As time passed and peace was restored and the ferocious beasts of the forests disappeared before the onward march of civilization, the more savage disposition was superseded by a spirit of humanity. Love sat enthroned at the hearthstone and when it bubbled over the overflow was caught at the school house. When the moral support of the home was withdrawn from the flogged, he lost the most attractive part of his profession and he began to droop and pine away. There was decided modification of all kinds of punishment in the schools. The seats were improved and the slithery ceased to run on overtime. A new kind of punishment was introduced which consisted of the seating of an offending boy between two patty girls. It was humiliating to the girls to be thus used as reformatory influences but the punishment was not more than the average boy could endure. It is thought that the first idea of a sandwich was thus suggested to one bright genius while undergoing this punishment and as a consequence the ham sandwich is today spread from sea to sea as shadowy and translucent as an Autumn moonbeam. In many places the elusive and crafty ham has boldly usurped the province of faith in becoming the evidence of a thing paid for but not found. Still the rod was not entirely abolished and could not become so by a bible reading people in the face of the warning that if the rod is spared the child will be spoiled. There was still sufficient rod exercise to hold a clearance on the Scriptural injunction and prevent the spoiling of any children.

Teachers gradually became more bold and would venture over a little further in the school books. In arithmetic they were known to have cruised over as far as Compound Numbers and not encounter any U-boats and get back safely. With the softening of hearts the bible took a place in the school and much valuable information was imparted to the youth of the land. The teacher could clear up the mystery about who was the father of Zebedee's children, it was made plain how that the shew bread was a product of the bakery that the Jews wore in their shoes during certain ceremonials in the temple and it was demonstrated to the class in physiology about the peculiar delicate organism of the stomach of the whale which caused it to revolt at such unwholesome food as Jonah and many other equally difficult things for the mind of the child to grasp.

After the war when the free school system was established under the protection and beneficent influences of the Test Oath, education enjoyed a big boom. School houses began to loom up near the homes of the school board. This was not only a matter of convenience for their children but gave them the inside track on boarding the teacher. It also afforded a strategic advantage to the housewife in securing the use of the school broom and waterbucket during the eight months of vacation. Myriads of Ohio teachers swarmed across the Ohio river at low water and infested the land like Pharoah's locusts. As they were fully protected by the game laws, they remained with impunity and enjoyed the usufruct and the teacher's fund. Boards for the examination of teachers were not then provided and the chief duty of the county superintendent was to acertain how little the Ohio teachers knew, not a difficult task to perform. Ohio teachers were the rule then. While they may have betrayed more of egotism and less of real gentility than our own teachers, many of them were almost as well informed in book learning. It was the rule to employ them both because they had the superior advantages of mixed schools and to observe the theory that "cattle at a distance wears long horns."
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(WCN - 1/15/1931) Pioneer Incidents Here Not Without Humor

Early Surveyorship Here

When the Civil War came up the office of surveyor of Wayne County was held, for some reason best known to himself, by a prominent citizen of the county who was not a practical surveyor and who really did none of the work of the office. The active duties of the office were discharged by C. W. Fergusson who was a very accurate, and capable surveyor. The surveyor's outfit and records were left in the care and custody of Mr. Ferguson during the war and he kept them at his home one mile from the court house. While Mr. Ferguson was not engaged in the activities of the war, he was precluded by the Test Oath after the war from holding any office because he had "aided and abetted the Rebellion" by occasionally affording food and shelter to his two brothers who were soldiers and from time to time furnishing their families with apples and potatoes from his farm.

When the county government was re-organized after the war there were numerous applications for the offices but it appears that no one asked for the surveyorship who had any practical conception of surveying beyond staking off an office for himself. In the distribution of the favors this office was drawn by a carpenter, who, probably, saw the court house the first time when he went up to take charge of the outfit and records of his office. He applied to Mr. Ferguson for the "working tools" and archives of the surveyor and Mr. Ferguson promptly placed before him the compass, the tripod, the chain, the books and field notes of public lands and the greatest of all these was the compass. The new surveyor looked the array of new things over with a critical eye and regarding Mr. Ferguson with a suspicious look demanded to know where the compass was. Being a carpenter he was expecting this instrument to be constructed along the lines of a carpenter's compasses for describing a circle.

Telling It To The Court

When the constitution of 1872 was young, some of its defects were as glaring as they were after it had taken on age and experience. The farmers were among the ablest lawyers that the state ever produced but the majority of them had been out of touch with legal questions for twelve years because of the war and the consequent Test Oath. They had not been brought to realize that the legal world "do move" at about the same velocity as the physical world. Consequently, it was but natural that they go back to the mother state for their inspiration at the point where they had left it.

One of the strange provisions of the organic law was to invest the county court, composed of a presiding officer and two justices, with law and equity jurisdiction without imposing a legal qualification for membership on the court.

Soon after the new judicial plan got into swing, a young lawyer named Ragland, had a case before it that hinged entirely on the construction of a point of law. Ragland was from Goochland county, Virginia and dropped down seemingly out of the skies into Wayne county. He was a school teacher, well reared, well educated, well read and very genteel in his manner. He was sharp, witty, quick at repartee and very well grounded in the law.

