Wood County, West Virginia Biography of Camden H. HOLDEN ************************************************************************** USGENWEB NOTICE: Material may be freely used by non-commercial entities, as long as this message remains on all copied material, AND permission is obtained from the contributor of the file. These pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by other organizations. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material for non-commercial purposes, MUST obtain the written consent of the contributor. Submitted by Pam Honaker ************************************************************************** The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume II, pg.460-461 CAMDEN H. HOLDEN, president of the Ranwood Lumber Company, one of the important business concerns of the City of Parkersburg, is a native son of West Virginia and the scion of the third generation of the Holden family in this state, the Holden family having been founded in America in the Colonial period of our national history. John C. Holden, grandfather of him whose name initiates this paragraph , was a son of Alexander Holden, who was born in the State of New Jersey and became pioneer settler in the Licking County, Ohio, where he reclaimed a farm and became one of the influential citizens of that section of the Buckeye State. He served as justice of the peace, county commissioner and representative in the Ohio Legislature, and his also was the destinction of having been a soldier in the War of 1812. He continued his residence in Ohio until his death in 1832, at the age of sixty-eight years. John C. Holden was born in New Jersey and reared in Ohio, where was solemnized his marriage to Miss Prudence Kettle. He gained pioneer honors in Barbour County, West Virginia, where he established his home when that county was still a part of Virginia and known as Harrison County. A man of fine intellectuality and exceptional ability, he gained much of his leadership in the pioneer community, and by his activities, which included the reclamation and development of a productive farm, he contributed much to the civic and material development of what is now one of the prosperous counties of West Virginia. He was a student of the Greek langauage, and his broad mental horizon made him a man of mature judgement and progressive ideas. Thus he gave to his children the best possible educational advantages, and gave his influence to measures and enterprises that advanced the welfare of his community. Both he and his wife were honored pioneer citizens of Barbour County at the time of their deaths. In that county was born their son Elijah K., who was there reared to manhood and who there married Miss Mahala Reed, likewise a native of Barbour County. Elijah K. Holden gained substantial success in connection with farm industry in his native county, effectivly upheld the honors of the family name and was content to follow his chosen vocation and to make his value felt through earnest and worthy achievemant and civic loyalty rather than through political activity of public office. Of his five children four are living, and of the number the subject of this sketch is the only son. Camden H. Holden, the eldest of the five children, was born on the old homestead farm in Barbour County, on the 30th of March, 1873. He was reared on this old home farm, and the discipline of the district schools was supplemented by his attending the public schools of the City of Buckhannon, Upshur County. That he made good use of his advantages is shown by the fact that, when seventeen years of age he proved himself eligible for pedagogic service and became a successful teacher in the rural schools. At the age of twenty years he inititated his association with the lumber business in Randolph County, and with this important line of industrial and commercial enterprise he has continued his alliance during the intervening years. In 1907 Mr. Holden established his residence at Parkersburg, and as president of the Ranwood Lumber Company of this city he is one of the representative business men of Wood County. He is a staunch democrat in politics, and he and his wife are members of the Baptist Church, with which the Holden family has been actively connected for many generations. He has received the chivalric degrees in the Masonic fraternity, in which his maximum York Rite affiliation is with the Commandery of Knights Templars in his home city. He holds membership also in Nemesis Temple, Ancient Arabic Order Nobles of the Mystic Shrine, the Parkersburg Lodge of the Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks, and the Parkersburg Country Club. The year of 1895 recorded the marriage of Mr. Holden and Miss Alice Reger, of Buckhannon, this state, and they have one daughter, Edna F., who is the wife of Ralph Jones, of Parkersburg.