WV-FOOTSTEPS-D Digest Volume 00 : Issue 74 Today's Topics: #1 BIO: JOHN L. COLEBANK, Monongalia [Valerie & Tommy Crook To: WV-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-Id: <3.0.5.32.20000319224408.008ef880@trellis.net> Subject: BIO: JOHN L. COLEBANK, Monongalia Co. WV Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 375 Monongalia JOHN L. COLEBANK. One of the most useful citizens of Monongalia County is John L. Colebank, whose home is a high class farm in Union District, seven miles north of Morgantown. Mr. Colebank is a teacher as well as a fanner, is still active in the pedagogical role, and in teach- ing, farming and the duties of citizenship he is known as thoroughly constructive in his thinking as well as in his acts. He appreciates among other things the value of good roads, has given his influence to secure such improve- ment, and he has taken a part in all the organized agri- cultural movements and has tried on his own farm to set a good example of progressive agriculture. Mr. Colebank was born in Union District of Monon- galia County October 19, 1871. His parents were Thomas J. and Margaret (Stewart) Colebank. His father, who was born in Fayette County, Pennsylvania, in April, 1844, was brought when a boy to West Virginia. Thomas J. Colebank has been a farmer, timber dealer, and in the early days rafted great quantities of logs down the river to Pittsburgh. He grew and fed cattle and sheep on a large scale. It is said that he has served on the Grand Jury more frequently than any other man in the county, and he has always been active in the republican party and has been a constant attendant and official member of the Eden Methodist Protestant Church. John L. Colebank attended the common schools, spent three terms in the State University at Morgantown, and has taken correspondence work and attended a number of Teachers Institutes and kept in touch with educational ideas by mingling with his fellow workers and through books and magazines. He began to teach at the age of twenty, and altogether has taught twenty-five terms, giv- ing a part of practically every year to work in the rural schools in his home vicinity. Most of his teaching has been done in the home school district. There are many now in the professions and in business who credit him with some of the inspiration and influence that molded their early lives. As a farmer Mr. Colebank is a breeder of Shropshire sheep, Berkshire hogs, and always has a large herd of cattle grazing over his 230 acre farm. He acted as census enumerator in 1900, has been deputy assessor, and for six years was on the County Board of Equalization. He has attended as a delegate a number of local republican conventions. Mr. Colebank and family are members of the Eden Methodist Protestant Church. He has been super- intendent of the Sunday School for many years, trustee of the board for years, and teacher in the Sunday School for many years, having attended for years without missing a Sunday. At the age of twenty-four Mr. Colebank married Miss Lizzie Shanks, of Clay District, Monongalia County. Their four children are Elmer Gay, Claude, Ocie and Thomas L. ______________________________X-Message: #2 Date: Sun, 19 Mar 2000 22:44:10 -0500 From: Valerie & Tommy Crook To: WV-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-Id: <3.0.5.32.20000319224410.008f2100@trellis.net> Subject: BIO: ALBERT N. LYON, Kanawha Co. WV Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 375-376 Kanawha ALBERT N. LYON, superintendent of the Kanawha & Mich- igan Railroad, with headquarters at Charleston, is a rail- roader with forty years of service to his credit. His early work in the ranks was done chiefly as a telegraph operator. He has been an operating executive with the Kanawha & Michigan for sixteen years. He began railroading on April 1, 1883, as a messenger boy in the office of the Toledo & Ohio Central at Granville, Ohio. He learned telegraphy, was an operator and railroad agent on that road for several years, and subsequently be- came train dispatcher and chief dispatcher at Bucyrus, Ohio. >From these duties he was called to the service of the Kanawha & Michigan Eailroad on September 1, 1906, as trainmaster at Middleport, Ohio, for the entire road. A few years later he was advanced to superintendent, with office at Charleston, and in 1911 was made general superintendent. During the period of Government control, from July 1, 1917, to March, 1919, he was superintendent, and with the restora- tion of private control the office of general superintendent was abolished and he continues as superintendent. The Kanawha & Michigan is now operated in conjunction with the Toledo & Ohio Central as the controlling management. Since 1916 the Kanawha & West Virginia Railroad has been a part of the Kanawha & Michigan. A considerable exten- sion of mileage has been made since Mr. Lyon became superintendent. The present Kanawha & Michigan em- braces a mileage of 220 miles, 176 being strictly the Kanawha & Michigan. There is an operating force of about 1,200 men and with seventy engines. The general shops are at Hobson, Ohio. This