Ragland had argued the legal point with much lucidity and at great length but the court was as Impervious to the legal touch as the back of a duck is to water. So the argument did not take. The court handled the niceties of the law as they would handle a mattock or a plowstock. Ragland persisted and the court resisted and finally ordered him to take his seat. If there is one thing that will put a keen edge on the temper of an attorney it is to be ordered by the court to take his seat, for the court is in a position to enforce the order.

Ragland saw that the court had the advantage of him and spreading one of his most gracious smiles all over his face he said in his most captivating manner: "All right your honors, I submit to your authority but I cannot refrain from observing that this court always suggests to me the proverbial South Carolina cotton team made up of two old mules and one jackass,"

An Editor's Troubles

An editor, using the term in its broadest sense, is necessarily, a man possessing much wisdom. In the first place the inspiration would never strike any but a wise man and like lightning, it seldom strikes the same object twice however conspicuous it may he. In the second place the wisdom he does not have in stock when he starts to be an editor he soon acquires by his varied and interesting experiences. At the first blush he is supposed to know all things. Later on he is conceded to know all things except such things as he knows differently from the way the other fellow knows them. That which he happens not to know he can "claim" and if nobody knows it any better than he does he can generally get by with it. To "claim" has long been admitted to be one of the perogatives of the editor and some it is the chief industry. As it is one on which no war tax has been imposed there is not likely to he much reduction in the output. He can "claim" that his periodical goes into 1699 1-2 more homes than the Saturday Evening Post and the only cost attached is in the way of depreciation of conscience because of the overstrain. There are some things that editors do know and sometimes they know them better than those whose business it is to know them.

But that is not what we started out to say.

A long time ago the editor of the Wayne News received from an attorney who did not reside at the court house, an order of publication in a suit for divorce. The order had been prepared by himself and he sent a letter requesting the editor to read the proof carefully and follow copy "verbatim et literatim". On reading the proof the editor observed that the object of the suit as stated was to "obtain a divorce mensa et torah" with the legal phrase loudly underscored. Taking it to be a mere error, the word "torah" was marked to read "thoro" and it was so published. In a few days the editor received another letter from the attorney pointing out in most emphatic language the negligence of the editor in reading proof and directing that before another publication the notice be corrected to read like the copy. The editor ignored the direction and the notice was published as originally set up and certificate and copy filed with the clerk.

When court convened the attorney called on the editor and informed him that he did not propose to pay for the publication of the notice because of the error made in failing to follow copy and not correcting when directed to do so. He was very indignant and declared that even should the error pass the eye of the court he "had been made the laughing stock of the whole bar".

The "error" evaded even the eagle eye of the court but the attorney never paid for the publication of the notice. He had been humiliated to the extent of the cost of the publication by being brought into ridicule before the bar. He had written the legal phrase from his recollection of how some other lawyer had used it.

A County Court Incident

The incongruity of the county court system in the constitution of 1872, conferring almost unlimited law and every jurisdiction on a court without imposing a legal qualification to membership on the court, was aptly illustrated in a case in Wayne County in the long ago. The case was one between the Davis Sewing Machine Co and R. H. Weddington, who at that time lived in sight of Huntington. The case involved some very fine points of the laws relating to agency and the ablest lawyers of the bar were employed on each side. The best part of a day was devoted to the arguments on the law and the tables in the court room were piled up high with law books and the reports of courts that were read, construed and digested. The court quietly endured its punishment and seemed to absorb the whole volume of the legal pabulum like a sponge drinking water. Late in the day the case was unloaded with a dull heavy thud and the three members drew their heads together with the seriousness and assumed wisdom of the judges at a country polemic. After wrestling with the proposition for some time, the presiding member addressed the attorney, and stated that the court would like to know what the question was that had been submitted for their decision. Ira J. McGinnis. who always prided himself on a plain and lucid construction of a point of law, regarded the court with a look of utter disgust. Captain Gibson, who had a sense for the humorous, strode to the bar and laughed outright, Colonel Ferguson, who was always a matter of-fact man, free from frills and furbelows, sprang to his feet as if electrified and gleamed on the court with indignation. He then faced about and surveyed the court room and beckoned first one man and then another into the jury room. His cousin, Joe Plymale, who had read law in his office, observing the mysterious conferences, asked Ferguson what they protended. Colonel Ferguson explained that the men were clients of his who had paid him fees to attend to cases in the county court but as he did not propose to further humiliate himself by appearing before such a court, he had refunded the fees that the suitors might procure other counsel. Plymale said: Well, Colonel, I have been very much disgusted with the rulings of the court on points of law and at times have been aroused to a high pitch of indignation but I have never been made mad enough to pay back any money.
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(WCN - 1/15/1931) OLD PAPER TELLS OF WAYNE MAN'S END DURING WAR

Rev. Carmi Crabtree, well known Wayne County preacher, is in possession of a newspaper 67 years old which records the death of Isaiah D. Crabtree, one of the well known Wayne County pioneers. Through the courtesy of Jas. R. Rigg a copy of the old journal was brought to the Wayne County News office.

The old paper is a copy of the "Holston Journal," published April 16, 1863 at Knoxville, Tenn. The paper was a weekly with a subscription price of $3.00 a year and began publication late in the year of 1862.

Following is the account of the Crabtree death which will be read with interest by a large number of his descendants who are now readers of Wayne County News:

ISAIAH D. CRABTREE

Isaiah D. Crabtree of Wayne County, Virginia, joined the Confederate Army under Captain Spurlock, Ferguson's regiment, in September, 1862 and died at Salem, Virginia, of typhoid fever the 10th day of February, 1863.

