WV-FOOTSTEPS-D Digest Volume 00 : Issue 155 Today's Topics: #1 BIO: MOSES TAMBURINI, Grant Co. WV [Valerie & Tommy Crook To: WV-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-Id: <4.3.1.0.20000709103329.00cc5100@mail.earthlink.net> Subject: BIO: MOSES TAMBURINI, Grant Co. WV Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 441-442 Grant MOSES TAMBURINI. This is the name of the veteran merchant of Bayard, Grant County, where he has been selling goods and building up a fine mercantile service in that mining community for nearly thirty years. His career is an interesting example of an American of foreign birth who came to this country with neither capital nor influen- tial friends and has made good both in business and good citizenship. He was born at Trentino in Tyrol of Austria, April 23, 1859. His father, John Tamburini, was born in the same locality and his ancestors had lived there for generations. John Tamburini married Margaret Bertini, and both died and were buried near their old home. The father was a farmer and millwright. Of their four children three grew to mature years: Mary, who married Bartholomew Girar- dini and lives in Tyrol; Moses; and Henry, who after spending some years in the United States and West Vir- ginia returned and is now living in his native country. Moses Tamburini as a boy learned farming as practiced in the mountain country of Austria, also the trade of mill- wright, and had a limited education in the common schools. On leaving home he spent a year or so in France, chiefly employed in and near the City of Paris. His last work in that country was quarrying stone for the building of high fences to enclose the vast estate of the wealthy Rothschilds near Paris. Leaving Prance, he started for New York, and passed through old Castle Garden with his wardrobe as his chief capital. He arrived in this country March 23, 1883. He and a shipmate who had traveled with him went to Phila- delphia, and there through an employment office they were directed to a farmer who wanted help. Eleven dollars a month and board was the highest wage offered, less money than they were making in France, and they finally decided to look elsewhere. They took the pike leading to Cincinnati, and followed it until their money was exhausted. This brought them within about a mile of Bayard and to a point where the old West Virginia Central Railroad was then in progress of construction. They secured their first employ- ment in America with the construction company, and did common labor until the road reached the top of the moun- tain. Remaining with the same company, the two young foreigners labored in the stone quarry and also in the mines of the company until January, 1885. At that date Mr. Tamburini started off to see more of America, and going by way of Chicago and Minneapolis and over the Great Northern reached Portland, Oregon. Business was dull there, and further travel and investigation offered no special opportunities in California. He spent a couple of days at Seattle, Washington, and while there vis- ited the Yakima tunnel, then in process of construction, saw Tacoma, and after several months of very intermittent employment and little beyond the pleasure of travel to re- ward him he returned to West Virginia in April, 1885. Then for a few months he again did railroad work, and was in the mines digging coal until February, 1893. At that date he went back to his old home in Tyrol, but in April again came to America, and resumed work in the mines for the West Virginia Central. In 1894 occurred the great industrial strike, and he then gave up mining for good. About that time he decided to marry the young woman of his choice and who had consented to travel life's highway with him. They were married at her old home at Keyser, and set up housekeeping in Bayard. In 1894 Mr. Tamburini opened his first stock of mer- chandise, a stock of groceries in Bayard, and his splendid mercantile enterprise today is located on the very spot where lie started in that year. From groceries his trade gradually expanded to general merchandising, including departments of millinery, furniture and building material, and his is the most popular place to supply the needs of merchandise in the little mining town. Besides his work as a merchant Mr. Tamburini helped organize the First Bayard National Bank, and has served as president of that prosperous institution from the be- ginning. He has declined public office, having no inclina- tion for politics beyond voting as a good citizen. He took out his first papers as a citizen at Keyser in 1887, and two years later received his final papers in the same court. He has been a democrat throughout his voting career. He was reared a Catholic, and is still in the same faith. The date of his marriage was August 9, 1894. The name of his bride was Margaret Hughes. She was born in Min- eral County, West Virginia, about a year younger than her husband. Her father, Terence Hughes, was born in the town and county of Longford, Ireland, where he mar- ried Mary Kenny. They came to the United States during the administration of President Andrew Jackson, and after moving about the country several years settled at old Hamp- shire, West Virginia, where Mrs. Tamburini was born. Terence Hughes helped build the tunnels in the construc- tion of the Chesapeake & Ohio Canal, and in later life was a coal miner. He died about the close of the Civil war and was buried in the cemetery at Frostburg, Maryland. His widow survived him until 1899, being about ninety- five years of age when she