Tyler County, West Virginia Biography of John M. L. SMITH 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. 295 JOHN M. L. SMITH is one of the young business men of Tyler County and has what is probably the busiest real estate organization at Middlebourne. He has been a practical farmer himself, and is also extensively inter- ested in the oil and gas districts of this section. Mr. Smith was born May 1, 1892, at Wilbur in Tyler County, where his father John M. Smith, now in his eighty- fourth year, is enjoying the comforts of an honorable and well spent life on his home farm. He was born in Tyler County in 1837 and has spent all his life there. The grand- father was also a native of Tyler County, and became owner of a large area of good farming land. John M. Smith took up farm work early, pursued it diligently and persistently through many years, and as a result provided for his family and accumulated the competency which now enables him to live retired. In younger years he served as county assessor, was a member of the board of educa- tion of his district, and is a stanch republican. As a young man he entered the Union army with a West Virginia regiment of infantry, and saw active service until the close of that struggle. He has been one of the leading sup- porters of the United Brethren Church in his community. John M. Smith first married a Miss Morgan, a native of Tyler County. She died leaving two daughters: Viola, wife of LeBoy Pierpont, a farmer at Alma, West Virginia; and Susan C., wife of Henry T. Pratt, a farmer in Tyier County. The second wife of John M. Smith was Cordelia A. Underwood, who was born in Tyler County in 1851, and died at the old home at Jefferson Run in December, 1920. Of her twelve children all but one remain to do her honor: Benjamin O., a merchant at Parkersburg; Estella, wife of Henry C. Williamson, a farmer at Friendly in Tyler County; Bertha, who died at the age of twenty- five; Florence, living at Alma, widow of Arch C. Moore, who was a farmer and merchant; Birkley J., who lives on a part of the old homestead at Wilbur; Wilbur M., Phillip A. and Icy, all with their father on the farm; Orla S., who was a soldier, spending eighteen months in France and was on the battlefront 100 days, and is now at home; John M. L.; Maxie and Amy, both at home. John M. L. Smith attended the rural schools of Tyler County, took the agricultural course in West Virginia Uni- versity at Morgantown, and from the age of twenty-two dill farming on his own account for two years. Since then he has been dealing in farms and building up an ex- tensive real estate business with headquarters at Middle- bourne. He individually owns a number of farms in the county and is a splendid judge of farm and land values in general. Since 1919 he has also done a large business in timber lands, and is financially interested in some of the. oil and gas operations in the various West Virginia fields. Mr. Smith is a republican, a member of Middlebourne Lodge, No. 34, Free and Accepted Masons, and during the war was associated with the various committees raising funds and carrying on other patriotic enterprises. April 25, 1913, Mr. Smith married Miss Nannie Under- wood, daughter of Lamar and Mary E. (Seckman) Un- derwood. the latter now deceased. Her father is a worker in the oil fields and lives at Clarksburg.