He was the son of Wesley and Mary Crabtree. He was a promising young man, moral and upright, and beloved by all who knew him. It is said he was never known to use profane language. He was raised by religious parents. He died far away from home, but he left an evidence of his readiness to depart.

Isaiah has gone from the army on earth and has joined the army of the saints in glory. Thus another son of the South has given his life for his country. His name stands enrolled on history's page and when Southern independence shall be acknowledged by the world the name of I. D. Crabtree will be remembered with gratitude by his countrymen.
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(WCN -1/22/1931) STATEMENT GIVEN CONCERNING BANK CLOSED AT WAYNE

C. E. Lawhead of Clarksburg, recently appointed receiver for the Peoples State Bank which failed at Wayne on November 29th, was in Wayne for two days last week and while here requested this news paper to assure the local public that all possible efforts will be made to liquidate the affairs of the defunct bank at the earliest possible moment. But he pointed out that the collection of notes and clearing up of the bank's business requires a considerable amount of time, since it will likely be necessary to settle some of the disputes that will arise in court procedure.

Mr. Lawhead said that the proof of claim blanks are now ready and requested persons who have claims against the bank, either in the form of debts or deposits, call at the bank and get the proper forms and file their proof of claims.

A meeting of the depositors and stockholders will probably be called at an early date and Receiver Lawhead says that he will attend this meeting to answer questions from interested parties. It is likely that a committee will be appointed at this meeting from the stockholder-depositor group to represent these and work with the receiver in the closing up of the bank's affairs.

The assessment on stock will be one hundred per cent, in the opinion of the receiver, while no opinion was expressed as to the amount that will be paid to depositors, this depending upon the amount of notes and other obligations that can be collected.

A state law in effect at the time the bank closed which became obsolete on January 1st when the new code went into effect makes the State a preferred depositor, and consequently the first money paid to depositors will be paid to the State to cover the $20,000 which the State had on deposit when the bank closed.

Receiver's Statement

While in Wayne Mr. Lawhead issued the following statement to the local public through this newspaper:

The Peoples State Bank of Wayne is now being liquidated for the benefit of the depositors, by Mr. C. E. Lawhead, Receiver, appointed by the State Department of Banking.

"An experienced and competent man, Mr. S. L. Edler, will be in active charge of the work locally and may be consulted at the banking room on any banking day.

"The receiver may be reached by communicating with him at P. 0. Box 1067, Clarksburg, W. Va. Telephone No. 237. As often as possible he will be at Wayne and will spend as much time in the local community as may be needed and as is consistent with his other duties.

"No interest of the depositors will be neglected and every reasonable effort will be made to realize the largest possible amount for them.

"All persons having deposits in the bank are requested to sign a Proof of Claim, which Mr. Edler will be pleased to make out for them. There will be no charge of course, for filing a Proof of Claim.

"All persons who owe the bank are asked to co-operate with the Receivership by paying their obligations as promptly as possible.

Partial payments will be accepted when necessary and arrangements may be made regarding reasonable time for further payment in full."

Bank Statement

Below we are publishing the first statement of the accounts of the failed bank since its doors were closed nearly two months ago. The following is a statement of the condition of the bank at the close of the set-up on December 10th:

RESOURCES DOLLARS

Loans and Discounts 88,264.95

Overdrafts 277.20

Stocks and Securities 1,598.82

Banking House 82,348.93

Furniture and Fixtures 13,681.73

Cash 127.78

Cash Items 665.53

Huntington National Bank, Columbus, Ohio 340.12

First Huntington National Bank Huntington, W. Va. 460.23

First Huntington National Bank

Huntington, W. Va. receiver's Account 2,241.35

Undivided Profits (LOSS) 1,785.77

TOTAL 141,792.41

LIABILITIES DOLLARS

Capital 30,000.00

Protest Fees 8.46

Individual Deposits 88,923.80

Certified Checks 555.12

Drafts Outstanding 1,730.53

Certificates of Deposits 7,492.67

Savings Deposits 5,581.63

Bills Payable 7,500.00

TOTAL 141,732.41
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(WCN - 1/22/1931) T. B. McCLURE, 84, ATTRIBUTES SPAN TO YOUTH, HABITS

Professor Taylor B. McClure widely known Wayne Count educator who now makes his home with his daughter, Mrs. D. I. Hager, in Huntington recently observed his 84th birthday.

Hal Curtis, reporting the observance of Professor McClure's birthday in Sunday's Herald-Advertiser, says that this prominent Wayne countian is enjoying his usual good health in spite of the fact that he is only sixteen years short of the century mark.

Professor McClure founded Oakview Academy at Wayne and was a school teacher of renown for sixty years, his last work in the field of education being that of librarian at Wayne County High School at Wayne.

Numbered among his former pupils are men and women in 40 of the 48 states of the Union, many of them prominent and leaders in their communities, a reflection of credit to their former school master.

Oakview Academy was founded at Wayne about 1882 and served the public faithfully as a private school until the coming of the high school here in 1922. The academy building still stands here, but is not used.

In a the Herald-Advertiser interview Professor McClure recalled his friendship with Waitman Barbe, John T. Harris, Dr. D. B. Puritan and other prominent West Virginia educators.

Professor McClure attributes his long life to simple habits, careful eating, exercise and his long association with young people which has helped him to keep a fresh outlook on life.