died. There were ten children in the Hughes family, the four survivors being: Mrs. Elizabeth Moore, of Washington, D. C.; James, of Western Port, Maryland; Francis Hughes, of Mount Savage, Mary- land; and Mrs. Tamburini. Of the deceased children Peter, the oldest, left two sons; Mary, who married Michael Mur- phy, was survived by ten children; Mrs. Bridget Halpin was survived by five children. Mrs. Tamburini was educated in the public schools of West Virginia, attended the Shenandoah Normal School, and was a very popular and successful teacher for eleven years. She was teaching when she met her husband at Elk Garden, Mineral County. Of the four children born to Mr. and Mrs. Tamburini three survived. Mary Josephine, a graduate of DeSalles Heights Academy at Parkersburg, and who finished a normal course in the preparatory school at Keyser, is a teacher in the Bayard schools. The son John is a graduate of DuQuesne University of Pittsburgh, and his brother Terence graduated from the same school. The sons are actively associated with their father's business at Bayard. ______________________________ X-Message: #2 Date: Sun, 09 Jul 2000 12:00:00 -0400 From: Valerie & Tommy Crook To: WV-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-Id: <4.3.1.0.20000709103338.00cddb50@mail.earthlink.net> Subject: BIO: HON. URIAH BARNES, Jackson Co. WV Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 446-447 Jackson HON. URIAH BARNES. While he has practiced law suc- cessfully and has been an influential member of the Leg- islature, Uriah Barnes is now and will be in the future known permanently for his remarkable industry and his mature scholarship as a legal writer and contributor to the literature of the legal profession. He was born in Jackson County, West Virginia, in 1883. His father, Charles W. Barnes, was a native of Ohio, and the Town of Barnesville, Ohio, was named for the family. Charles W. Barnes about 1875 settled in Jackson County, West Virginia, and is still living there. Uriah Barnes was accustomed to farm labor when a boy, secured his education in public schools, and also attended West Virginia University. At the age of sixteen he began teaching, and taught for two terms. His home has been at Charleston since 1901. He finished a business course in Elliott's Business College, did clerical work in several offices, and in the meantime was diligently studying law and qualified for practice in 1908. The next four years he was at the state capitol with the Supreme Court of Appeals, briefing cases for the use of the judges of that court. No law school could offer opportunities for a more thorough training for a young lawyer, and it was in this work that Mr. Barnes improved his talent for a legal analysis and a clear statement that distin- guished his own publications. For years he has been a student of the best in standard and general literature as well as in his own field. For years he was a law instructor in the University College of Law and for one year was secretary of the College of Agriculture and the Experiment Station at Morgantown. His literary work has been done both as an editor and author, and he has contributed a number of articles to law encyclopedias. Recently he com- piled and edited the ordinances of Charleston. His first important achievement was editing the "West Virginia Code" of 1916, making a careful and exhaustive study of all state statutes. This was issued in a handy form, but has recently been fully revised to include all the laws down to 1922, with full annotations to the same date, and has been published as "Barnes' West Virginia Code of 1922, Annotated." One or the other of these books is probably known to every practicing attorney in West Virginia and in many other states as well. In 1919 his "Barnes' Federal Code" appeared. This book is now the standard and monumental work in its field. The American Law Review said: "It marks an epoch in law publishing." The "Bench and Bar of West Vir- ginia," by Judge Atkinson, speaks of this work as fol- lows: "He brought to bear in this work a comprehensive knowledge, a sound and discriminating judgment, a genius for editorial detail that have combined to bring him uni- versal recognition as a master in his field. The remark able sale of the Federal Code in every state in the Union and abroad, and the unsolicited encomiums upon it, coming from bench and bar and from eminent scholars and edu- cators throughout the country, attest its rank as a master- piece of compilation." Mr. Barnes was elected to the House of Delegates in 1920 as a member from Kanawha County. He served on the judiciary committee and the committee on public build- ings and humane institutions, and was sponsor for a law creating the State Board of Childrens' Guardians, and the State Training School for Mental Defectives. He introduced a minimum wage bill, which was killed in com- mittee, and was author of a bill favored by many of the ablest lawyers and judges of the state for the reform of the judicial procedure. Mr. Barnes has participated in a number of republican campaigns and has attended three national conventions of the party. He has a mind of remarkable power, and has carried on his studies and investigations over a large field involving sociology, economics, political science and history, as well as the literature of his own profession. He is a member of the Methodist Church. Mr. Barnes married Lena Belle Ice, and they have two children, Hugh and Margaret. ______________________________ X-Message: #3 Date: Sun, 09 Jul 2000 12:00:00 -0400 From: