Tucker County in 1910, at the age of sixty-seven, had led an active career on his modest farm for many years. He was a school commis- sioner in his district, road supervisor, a democrat in poli- tics and a member of the Methodist Protestant Church. In Barbour County he married Miss Nancy Phillips, daugh- ter of Elijah Phillips, of one of the old families of that county. Mrs. John Wilt died in 1883, at the age of thirty- five. Her children were George W., Albert, Alice, Amanda, Mary Catherine, Peter and James Bowman. James Bowman Wilt spent his boyhood on the home farm, and at the age of seventeen had only the equivalent of a rural school education. After some further prepara- tion he became a rural school teacher at the age of nine- teen, and for two winters taught school. He attended a summer normal school, and for a brief period was a coal miner at Arden and at Meriden. It was on June 5, 1903, that Mr. Wilt entered what has proved to be his continuous service of nearly twenty years with the Parsons Pulp & Lumber Company. Several years before he had acquired some experience in the pulp busi- ness with the West Virginia Pulp & Paper Company at Davis. In the Parsons plant he began as a common laborer in the machine room, was promoted to machine tender, then to foreman of the department, and in 1911 was made sulphite mill superintendent and since 1918 has had the responsibilities of general superintendent of the entire plant. The Parsons Pulp & Lumber Company was established at Parsons in 1900, and the industry was ready for busi- ness in 1901. The product is bleached sulphite pulp, which is converted into bond and book paper. Most of the pulp is worked up in this country, though at one time some of the product was exported. The company has 140 men on the pay roll, and besides the mill at Parsons the company operates a sawmill at Horton, West Virginia, and two sawmills in North Carolina. The mill at Horton supplies the pulp wood for the Parsons plant. The main office of the corporation is in the Finance Building at Phila- delphia. Mr. Wilt has made a deep study of the technical work involved in pulp and paper manufacture. He took special courses in these subjects with the International Correspon- dence Schools of Seranton, and in 1917 .began a course in business administration with the La Salle Extension Uni- versity of Chicago, completing it in 1922. He and some other business men of Parsons organized in 1920 the Par- sons Excelsior and Wood Products Company for the manu- facture of mattress excelsior, lumber and other wood prod- ucts. Mr. Wilt is secretary and treasurer of this com- pany, the president being R. V. Willson. Mr. Wilt is a member of the River City Club, an organi- zation whose purpose is to advance the general welfare and business prosperity of Parsons. He is a past master of Pythagoras Lodge No. 128, A. F. and A. M., is a mem- ber of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and in poli- tics is a democrat, through frequently casting an inde- pendent vote regardless of party line. In the Missionary Baptist Church he is a deacon, and is treasurer of the fund of the local church in the hundred million dollar movement of the Baptist denomination for missions. He was one of the contributors to the Broaddus College fund. At the time of the World war he was a member of the Savings Stamp Committee, and he was registered and waived all exemption. He belonged to the technical asso- ciation of the pulp and paper industry and also to the American Pulp and Paper Mill Superintendents' Associa- tion, both of which organizations offered their services as a body to the Government during the war. In Tucker County, November 30, 1902, Mr. Wilt mar- ried Miss Ella May Parsons, of Randolph County, daugh- ter of Joshua and Lois (Schoonover) Parsons, well to do farming people of Tucker County. Mrs. Wilt was born February 6, 1881, and was next to the youngest in a large family of children, the others being Page; Burl; Maud, wife of Gilbert Ayres; Birdie, wife of Edward Coberly; Jared G., of Parsons, who married Frances Phillips; and Nancy, wife of W. C. Smith, of Belington. Mr. and Mrs. Wilt have a son and daughter. The son. Wilson J., now eighteen years of age, graduated from the Parsons High School in 1921. and is pursuing the mechanical engineering course in West Virginia University. The daughter, Thelma Lois, born in 1909, is in the eighth grade of the Parsons schools.