The Wayne County High School Annual of 1928 was dedicated to this well known man and the dedication tribute, which is published below, expresses the useful life which this eminent citizen has lived. It reads:

"Few educators in this or any other state have trained more boys and girls for lives of useful leadership in this world than the man to whom this tribute is addressed. His investment of years of service is now yielding of achievements by those he has trained.

In the school room as a teacher and counselor, in the educational world at large as a leader of thought and a promoter of progressive ideas and lofty ideals, in his state as an outstanding exponent of good government and educational opportunities, in these and other realms has the subject of this sketch left an imperishable monument that will not crumble with the passing of years.

"So in recognition of his long and loyal services as a teacher of teachers, of farmers, of business and professional men and women of Wayne county, and especially in recognition of his zealous devotion to the cause of education as evidenced by his untiring labors in the establishment of Wayne County High School at Wayne to better equip for successful living the young people of the county in which he has reared his family, we dedicate this annual to our school librarian.'

Professor McClure was born in Lawrence County, Kentucky, on January 16, 1847, and was graduated from West Virginia University in 1873. Most of his life was spent at Wayne, until his beloved wife died a few years ago. He has two children, Mrs. Hager, with whom he lives, and Lawrence L. McClure, prominent Huntington attorney and secretary of the Jackson Building & Loan Association of that City.
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(WCN - 3/12/1931) 17 MIDWIFE LICENSE ARE ISSUED HERE

A marked reduction in the number of applicants for license to practice midwifery in West Virginia is noted in this years record at the State Health Department. Whether this decrease is the result of a decline in the number of those practicing midwifery or is the result of a failure to secure a license from the state Health Department as required by law is the problem before Dr. W. T. Renshaw, state health commissioner.

He is now making plans to ascertain the truth of this matter.

Under the revised code, which went into effect January first, a fine of not less than twenty-five dollars or more than one hundred may be imposed on anyone other than a physician or a licensed midwife who officiates at the birth of a child and receives money for the service rendered. This does not prevent a neighbor or friend from rendering assistance in an emergency. The law seeks to in every way safeguard the lives of mothers and infants by excluding from practice the ignorant and careless midwife who through crude, insanitary methods would endanger the lives of both.

Licenses to practice midwifery in West Virginia are issued by the State Health Commissioner only on recommendation of a local physician. A fee of one dollar is charged for each license.

Under the law requiring midwives to be licensed which was passed in 1925, applicants must be over twenty-one years of age, must be able to read and write, must be clean in appearance and general habits, free from communicable disease, and must possess a diploma from a recognized school of midwifery or have attended five mothers and new born babies under the direction of a licensed physician. Every licensed midwife is required to place in the eyes of each new born baby a solution of silver nitrate. This solution which is to prevent blindness, is furnished free by the State Health Department. The birth must be reported within ten days to the local registrar. Failure to do this is punishable by fine.

In 1927 more than five hundred midwives were licensed in the state. These included several men who had taken some medical work but were not licensed physicians. To date this year only 299 licenses have been issued.

Good roads which have placed medical services within the teach of the average citizens, together with a more general knowledge of the principles of health are responsible in a large measure for the decrease in the employment of midwives, in the opinion of Dr. Renshaw.

The following midwives have been licensed by the State Health Department to practice in this county for the year 1931, and are the only persons qualified under the law to serve in this capacity.

Liza J. Adkins, Route No. 2, Box 74, Wayne; Mrs. Allie Brown, Route No. 1, Box 27, Dunlow; Martha Copley, Webb; Mrs. Ollie Crum Webb; Ines Dyer, Cove Gap; Mrs. H. Finley, East Lynn; Nannie Hundley, Quaker; Mrs. Mary Mathis, R.F.D., Box 75, Dunlow;

Rachel Marcum, Crum; Vergie Roberts, Route No. 2, Box 57, Fort Gay; Isabelle Skeens, Route No. 1, Box 70, Prichard; Mrs. Dora Smith, Dickson; Mrs. Eliza Smith, Route No. 1, Box 78, East Lynn; Mrs. Laura B. Smith, Dunlow; Mrs. J. B. Smith, Ferguson; Mrs. Pricy Sparks, 704-23rd Street, Kenova; Jessie Y. Wilson, Glenhayes.
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(WCN - 4/23/1931) James H. Ferguson and J. J. Mansfield were first two attorneys in Wayne. (Used)

It was stated in these columns last week that we were publishing in that issue the final installment of the remarkable series of Wayne county historical articles, written by the late W. L. Mansfield, former editor of this paper, and never before published here. But since last week it has been our good fortune to come across another short historical sketch by Mr. Mansfield in which he paints a vivid word-picture of the first two attorneys-at-law who hung out their shingles in Wayne County. And we are pleased to offer our readers this article below. Editor's Note.

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The first lawyer to locate in Wayne County was James H. Ferguson, who removed here from Barboursville soon after the county was formed. He lived on a farm two miles west of the court house on Toms Creek. Here he lived when he took young Leander Spurlock, a brilliant young Wayne county school teacher into his home to read law, afterward took him in partnership and in a short time they both removed to Logan, where Spurlock died suddenly by the roadside, on a hot summer day.