road is one of the great feeders of coal to the main trunk lines of the country. Through its lines it affords outlet for 126 coal mines in the Kanawha coal field. The daily business in normal seasons is about 400 cars of coal. Mr. Lyon is a member of the Railroad Superintendents' Association of America. He was born at Granville, Ohio, and his father was a railroad man, identified with railroad constructions, particularly in the building of the Toledo & Ohio Central. Mr. Lyon is a well known and popular busi- ness man and citizen of Charleston, is a director of the Security Bank of that city and the Empire Savings and Loan Company, and is president of the Victory Cone Com- pany, a concern for the manufacture of ice cream cones. He is a thirty-second degree Scottish Rite Mason, a Knight Templar, a Noble of the Mystic Shrine and a member of the Rotary Club of Charleston. Mr. Lyon's first wife was Minnie Fultz, of Ohio. His second wife was Jessie Gates, of Charleston. His two children are by his first marriage: William, manager of the Victory Cone Company of Charleston; and Marie, wife of B. C. McKnight, a coal operator at Middleport, Ohio. ______________________________X-Message: #5 Date: Mon, 20 Mar 2000 04:33:38 -0500 From: Valerie & Tommy Crook To: WV-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-Id: <3.0.5.32.20000320043338.0085f7c0@trellis.net> Subject: BIO: WILLIAM HOLLAND WEST, Monongalia Co. WV Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 376 Monogalia WILLIAM HOLLAND WEST. West and Holland are both old family names in West Virginia, and they have been families of most substantial character, contributing to the current of progress during the century or more they have lived on the western slope of the Alleghanies. Wil- liam Holland West has devoted the work of his mature years to farming and the cultivation of good social and civic standards in his home community in the Union Dis- trict of Monongalia County. His home is seven miles north of Morgantown, on the Point Marion Road. He was born in Clinton District of Monongalia County August 18, 1853, son of Hamilton G. and Elizabeth (Hol- land) West. His grandfather, William West, settled in Taylor County, West Virginia, from Maryland about 1800, and lived in Taylor County until his death, at the age of about sixty. He was a man of influence in his locality, serving as justice of the peace. Hamilton G. West was born in Taylor County in 1826, and in early life became a carpenter. While working in Monongalia County he met Elizabeth Holland, who was born in Clinton District, daugh- ter of Reasein and Johanna (Wilson) Holland. The Holland family goes back to almost the beginning of things in this part of Monongalia County. Capell Holland, father of Reasein, was born in 1733 and died in 1823. On moving to the Clinton District of Monongalia County he settled near the site of Goshen Baptist Church. Reasein Holland was born in Maryland in 1776, and was four years of age when the family settled in West Virginia. Reasein Hol- land is said to have erected the first mill in Monongalia County, and he died here in 1851. The old Holland home- stead is now owned by William H. West, who inherited a portion of it from his mother. Capell Holland took up this land in a virgin condition, and it is one of the few places that have not been sold out of the direct line of descent. Hamilton G. West lived there after bis marriage. His wife, Elizabeth, died there in 1912, at the age of eighty-five, having been born in 1827. Hamilton G. West, who died in 1883, at the age of fifty-seven, was one of the leading democrats of the county, filled the office of justice of the peace for a number of terms, and was active in convention work. He was a major in the West Virginia Militia during the Civil war. He was a deacon of the Goshen Baptist Church. Of his nine children the seven who survived infancy are noted: William H.; Lancelot, of Fairmont, West Virginia; Johanna, who died in middle life, the wife of Calvin Roby, and moved to Preston County; Esther, Mrs. Clark Price, living on a portion of the old homestead; Sally, Mrs. W. W. Graham, of Uniontown, Pennsylvania; Hamilton, who met an accidental death at the age of twenty; and Hardwick, who was accidentally killed at the age of fifteen. William Holland West lived at home until 1877, having acquired his education in the common schools. When he left home he took charge of the farm he now occupies, then owned by his uncle, Lancelot John. Lancelot John was then an old man and had lived on the present West farm from early life. Lancelot John was born in Greene County, Pennsylvania, was reared in West Virginia, and died in 1895, at the age of eighty-two. His wife was Sarah Holland, a sister of Elizabeth Holland. She died at the age of sixty-five, and they were not survived by children. William H. West had cared for them twenty-one years and inherited the 150 acres they owned. As noted previously, he also has the old farm owned by his mother, where he had lived fifteen years, looking after her in old age. This part of the estate comprises 168 acres out of the original 420 