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BARBOUR COUNTY WEST VIRGINIA
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Submitted to the West Virginia Biographies Project by:
Valerie & Tommy Crook
vfcrook@trellis.net
November 26, 1999
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The History of West Virginia, Old and New
Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc.,
Chicago and New York, Volume III,
pg. 339-340
EDMOND WHITEHAIR, though past the age of three score
and ten, still bears a part in the business affairs of Philippi.
He was a boy soldier of the Union in the Civil war, and
for the greater part of his active career lived in Preston
County, where the Whitehairs are one of the oldest and
most prominent families. The family history is given
with more detail on other pages of this publication.
Edmond Whitehair was born near Terra Alta in Preston
County, January 19, 1848, son of Daniel and Sarah (Mes-
senger) Whitehair. His mother was a daughter of Edmond
and Louisa (Hardesty) Messenger. Edmond was one of
a family of eight sons and four daughters, and his boyhood
was spent on the farm close to the little city on the moun-
tain top. At that time country schools were poorly equipped
and conducted only a few months of each year, and it was
from such schools that Edmond Whitehair acquired his
education. He worked with his father, and though only
thirteen years of age when the Civil war broke out, he was
eager to get into the service, and after being rejected on
account of his age he was finally accepted in February
after bis fifteenth birthday. At Grafton he enlisted in
Company I of the Seventeenth West Virginia Infantry,
under Captain Samuel Holt and Colonel Day. He joined
his company at Wheeling, did some training there, was
in training at Clarksburg, and during the remainder of the
war was on scouting duty. There were many Confederate
prisoners gathered in, some of them being deserters from
the Confederate Army while others were bona fide soldiers.
The Seventeenth Regiment was ordered back to Wheeling
and Company I was discharged in July, 1865.
After his return to Terra Alta Edmond Whitehair joined
Senator Jones in the "shook" business, making shocks
for molasses and sugar barrels. This was an industry with
which he was identified about eight years. Mr. Whitehair
then returned to farming, and was an active factor in the
agricultural community near his birthplace for many years.
On leaving the farm he retired to Terra Alta, and about
twelve years later, in 1904, came to Philippi, where he
purchased the marble business of Mr. Joseph Crim, acquiring
the plant and goodwill. He took charge and has since con-
ducted this local industry, known as the Tygart Valley
Marble Works, a corporation of which Sylvanus Talbott
is president, Ira H. Byers, secretary, and Mr. Whitehair,
treasurer and general manager. The company is capitalized
at $5,000, and it does a business over a large adjacent sec-
tion of West Virginia and extending into Pennsylvania and
Maryland.
Mr. Whitehair was one of the promoters and stockholders
of the First National Bank of Terra Alta, and is also a
charter member and one of the stockholders of the Peoples
Bank of Philippi. He is a republican, having cast his first
vote for General Grant, and has supported the national
ticket for half a century. He was a member of the City
Council of Terra Alta and president of the Board of Educa-
tion of Portland District, Preston County, for fourteen
years, resigning that office when he came to Philippi. In
this city he has served two terms as a member of the
council, but after his second term declined to serve longer.
Mr. Whitehair has been a member of the United Brethren
Church for half a century and has been superintendent of
the Sunday School. He is affiliated with the Grand Army
of the Republic.
In Preston County he married Miss Lucinda Freeland.
Her father was Benjamin Freeland, who married a daughter
of Samuel Messenger. Mrs. Whitehair died seven years after
her marriage. She was the mother of three children. Her
son Walter was killed in an explosion at Cumberland, Mary-
land, leaving a wife and four children, whose names are
Nora, wife of Clarence Mullendor, Blanche, Stanley and
Mrs. Mildred Jennings. The only daughter of Mr. White-
hair by his first marriage is Lizzie, wife of M. N. Taylor, of
Terra Alta, and the living son is Samuel Whitehair, of
Philadelphia. For his present wife Mr. Whitehair married
in Garrett County, Maryland, Susan Sanders, daughter of
John F. and Elizabeth (Baker) Sanders. Mrs. Whitehair
was born in Garrett County February 22, 1851. The one
child of Mr. and Mrs. Whitehair is Missouri, wife of Floyd
H. Smith, of Philippi, and they have one child a daughter,
Pearl, a student in the Philippi High School.
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