Valerie & Tommy Crook To: WV-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-Id: <4.3.1.0.20000709103342.00cd9140@mail.earthlink.net> Subject: BIO: JOHN JAMES DOWER, Mason Co. WV Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 450-451 Mason JOHN JAMES DOWER, mayor of Point Pleasant, has throughout his active life been identified with the business interests of Mason County, in which county he was born at Hartford, February 8, 1868. His father, Patrick F. Dower, was born in County Water- ford, Ireland, in 1841, came to the United States in 1860 and settled at Hartford, West Virginia, and his business was chiefly as a contracting teamster and farmer. He died at his home at Graham in Mason County in July, 1918. He was a democrat and a Catholic and active in the Mason County Grange and Farmers Alliance. Maria Theresa Weaver, who became his wife, was born in Mason County in 1851 and died at Graham in 1890. Her children were: John James; George W., a farmer at Graham; Margaret A., of Graham; Mary E., wife of Thomas O'Conner, a merchant at Graham; Patrick V., of Martins Ferry, Ohio; Staunton M., a merchant at Columbus, Ohio; Albert A. and Jerome A., in business at Pittsburgh; Agnes T., wife of William Lightly, of Pittsburgh; Mrs. Frances M. O'Shaunnessy, of Pittsburgh; and Josie E., wife of William Boggess. John James Dower acquired the equivalent of a high school education in Mason County, and from the age of seventeen to twenty worked on the home farm. After that he was in the mercantile business at Graham until 1905, and during fifteen years of that time was station agent for the Ohio River Railroad, which in 1900 became part of the Baltimore & Ohio system. For seventeen years he was either postmaster or assistant postmaster of Graham. For several months Mr. Dower was a salesman for the Star Grocery Company of Parkersburg, and then returning to Mason County was with the mercantile firm of W. E. Hay- man & Company at Letart. June 1, 1906, he became a traveling salesman and vice president for the Point Pleas- ant Grocery Company, and that has been his chief business ever since. In 1920 he was chosen secretary and treasurer of the Davis Orchard Company of Mason County. Mr. Dower was elected mayor of Point Pleasant, May 21, 1921, and began his orderly and efficient administration of municipal affairs July 1, 1921. He is a democrat, a mem- ber of the Episcopal Church, is a past master of Minturn Lodge No. 19, F. and A. M., was high priest in 1921 of Point Pleasant Chapter No. 7, R. A. M., Is a past com- mander of Franklin Commandery No. 17, K. T., is a member of the Lodge and Encampment of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows, and past chancellor of Oriental Lodge No. 49, Knights of Pythias. During the World war he served as county food administrator, and gave his effective aid to all patriotic causes. In 1899, near Letart, he married Miss Carrie B. Luse, daughter of Algernon and Rhoda E. (Hart) Luse. Her father was a soldier of the Civil war. Mr. and Mrs. Dower have five children. The oldest, Theresa A., was born in May, 1900, is a graduate of the Point Pleasant High School, has gained some scholarship honors in the extension work of the University of West Virginia, where she is now regularly enrolled as a sophomore, and during the summer of 1921 she was an instructor in the extension department. Eleanor, the second child, was born March 14, 1903, is a senior in high school; Mary, born in 1905, is in the sophomore class; and the two younger children are John J., Jr., born in 1908, and Louise, born in 1912. ______________________________ X-Message: #4 Date: Sun, 09 Jul 2000 12:30:00 -0400 From: Valerie & Tommy Crook To: WV-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-Id: <4.3.1.0.20000709102144.00c2c3d0@mail.earthlink.net> Subject: BIO: HARRY W. BAYER, Morgan Co. WV Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 424 HARRY W. BAYER. The high standing which is that of Mr. Bayer as one of the representative members of the bar of Morgan County is the more gratifying to note by reason of the fact that he is a native son of this county, having been born on a farm in Sleepy Creek District. His father, Robert Bayer, was born in Washington County, Maryland, where he was reared and educated and where as a youth he served an apprenticeship to the plasterer's trade. He was a young man when he came to Morgan County, West Virginia, and after his marriage he here settled on the old homestead farm of his wife's parents and continued as one of the substantial farmers and representative citizens of Sleepy Creek District until his death. On this old homestead farm was born his wife, whose maiden name was Angeline Johnson, and she still resides on the place, which is endeared to her by many gracious memories and associa- tions. She is a daughter of James and Sarah (Ohlinger) Johnson and a granddaughter of John Johnson, who was one of the very early settlers in what is now Morgan County. He here purchased land and reclaimed a productive farm, his farm having been situated nine miles distant from the courthouse and he having been familiarly known as Nine- mile Johnson, to distinguish him from another Johnson of the same personal name. It is of local historic interest that this sturdy pioneer in 1870, when 109 years of age, walked from his farm to Berkeley Springs to cast his vote for General Harrison for president of the United States. James Johnson passed his entire life in Sleepy Creek District, and was one of the substantial exponents of farm industry in his native