James H. Ferguson was a native of the upper New River country who had drifted down to Barboursville in the thirties plying the trade of a shoemaker. Like most of the itenerant shoemakers of the period he gave some attention to agricultural pursuits and his specialty was "wild oats." His commanding physique combined with his strong intellectuality could not fail to attract the attention of men capable of recognizing such towering native ability and they deplored the lavish waste of fragrance on the desert air. Influences were used to induce him to turn his efforts into channels more in keeping with his splendid capabilities and afford him a broader field of usefulness. The best lawyers visited him at his humble shoe bench and tendered him the use of their libraries and the benefit of their instruction if he would read law. He finally accepted the proposals and read the law books and mastered their contents. In his giant mind the most profound and intricate questions of law were as simple and comprehensible, as the rudimental school books. He was eminently successful in the law and stood in the front rank of lawyers at any bar. It has been charged against him that he was lacking in gratitude toward those who contributed largest to his success and in his imperious manner hectored over friend and foe alike. Law brought him into politics and he shone in splendor in the political arena. He was a Democrat in contradistinction to the then opposing Whig party. Like Evermont Ward, an early judge here, he also did some preaching on the side as a local Methodist minister, and in that early day when the religious services were held in the cabins of the pioneers, and in the shady forests, he and Ward were sometimes associated together in the services. Some years before the war and after he had served a term in the senate with such illustrious colleagues as E. W. McComas of Cabell, and Henry I. Fisher, of Mason, he suddenly went west and as there was another notable disappearance simultaneously with his, the two were always associated together in the mind's eye of an ever suspicious public. That old gossiper, "Madam Rumor," also whispered it about that while in the west he held some very important legal relations to some of the state and territorial governments. His ability, astuteness and legal knowledge would command important legal relationships anywhere.

He was giant-like in physical build as well as in mental capacity and to these advantages was added an imperious manner and domineering spirit that cut no little figure in the success he achieved in the legislature, when he was handling measures that provoked opposition and on the courtroom when he was being worried by having a weak case on his he would frequently raise a storm and run the opposition to shelter that he might have a clear field for his measure of cause. He was a critical observer of human nature and studied his opposing counsel closely. If they exhibited signs of timidity he provoked them to rage that they might abuse him and thus neglect their cause. He never failed to guard his own points nor to take advantage of a point left unguarded by his opponent. Many a bright young lawyer with a strong case against Ferguson in the courts, and ambitious and zealous young statesmen in the legislature with some wholesome measure to promote that was opposed to Ferguson's interests, have felt the keen edge of his sarcasm and been driven into a corner to escape his crushing onslaughts.

The second lawyer to locate in Wayne county was Joseph J. J. Mansfield, a native of Bedford county. He had come of good families and his father fought both in the Revolution and the war of 1812. His father was a Methodist minister, whose credentials as an a elder were duly inscribed on parchment and signed in Mechlenburg, Va., in 1795, by Francis Asbury, the eminent English divine and co-worker of John Wesley. Bishop Asbury, after he came to America resided in Spottsylvania county, Va., and died there in 1816. Colonel Mansfield's mother's name was Jefferson and he took his middle name from her family. He was left an orphan at a tender age and early in life was thrown upon his own resources. He started out from the old town of Liberty, a poor but resolute young man, facing his course westward and going by easy stages teaching school and reading law as he proceeded. He reached the Ohio river border in the thirties and located at Barboursville a full-fledged lawyer. As was the custom of that day he practiced in several of the adjoining counties, reaching the county-seats by horseback and carrying books and papers in saddlebags. When the trouble arose between this country and Mexico he went to Texas and remained there for several years and acquired a soldier's section of land. At the close of the Mexican war he returned and located in Wayne county and married there in 1850. He served one term as prosecuting attorney from 1853 to 1857, defeating John N . Laidley and was defeated by Laidley the following election. He was the first resident lawyer to hold the office of prosecuting attorney which was not considered very attractive as the remuneration was a small allowance made by the judge at each term.

Colonel Mansfield was prominent in politics and a strong campaigner and usually canvassed the border counties below the Little Kanawha River for the Democratic ticket. He was intensely Southern in his sentiments and firm in his loyalty to Virginia. His resolute leadership had aroused the enmity of the Union element and while he was over the age of a soldier, he went to the front at the beginning because he knew he would not be permitted to remain at home unmolested.

Colonel Mansfield had a good library for that day which was most depleted of the best books during the war. They were carried off by the soldiers who would often overload themselves and be compelled to leave some of the burden at houses by the roadside. A few of the books so left were afterward recovered. Information came in for several years of valuable volumes being seen in homes and libraries in Southern Ohio, bearing the name of "J. J. Mansfield," some of them as far away as Chillicothe.
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(WCN - 5/7/1931) CRUM MAN GIVE CARNEGIE MEDAL FOR HEROIC ACT

Charles M. Perry, age 56 of Crum, Wayne County, a powder man and Garfield B. Muse, 45 colored, brakeman of Okeefe, Mingo county, were both awarded bronze medals by the Carnegie hero fund commission at Pittsburgh last week. These were the only two West Virginians thus honored.

This is probably the first instance of a Wayne County man winning the coveted Carnegie medal.

The award of the hero medal to Perry grows out of a miraculous rescue he achieved single-handed at Crum last October 26 in which he saved the daughters of Walter and Leonard Copley, Williamson attorneys, from the wheels of Norfolk & Western Railway train No. 16 as it sped at 60 miles per hour through Crum toward Williamson.

