Collections : [West Virginia and Regional History Center]

West Virginia and Regional History Center

West Virginia & Regional History Center
West Virginia University
P.O. Box 6069
1549 University Avenue
Morgantown, WV 26506
Primary Collecting Areas:
West Virginia and Appalachia History and Culture
Description:
The West Virginia & Regional History Center preserves and provides access to the records that document the history and culture of the state and the central Appalachian region. The Center is part of West Virginia University Libraries.
POC: Lori Hostuttler
Phone: (304) 293-3536
Start Over Repository West Virginia and Regional History Center Date range 1857 Subjects Railroads - Baltimore and Ohio Railroad.

Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Records 0.01 Linear Feet Summary: 1/4 in. (2 folders, 1/4 in.); (1 oversize folder, 7 items)

Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company

Records of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, consisting of five telegrams (1864), one letter with envelope (1863), one freight conductor's report (May 17, 1862, between Piedmont and Grafton), and small map of the Railroad (ca. 1853 - 1863). There is also a letterpress copybook for correspondence of B.L. Jacobs, an employee of the Railroad writing from the Grafton station (43 pages for April to August, 1858). A telegram to Colonel George R. Latham regards an arrest (ca. 1864), and a telgram to Colonel John Ely (August 17, 1864) asks the question of whether a slave of a loyal man in West Virginia can act as a substitute for another "without the master's consent." The copybook includes a letter regarding the wreck of engine 125 (page 61, April 20, 1858).

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Charles Brinkman, Collector, Papers 5.84 Linear Feet Summary: 5 ft. 10 in. (14 document cases, 5 in. each); 1 oversize folder (1/4 in.)

Brinkman, Charles.

The papers received from Mr. Brinkman in 1938 include manuscripts, typescripts, and printed items, and general merchandise account books. The manuscript items are mainly letters, receipts, account statements, and certificates concerning the general merchandise business of George Brinkman in Grafton, Grafton Gas Works, Charles Brinkman's History of Grafton, history of the first memorial service and the location of the National Cemetery in Grafton (Box 13), and stock in the Grafton & Greenbrier Railroad Company.

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Charles Carpenter (1889-1975) Papers 0.1 Linear Feet Summary: 1 in. (2 folders)

Correspondence and manuscripts of articles by Grafton resident Charles Carpenter (1889-1975), a historian, writer, and collector of West Virginia memorabilia. The collection also contains a brief genealogy of the Haymond family and an incomplete Upshur County, West Virginia court record book of 1853-1856.
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Festus P. Summers (1895-1971), Historian, Papers 39 Linear Feet 39 ft. (93 document cases, 5 in. each); (1 index card box, 3 in.)

Summers, Festus P. (Festus Paul), 1895-1971
Correspondence, speeches, manuscripts, research notes, and other papers of a historian who served on the faculty of West Virginia University from 1932 to 1965 and as chairman of the history department from 1946 to 1962. Included are: his official as well as personal correspondence; notes for speeches; research notes, rough drafts and proofs for his published works on William L. Wilson and Johnson Newlon Camden; exams, outlines, and notes for classes he taught; material relating to the University Senate and committees on which he served; a scrapbook covering Monongalia County and other subjects (1850-1897); and papers relating to West Virginia University. Included is a manuscript history of West Virginia University which Summers worked on during his retirement and which William T. Doherty, Jr. finished and published in 1982 as WEST VIRGINIA UNIVERSITY: SYMBOL OF UNITY IN A SECTIONALIZED STATE. There is also desk plaque given to Summers when he served on the West Virginia Centennial Commission; the plaque is fashioned of wood from the first capitol in Wheeling.
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Harrison Hagans (1796-1867) Papers 12 Linear Feet 12 ft. (22 document cases, 5 in. each); (6 document cases, 2 1/2 in. each); (4 small flat storage boxes, 5 in. each); (3 small flat storage boxes, 3 in. each)

Hagans, Harrison (1796-1867)
Papers of the Hagans family of Preston County, West Virginia, including Harrison, Elisha, George M., Henry C., John Marshall, Zer Hagans, and others. There are letters, invoices, account books, advertisements, and other business records pertaining to family business enterprises including several general merchandise stores and outlets in western Pennsylvania and Maryland, and at Brandonville, Kingwood, Greenville, and Palatine, West Virginia. There are several postal records from Harrison Hagans' twenty years as postmaster, 1822-1841, at Brandonville, and magistrate papers and deeds, most regarding the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. There are also financial records documenting Hagans' tenure as president of the Greenville Mining and Manufacturing Company which produced iron in Preston County in the 1830s. Other information records Hagans' interests in: county roads, schools, churches, government and politics; the Preston Telegraph Company; a fulling mill, 1827; and a linseed oil mill, 1842. There are Hagan patents for a washing and wringing machine (1845), and working models of mowing and threshing machines. There is a volume of minutes of the quarterly conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church, 1834-1859, and 1861 Wheeling Convention papers regarding a new state government, and Civil War letters from family and friends.
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Harvey W. Harmer (1865-1961) Papers 1.7 Linear Feet Summary: 1 ft. 8 in. (4 document cases, 5 in. each)

