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HANCOCK COUNTY WEST VIRGINIA - BIOS: BUCHANAN, G.L.
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Submitted to the West Virginia Biographies Project by:
Valerie & Tommy Crook
vfcrook@trellis.net
September 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. 256
Hancock County
G. L. BUCHANAN. One of the important business in-
dustries of Holliday's Cove, the Cove Valley Lumber Com-
pany, is an expression and example of a well worked out
plan of business procedure, based upon the solid foundation
of efficiency and thorough knowledge of conditions and re-
quirements. Back of the success of this concern has been
the directing mind and guiding hand of its president,
G. L. Buchanan, a man of sound ability and known integrity,
practical, energetic and result-attaining. He has worked
his own way to a place of business preferment, and while
so doing has contributed materially to the advancement of
the community through his business enterprise and his per-
sonal public service.
Mr. Buchanan was born at Wintersville, Jefferson County,
Ohio, June 10, 1869, a son of J. A. Buchanan. His grand-
father, Ebenezer Buchanan, was born in Ohio County, West
Virginia, and spent his life in this state and Pennsylvania in
agricultural pursuits. J. A. Buchanan, also a native of
Ohio County, passed his active life as a tiller of the soil
with the exception of the three years he spent in the Union
Army during the war between the states, when he was a
private in Company D, Twelfth Regiment, West Virginia
Infantry. He was wounded in the service, but recovered
and returned safely to his home, where he resumed his
farming operations. He made a decided success of his
business affairs and is now living in comfortable retirement
at St. Petersburg, West Virginia.
G. L. Buchanan received his education in the public schools
and as a young man learned the trade of carpenter, a voca-
tion at which he worked for about ten years. Coming to
Holliday's Cove about 1899, during, the following decade
he built practically all the buildings erected at that time,
and many evidences of his mechanical skill and sound work-
manship are to be found still standing in this locality. In
1909 Mr. Buchanan founded the Cove Valley Lumber Com-
pany and established a lumber yard, and this he conducted
as a private enterprise until March 24, 1920, when the busi-
ness was incorporated with a capital of $100,000, the officers
being as follows: G. L. Buehanan, president; William I.
Graham, a practical mechanic and foreman of the plant,
vice president; and O. C. Talmann, secretary and treas-
urer, all of these being active in the management and oper-
ation of the business. The Board of Directors includes also
Eric Stern, of East Liverpool; and Daniel F. Sheckler, of
Holliday's Cove, assessor of Hancock County, also active in
the business. Recently there has been installed in the plant
modern planing mill machinery for the manufacture of
interior equipment, fittings and ornaments for buildings.
The company acts as building contractor, furnishing any-
thing required by architects' drawings in the way of build-
ing materials, exterior or interior. At times fourteen or
fifteen men are given employment, and the operations of
the company have not been confined to Holliday's Cove,
but have reached to Follansbee and other communities. The
product includes all kinds of lumber, cement, lime, sewer
pipe, etc. Mr. Buchanan has other business connections
and is a member of the Board of Directors of the Bank
of Weirton.
>From the time that he arrived at Holliday's Cove Mr.
Buchanan has been active in civic affairs. Not long after
his arrival he was elected a member of the Village Council,
a position which he held for a number of years, as he did
also that of member of the Board of Education. He was also
mayor of the city for two years, giving a very satisfactory
administration, and was elected on the republican ticket
as a member of the Board of County Commissioners. It
was during his term that the first good roads movement in
the county was put under way. With his family Mr.
Buchanan belongs to the Presbyterian Church of Holliday's
Cove, and as a fraternalist he is a thirty-second degree
Mason at Wheeling, a Blue Lodge Mason at New Cumber-
land, and a member of Osiris Temple, A. A. O. N. M. S.
Mr. Buchanan married at Holliday's Cove Miss Jessie
I. Gilmore, daughter of J. R. Gilmore, who has followed
carpentry all his life and is still a resident of Holliday's
Cove. To Mr. and Mrs. Buchanan there have been born
two daughters: Virginia, who is attending high school; and
Evelyn, a student of the graded schools.
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