Muse saved Harold E. Wallace, 4, from being killed by a train at Devon, October 9, 1929. The boy was walking on a track on which a train was approach behind him. Seeing his plight, Muse leaped from the caboose of a passing train, raced 65 feet to the boy, and pulled him from the track at the risk of his own life just as the locomotive, screaming to a stop, reached them.

The Copley brothers and their families, former residents of Dunlow, Wayne County, were visiting a sister of Walter Copley on Sunday afternoon, last October 26, when Perry performed his extraordinary feat, according to the Williamson Daily News. The families had been taking pictures, and Walter Copley had sat down on the running board of an automobile to adjust the camera they were using, when Mary Joan Copley, 2 years and 8 months, his daughter, and June Copley of the same age, daughter of Leonard Copley, wandered away unnoticed.

The house in front of which the Copleys were taking pictures was some distance from the tracks of the Norfolk & Western Railway, and clear view from that point toward the tracks was obstructed by a tool house. Assembled in front of the residence of J. B. Crum, Sr., the parents of the children thought they had gone in the rear yard of the house to play. Instead, the tots had wandered down to the railway tracks.

Charles Perry, by a rare stroke of luck, happened to be sitting on the front porch of his own house about 200 feet east of the J. B. Crum Sr., residence. He saw the little girls on the tracks and heard the rumbling approach of Train 16, hustling to make its schedule in Williamson at a 60 mile an hour clip.

Leaping from the porch, Perry ran 250 feet, beating the train to the children on the tracks by a hairbreadth margin. Catching one child under each arm, he hurled himself out of the path of the tram and rolled down the embankment with the two as the engineer of No. 16, Andy Wilson, Portsmouth, Ohio, horrified with the thought that all three had been crushed beneath the wheels of his locomotive, applied his brakes and brought his train to a grinding stop a short distance from the scene of the miraculous escape.

Attention of the parents of the children was first attracted to the train by its sudden stopping, since No. 16 has no stop at Crum on its schedule. Following investigation of all facts concerning the heroic action on the part of Perry, Walter Copley, who is Mingo county prosecuting attorney, brought it to the attention of the Carnegie Hero Fund Commission in Pittsburgh.
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(WCN - 5/21/1931) ONLY 10 IN FIRST WCHS CLASS HERE SEVEN YEARS AGO

The graduation of a class of 49 Seniors at Wayne County high school at Wayne on Friday morning of this week will be the seventh Commencement exercises held at WCHS.

The first commencement at the county high school was held on May 20th, when C. T. Hatcher was principal, and at this time only ten Seniors composed the graduating class. The names of the ten in the first graduation class at WCHS are:

Harold Hatcher

Leo Tabor

Arnold Wellman

William Taylor

Clyde Matthews

Gladys Frazier

Helen Newman

Earnestine Tabor

Ruth Staley

Irene Smith Jackson

What They're Doing

The Hatcher family moved from Wayne to Ohio and it is not known what Harold is doing. Leo Tabor is working is a glass plant at Fairmont. Arnold Wellman lives at Wayne and is doing civil engineering. William Taylor lives at Charleston and is employed as an abstractor. Clyde Matthews is selling insurance at Wayne. Gladys Frazier recently finished a term as teacher in the Effie Graded School. Helen Newman is a student in Marshall College. Earnestine Tabor is on the faculty of Wayne County High School, teaching English. Ruth Staley is a teacher in the Ceredo District schools; and Irene Smith Jackson was a teacher in the Wayne Grade school this past year.
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(WCN - 6/11/1931) BREWERS CONFESS AND GET 6 YEARS

Pleading guilty to murder in the second degree, Carl Brewer, 20 and Selwyn Brewer, 23, of the Marrowbone section of Mingo county, near the Wayne-Mingo line, were each sentenced to serve 6 years in the State penitentiary by Judge Beno F. Howard in the Mingo circuit court last week in expiation of the slaying of Mose Block, 40, last March 20 in the latter's home.

Plea of the defendants came after the jury was drawn for trial. Three members of the panel had been removed from the jury box when they expressed themselves as opposed to the death penalty. It was at the request of the prosecuting attorney that the court examined the veniremen on their views as to capital punishment. Following a long conference between counsel on both sides, the two young defendants entered pleas of guilty to second degree murder.

Block, brother-in-law of the Brewers, was slain in what was described as the culmination of a moonshine orgy staged in celebration of the completion of a job of log-rolling on Marrowbone Creek. He was shot three times, one pistol bullet penetrating the chin and emerging on the right side of the neck, another entering the chest and the third striking a point just above the abdomen.

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(WCN - 7/9/1931) Paper Published Here Years Ago Reveals Former Habits, Customs

Through the courtesy of our friends, G. H. Lowder and A. C. Carey, of Bluefield, Wayne County News received this week four copies of old newspapers published in 1849, 1859 and 1863. Three of the four were published before the Civil War and the other one during that conflict.

One of the four interesting old journals was a copy of The Ceredo Crescent, published at Ceredo, in Wayne County on September 10th, 1859. This is Volume 2, Number 39 of the Crescent.

The old copy of the Crescent shows that C. B. Webb was editor and publisher and W. Boyd Wilson was contributing editor. The subscription rate of the paper then was $1.50 a year. Practically no local Wayne County news of any kind was published in the Crescent, most of the paper being made up of news and editorials clipped from daily newspapers from the large cities. In this regard, the small community newspapers of the country have undergone great improvement in the past several years, for now you will find that the more progressive weeklies give their readers a full coverage of local news happenings.