acres. Mr. West has made a practical success of gen- eral farming, growing both grain and cattle. He has served as a director and is still a stockholder in the Fed- eral Savings & Trust Company of Morgantown. The dem- ocratic organization has been kept alive through the ef- forts of such men as Mr. West, and he is the county com- mitteeman for Clinton District and has attended several conventions as a delegate. For four years he was school commissioner, served by appointment from Governor Glass- cock as a member of the County Board of Equalization, and has been a candidate for county commissioner. In 1883 he married Miss Ellen Cole, then twenty-four years of age. She is a daughter of John S. and Lovina (Bonner) Cole, of Cheat Neck, Monongalia County. Mr. and Mrs. West have three children. Elizabeth is the wife of Frank Shuttlesworth, a retired farmer at Morgantown. The second child is John Hamilton West. The third is Mary, wife of Ernest Winner, and they live with Mr. West. John Hamilton West married Maude Clark, of Marion County, and for some years he has been the man- ager of the old Holland farm. W. H. West is a member of the Forks of Cheat Baptist Church, the oldest Baptist Church in West Virginia, organized November 5, 1775. Four successive church buildings have accommodated the society, and the present church was erected in 1884, succeeding the former brick church. Mr. West is a member of the Grange, and is affiliated with the Independent Order of Odd Fellows and Junior Order United American Mechanics. ______________________________X-Message: #6 Date: Mon, 20 Mar 2000 04:33:48 -0500 From: Valerie & Tommy Crook To: WV-FOOTSTEPS-L@rootsweb.com Message-Id: <3.0.5.32.20000320043348.008ebe70@trellis.net> Subject: BIO: FRANK BLAINE ST. CLAIR, Monongalia Co. WV Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 376-377 Monogalia FRANK BLAINE ST. CLAIR is one of the younger men of progress identified with the substantial development of Monongalia County. He is a farmer and Hereford cattle breeder, living in Union District, seven miles north of Morgantown, on the Point Marion Road. This farm where he lives today is his birthplace, and both he and his mother were bom in the same house, which stood almost on the site of his present home. He was born January 12, 1880, son of Edgar W. and Elizabeth (John) St. Clair. His father was bom in the same district in 1839, and died in 1901, at the age of sixty-two. The pioneer of the family was Jordan St. Clair and his wife, Malinda, who lived out their lives on a farm on West Run. Jordan St. Clair is survived by two sons, Millard and Leroy, and a daughter, Carrie, widow of Edgar Donley. Edgar W. St. Clair was married at the John homestead. Elizabeth John was a daughter of William John. and in- herited a third of his estate and has lived practically all her life on the farm. For a number of years Edgar St. Clair operated a store at Easton and later at Stewartstown, and then took the management of the John homestead. He did general farming here and he also had an extensive business as a timber buyer. He bought a number of tracts of standing timber, gave employment to a large force of men in the logging season, operated a saw mill and also rafted great quantities of lumber and timber down the Cheat and Monongahela rivers to Pittsburgh. He owned the old St. Clair place of 100 acres four miles from his own home. He was a director of the Second National Bank of Morgantown. Edgar St. Clair was not only an efficient business man but had unusual abilities in a pub- lic way, being able to make effective public speeches and was a party worker in the Republican ranks. He served four terms in the State Legislature during the '90s. He and his wife were members of the Forks of Cheat Baptist Church, the oldest church of that denomination in the state. He was survived nine years by his widow, who passed away in 1910, at the age of sixty-eight. Their two children are Myrtle and Frank Blame. The former is Mrs. Charles Hunter, and she owns a part of the old St. Clair homestead. Frank Blaine St. Clair finished his education with two years in West Virginia University, and then took charge of the homestead. On October 24, 1898, he married Mabel J. Echart, daughter of William and Belle (Moore) Echart. Her father was born in Monongalia County, but as a young man removed to Kansas, where he married and where for some years he followed the trade of stone mason at Topeka. He then returned to West Virginia, and is still active In his trade at Morgantown. Mabel Echart was born in Kan- sas and was nine years of age when brought to West Vir- ginia. Mr. and Mrs. St. Clair have three children: Dale Mortimer, Edgar William, a senior in the Morgantown High School, and Helen Elizabeth, all at home. Mr. and Mrs. St. Clair are members of the Eden Methodist Protestant Church. They live in a very attractive country home, hav- ing built their residence four years ago. Mr. St. Clair has continued in a measure in the lumber business in which his father was engaged, and operates a portable saw mill. For several years he has been a successful breeder of Hereford cattle.