Harmer, Harvey W. (Harvey Walker), 1865-1961

Correspondence, speeches, essays, clippings, and account books of a Clarksburg lawyer, Republican state senator, and Harrison County local historian. Subjects include the history of Clarksburg and Shinnston; the Progressive Movement, women's suffrage, and prohibition in West Virginia; West Virginia Wesleyan College; West Virginia Historical Society; Methodism in Harrison County and the state; Methodist missions in Korea, China, India, the Philippines, and the United States; gristmills and covered bridges in West Virginia; America First Day [1922]; Edward Grandison Smith; Parkersburg Branch of the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad; family and personal history; history of the Mason-Dixon Line; the (Clarksburg) 50-Year Club; Nutter Fort Methodist Church; and the Harrison County Fair. Also, tape recordings of an interview relating to Mr. Harmer's career as an attorney in Clarksburg.

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Henri Jean Mugler Diary and Memoir 0.44 Linear Feet Summary: 5 1/4 in. (3 reels of microfilm (38 vols), 1.75 in. each)

Mugler, Henri Jean
Diary and memoir of a Confederate soldier, railroad laborer, and shop owner from Grafton. The memoir begins with Mugler's birth in Alsace-Lorraine in 1838, and covers his immigration to the United States; enlistment in the United States Army in 1851; military duty in New York, Boston, Rhode Island, Texas, California, and the Washington Territory where he participated in the expedition against the Yakima Indians as a member of Company B, Third Regiment, United States Artillery, under Phil Sheridan; and his return to Orange County, Virginia, where following the passage of the Secession Ordinance he enlisted in the Thirteenth Virginia Infantry serving as chief musician. The memoir concludes with Mugler's military career during 1861-1862. The diary covers the remainder of his military service, 1862-1864, and his confinement as a war prisoner at Elmira, New York, 1864-1865. Following the war, Mugler returned to Washington, D.C., and eventually gained employment with the National Cemetery Corps, working at various Virginia battlefields. While in Virginia he served as a delegate to the Virginia Republican Convention of 1867. He worked at the National Cemetery at Grafton and for the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, eventually becoming superintendent of painters on the Road Division in West Virginia. After 1874 he worked briefly as a self-employed painter, and then opened a paint and hardware store in Grafton which he managed until the end of his life. Subjects include the Battle of Mine Run, the retreat from Antietam, the Battle of the Wilderness, prison life at Elmira, New York; reconstruction in Virginia; railroading and the railroad towns of Keyser, Oakland (Maryland), Parkersburg, Fairmont, and Wheeling; the strikes of 1877; interviews with Generals Ord and Sheridan; the Murphy Temperance Movement and W.C.T.U. activities; the Liberal Republican movement of 1872; the Greenback Party; the Chicago World's Fair of 1893; political figures such as John S. Carlile, John G. Carlisle, John T. McGraw, John W. Mason, Frank Hereford, John E. Kenna, John A. Logan, James G. Blaine, and "Sockless" Jerry Simpson.
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John Bassel (1840-1914) Papers 28.8 Linear Feet 28 ft. 9 1/2 in. (68 document cases, 5 in. each); (2 large flat storage boxes, 2 in. each); (1 ledger, 1 1/2 in.)

Bassel, John, 1840-1914

The first 59 boxes are the papers and correspondence of Clarksburg attorney and district legal counsel for the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. John Bassel graduated from Washington and Jefferson College, was admitted to the Bar in 1864, participated in the State Convention of 1872, and for a times, served as prosecuting attorney for Clarksburg. His papers are almost exclusively concerned with his legal practice, financial interests, and his work as legal counsel for the B&O. The latter constitutes the bulk of the collection.

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John Bassel (1840-1914) Papers 7.9 Linear Feet Summary: 7 ft. 11 in. (19 document cases, 5 in. each)

Bassel, John, 1840-1914

Office files of the Clarksburg attorney and counsel for the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company. There are a few personal papers and none relating to the Bassel's participation in the Constitutional Convention of 1872.

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John Jacob Cornwell (1867-1953), Governor, Papers and Records 78.2 Linear Feet Summary: 78 ft. 2 1/4 in. (184 document cases, 5 in. each); (1 document case, 2 1/2 in.); (2 small flat storage boxes, 3 in. each); (1 wrapped package, 5 1/2 in.); (2 oversize folders, 1/4 in.); (1 rolled storage tube, 4 in.)

Cornwell, John J. (John Jacob), 1867-1953

Papers of the fifteenth governor of West Virginia who was a newspaper publisher in Romney, an orchardman, lawyer, and counsel for the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. There are a few papers of W.B. Cornwell. The collection includes: personal and business correspondence, 1896-1953; correspondence as governor, 1916-1922; legal papers, ca.1843-1916; and material relating to "Cornwell Day," 1931; Baltimore and Ohio and other railroads; Romney Orchard Company, ca. 1916-1919; South Branch Development Company, ca.1913-1926; newspaper publishing; and other subjects. Box 100 includes papers regarding women's suffrage, including a proclamation by Governor Cornwell to extend the legislative session of 1920 in order to address the suffrage amendment, among other legislative concerns.

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