We read some interesting market reports in the Crescent of 1859. 72 years ago in Wayne County the prevailing prices were as follows:

Butter, pound .13 to .15

Coffee, pound .12

Candles, dozen .13

Flour, barrel 4.65

Wheat, bushel .95

Molasses, gallon .38

Pork, pound .15

Lard, pound .12

Hams, pound .11

Sugar, pound .07

In this 72-year old issue of this interesting Wayne County paper we read a lodge notice of the Wayne Masonic lodge and the notice is signed by the following lodge officers:

J. C. Wheeler, W. M; Frederick Moore, J. W; Charles W. Ferguson Treasurer; Calvin Cyfers, J. D; Hiram Moore, H. W.; David Smith, Secretary; Milton Ferguson, S. D; and R. G. Smith, Librarian.

Several carriage dealers advertised buggies, harness and saddles. Dr. W. L. Maupin, of Ceredo, carries a professional card. The paper carried advertisements of merchants in Catlettsburg, Guyandotte, Portsmouth, Ashland, and Catlettsburg as well as from Ceredo. The paper was published before the city of Huntington was born.

The paper carried a lengthy advertisement by Eli Thayer, founder of the town of Ceredo, who invited mechanics, machinists and other skilled laborers to come to Ceredo "the land of opportunity" to live.

The Crescent's display advertising rates was one dollar an inch, or more than twice the present-day rate charged by any Wayne county newspaper. The Crescent announced that it would take produce, poultry, hides or anything of value in the place of money for subscription of the paper. The Crescent publishes on its front page a recipe for Elderberry wine, but the prohibition laws of today would not permit this information to be given to a thirsty public!

Another of the four old papers sent us was a copy of The Lawrence County (Ohio) Gazette, published January 16, 1849, at Burlington, Ohio (located just across the Ohio river from Kellogg, Wayne County). This issue is Volume 3, No. 37 of the Gazette, which was published by W. C. Wheeler.

The motto of the paper as carried on page one was "There is no such word as Fail."

This old issue of the Gazette carries a news story about a steamboat accident at Portsmouth, Ohio, when the packet "Skipper" plying the Ohio and Big Sandy rivers was moving up the river with the house boat of one John Ward in tow. The house boat sank and one life was lost.

An editorial squib from the Gazette reads: "The long winter evenings cannot be better employed than by a discussion of the temperance question." Evidently the Gazette was dry.

But the Gazette was not too dry to carry the advertisements of a number of liquor companies.

A society called "The Sons of Temperance" advertised a meeting for Proctorville. Dr. J. James and Wm. M. Murphy were among the Burlington doctors publishing cards. And these attorneys had offices in Burlington; Eliah Nigh, S. M. Browning, A. Cushing, R. Leet, J, F. Wheeler, Le Grand Byington, Hamilton & Jordon, O. F. Moore, Singleton Springg and C. O. Tracy. Today it is doubtful whether or not a single attorney lives it Burlington, at least we do not know of any.

The third of the old papers sent us was The Dollar Weekly Times published at Cincinnati, Ohio, April 16, 1863, which announced that it was "Independent in all things, but neutral in Nothing."

The Dollar Weekly Times was an old style blanket newspaper of nine columns width. This paper was given over principally to the publication of Civil War news, since the issue reviewed was published while that memorable conflict was at its height. War news, poems, sermons and editorial comment made up the chief contents of the publication.

The fourth old paper received was a copy of the "Liberty Hall and Cincinnati Gazette, published at Cincinnati, Ohio, January 4, 1849. This old journal began publication in the year 1804 and had been running 45 years when this issue we received was printed. It carried a comprehensive news report from Columbus, the Ohio State capitol, and also carried reports of some world news events. But this sheet has little in common with the modern newspapers of today.

In none of the four old papers referred to above was a single picture published with the news stories and only a very few crude cuts were used to illustrate advertising. All of the four papers were four-page sheets, and all of them composed of type by hand for that was before the advent of modern typesetting machines. The page size of Wayne County News today is 13 by 24 inches in comparison to the cumberson size of approximately 23 by 29 inches of the old Cincinnati Gazette.

All the world has progressed in the past three-quarters a century, but certainly no change is more evident than the change which has taken place in the printing and publishing industry where slow and antiquated hand-methods have been supplanted by modern automatic machinery, driven by electric power.

The average small town weekly paper of today is a much better publication than the best of metropolitan journals of seventy-five years ago.
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(WCN - 7/9/1931) Former Wayne Saddle-Maker Renews Acquaintance Here

Peter Fischbach, widely known in Wayne County as a saddle and harness maker for many years, was renewing old acquaintances here over the week end.

Mr. Fischbach was accompanied by his wife and his son, Jack Fischbach and his wife. They drove through from Williamsburg, Ohio, where the Fischbach family have lived since moving from Wayne 18 years ago. Mr. and Mrs. Fischbach while here visited the latter's brothers, John and Grover Chadwick, of Whites Creek.

Peter Fischbach has for a great many years been recognized as one of the best saddle-makers in the country. He manufactures the famous "Kentucky Spring Seat Saddle" and makes each saddle by hand. There are still hundreds of these Fischbach saddles in Wayne County.