county, where he commanded unqualified popular esteem. The Ohlinger family likewise was established in Morgan County in the pioneer days, this county having at that time been a part of Berkeley County, and the home- stead farm of the family having been in the Hedgesville District. The subject of this sketch is the eldest in a family of three children, the other two being daughters, Sarah and Latona, who remain with their widowed mother. Harry W. Bayer waxed strong in mind and physique through the discipline which he gained in connection with the activities of the home farm and the advantages which were his through the medium of the rural schools of the dis- trict. He advanced his education by attending summer normal schools, and at the age of nineteen years he became a teacher in a rural district. By his pedagogic service he earned the funds to defray the expenses of his course in the Shenandoah Institute at Dayton, Virginia. He taught eight terms of school, in Morgan and Berkeley counties, and for two terms was principal of the graded school at Hedgesville. In the meanwhile he applied himself diligently to the study of law, and in 1893 was admitted to the West Virginia bar, after passing a specially successful examina- tion before Judges Faulkner, Hohe and Dailey. He forth- with opened an office at Berkeley Springs, where he has since continued in active general practice, except for an interim of two years passed at Manning. He has proved his powers as a resourceful trial lawyer and well fortified counselor, and has built up a large practice that marks him as one of the representative members of the bar of his native county. He gave twenty years of most effective service as prosecuting attorney of Morgan County, and was for two years city attorney of Manning. Mr. Bayer has been in- fluential in the local councils and campaign activities of the republican party, and has served as a member of the Republican Executive Committee of Morgan County, as well as a member of the republican committee for this congres- sional district. He has frequently been a delegate to the district and state conventions of his party, and in 1920 was a republican candidate for nomination for the office of state commissioner of agriculture. His first presidential vote was east for Gen. Benjamin Harrison. As a youth Mr. Bayer became deeply interested in horti- culture, and he started one of the first commercial orchards in Morgan County. He has been a progressive and public- spirited citizen, and his influence has been felt in connec- tion with many movements and enterprises projected for the general good of the community. He organized the Peo- ples Mutual Fire Insurance Company of Morgan County, and continued his executive connection with the same until it had been established on a firm foundation and had de- veloped a prosperous business. He was the organizer also of the Berkeley Springs Telephone Company, promoted and effected the establishing of the cold-storage plant at Berk- eley Springs, and has otherwise shown lively interest in all things touching the welfare and advancement of his home town, the judicial center of Morgan County. At the age of twenty-nine years Mr. Bayer wedded Miss Agnes Slaughter, who was born in Berkeley County, a daughter of James T. and Henrietta C. Slaughter. Mr. and Mrs. Bayer have three children: Rana C., Beverley C. and Alice. ______________________________ X-Message: #5 Date: Sun, 09 Jul 2000 12:30:00 -0400 From: Valerie & Tommy Crook To: WV-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-Id: <4.3.1.0.20000709101714.00c278f0@mail.earthlink.net> Subject: BIO: JOSEPH S. WHEAT, Morgan Co. WV Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"; format=flowed The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 419-420 JOSEPH S. WHEAT was representative from Morgan County in the First and Second Legislatures of West Vir- ginia. He was born in the Village of Berkeley Springs, March 31, 1803, a son of William and Elizabeth (Shaw) Wheat, the latter a native of Virginia, while William Wheat came from England. William Wheat at one time kept a hotel at Berkeley Springs. Joseph Wheat acquired a good education, became a civil engineer, and was too old for service as a soldier in the Civil war, but was an active Union man. He was taken prisoner by the Confederates and confined at Richmond for three months until exchanged. He was elected in 1863 to the House of Delegates as representa- tive of Morgan County. While in the Legislature he was instrumental in the passage of the law establishing a free school system in the state. He also served several years as justice of the peace. Joseph S. Wheat died May 6, 1872. He married Miranda Grove, a native of Frederick County, Virginia, and daughter of John and Eleanor (Newbaugh) Grove. Her father was a farmer and local Methodist minister and died at the age of eighty-one, his wife dying ten years later at the same age. Mrs. Joseph S. Wheat died December 17, 1890. She reared six children: Harriet, Henry, Mary, James, John and Alfred. The daughter Harriet, became the wife of John Hunter and reared seven children namely, Raymond, Carrie, Bailey, Jessie, Leslie, Helen and Albert. A second daughter Mary, married Edward Bechtol, a son of Aaron Bechtol. Edward Bechtol was well educated, for many years was in the tannery industry and was a life-long resident of Berkeley Springs where he died at the age of seventy-two. Mr. and Mrs. Edward Bechtol reared seven children: Edward Ford, Eugene Leroy, Nellie, Harry F., William Guy, Maud S., and Florence May.