But saddle-making isn't what it used to be, according to this veteran artist in leather. "Fords and other cars have taken the place of a lot of horses," Mr. Fischbach explains," and in addition a lot of present-day riders buy the English type saddle for looks instead of the spring-seat saddle which is designed especially for the comfort of the rider."

"Pete," as he was always known to his many friends here, still makes a few saddles, but most of his time is given over to harness. But he much prefers to build a saddle, for he says that a lot more art and ability is required in making a saddle than in manufacturing a set of harness. His best year's business was a few years ago when he made 100 Kentucky Spring Seat Saddles which were shipped by parcel post from his Williamsburg shop, many of them being shipped to former acquaintances in Wayne County.

Mr. Fischback's hand-made saddle sells for $30 to $35 in comparison to the price of $60 to $125 usually asked for the much less comfortable English saddle, which Pete described as a "strip of leather nailed over a couple of clapboards." His saddle shop in Williamsburg was burned down last fall and on the site he has recently erected a modern new brick building, renting the lower floor and using the second floor as a saddle shop.

Pete was born in Germany and despite the fact that he is now within a very few months of 70 years of age he is apparently as active as he was twenty years ago. He came to the United States when he was only three years old and lived at Georgetown and Lexington, Ky., and in Wayne county he lived at the mouth of Newcomb Creek, on Gragston and in the town of Wayne. He learned the saddle-maker's trade from Bill Moore, brother of the late Calvin Moore, well known Wayne countian.

Mr. Fischbach has three sons, Earl who is in the government hospital at Chillicothe, Ohio, and who was a chemist in U. S. Civil service before he had a breakdown in health; Henson, who is a farmer and works at home; and Jack, who is employed by the American Telephone & Telegraph Company. Mr. Fischbach had two brothers, Julius, of Huntington, and Clifford, an N. & W. conductor to die within a month of each other, both of them being victims of heart attacks.

Williamsburg, where Mr. Fischbach now lives, is a small town located near Cincinnati. It is a hub of a wide trading area and there are seven other small towns within a radius of seven miles of Williamsburg.

Wayne County has undergone some nearly unbelievable improvements since Mr. Fischbach sold saddles, harness and buggies here twenty years ago. Good roads, electric lights and power, natural gas, telephones, and high schools are only a few of the outstanding local improvements which have come about in the past two decades. "But the greatest of all improvements I find in Wayne County is your improved roads," Mr. Fischbach says, "for these have opened up and made possible many of your other improvements. I have enjoyed being back among Wayne county people again, but there is a touch of sorrow in the fact that not many of the folks whom I once knew here are still living."
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(WCN - 9/3/1931) DR. S. J. FERGUSON MOVES TO WAYNE

Dr. Sam J. Ferguson, son of Mr. and Mrs. L. B. Ferguson and brother of Judge Charles W. Ferguson of Wayne, moved from Catlettsburg, Kentucky, to the town of Wayne Tuesday of this week and will live in Mrs. R. J. Thompson's residence on Keyser street.

Dr. Ferguson will engage in the general practice of medicine in the Wayne community and will open offices in the town of Wayne in a building to be decided upon later.

Dr. Ferguson is a native of the Wayne community, attended Oakview Academy here, was graduated from Marshall college, received his B. S. degree from West Virginia University and finished with his M. D. degree from the Medical College of Virginia at Richmond in 1924.

He began practice as company doctor for the Island Creek Coal Company on Mud Fork in Logan county, went to Cincinnati two years ago and for a year was resident physician in the Deaconess hospital there, and for the past year has been practicing medicine in Catlettsburg. He is married and has one child.

Dr. Ferguson has been eminently successful in his profession, is well equipped both by educational training and by actual practice seven years and already has a host of friends in the county, which facts combine to insure his success in the local field.
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(WCN - 10/1/1931) CORNERSTONE IS LAID AT FT. GAY

The corner stone of the new Butler District High School building was laid by the Grand Lodge Knights of Pythias at Fort Gay Friday, September 25, 1931, with the beautiful ceremony of that order. Thomas H. Scott, Grand Chancellor of Bluefield was unable to attend in person, but he gave a commission to Supreme Representative W. W. Smith of Huntington, who was present and with the aid of C. C. White, acting Grand Vice, who is also District Deputy Grand Chancellor of the 10th District, Robert H. Weber, Grand Prelate, Chester M. Rife, acting for the Grand Keeper of Records and Seal, Vernon Galloway, acting Grand Master at Arms, L. L. Lycon, acting Grand Master Exchequer, and Homer Christian, acting Grand Inner Guard.

The principle addresses were given by W. W. Smith, Past Grand Chancellor and Supreme Representative and Dr. L. J. Corbly of Marshall College. The crowd numbered near 700 persons.

The Fort Gay school orchestra under direction of W. C. Lovely furnished music for the occasion. Among the things deposited in the corner stone were: A Holy Bible, copies of Wayne County News, Big Sandy News Recorder, Ashland Independent, and The Herald Dispatch, each containing announcement of the ceremony, copy of Grand Lodge proceedings of K. of P., student enrollment, faculty, Board of Education, town officials, and a copy of the Special acts of the Legislature relating to the school and the program for the occasion.

The Butler High School football game followed with Chesapeake high on the local ground with the result that they met defeat 15 to 0. However, they gave a good fight and played a real fast game and showed their visitors that they had improved over last year.

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