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Correspondence, legal and business papers, mercantile records and tax receipt books of Isaac McNeel, who operated a store at Edray and Mill Point, Pocahontas County, West Virginia, served as sheriff of the county, operated a gristmill, raised livestock, and was appointed provost marshal of the county in 1862 by the Confederate Army. The collection also includes letters and school reports of McNeel's sons, Winters and Summers, while students at Washington and Lee and the Medical and Law Departments of the University of Virginia, 1893-1897. Other school material pertains to the Hillsboro Male and Female Academy and the Lewisburg Female Institute. Subjects include mercantile and cattle trade with Baltimore and Richmond; business conditions in the l850s and in Richmond during the Civil War; slave hiring; ginseng trade; agriculture; the American Party, 1855; Henry A. Wise; Virginia Secession Convention; effect of the Union blockade on Richmond commerce; speculation in whiskey, tobacco, and cattle during the Civil War; and postwar economic and political conditions in the Pocahontas County area.

Church record, 1852-1896, listing baptisms, marriages, probationers, members and various classes; quarterly conference records, 1899-1903, 1917-1920; church ledgers, 1910-1936; the minutes of the Women's Home Missionary Society, 1914-1937; and "A Brief History of Methodism in Kingwood and Vicinity from Our Earliest Times to March, 1874," by W.C. Snodgrass.

The business papers and legal correspondence of Louis Bennett (1849-1918) of Weston, a wealthy landowner and lawyer. Also included are papers of his father Jonathan M. Bennett and the latter's associate Gideon D. Camden.

Photographs and other material regarding Louise Dennison (1898-1991) and the Dennison family of West Virginia. Formats of photographs include cartes-de-visite, cabinet cards, and gelatin silver prints. See Scope and Content Note for further information.

Correspondence of Martha Brand Wolfe and Charles M. Wolfe, who operated a small farm at Morgantown. The papers include some old Monongalia County land deeds of Charles I. Brand; letters from evangelists Dr. R.E.L. Jarvis and Dr. Edward D. Fellers, together with letters of Mrs. Wolfe on religion. There are also Christmas cards, local news clippings, two Brand family autograph albums, family photographs, and a newspaper clipping book, 1881-1905.

Correspondence, bills, receipts, and memoranda books of Gordon, Gordon, Jr., Jacob, George H., and Mrs. F.R. Mullen of Charleston. Subjects include farming operations; the management of a small store in Kanawha County, West Virginia; Barboursville College; and the State Free Silver Headquarters. The collection includes letterheads, business cards, and calendars of Charleston mercantile establishments, ca.1877-1914; and some Ku Klux Klan papers, 1928, of Dr. A.G. Mullen of Galesburg, Illinois.

Correspondence, speeches, essays, financial notes, certificates, an account book, a class attendance book for 1860, and a term paper prepared for a Glenville College, West Virginia, history class entitled, 'The Aaron D. Peterson Family.' The correspondence contains letters written by David T. Peterson to family and friends while serving with Federal forces in the Civil War. Subjects include schools, politics, farming, Civil War camps, units, troop movements, and battles at Droop Mountain, Moorefield, and Winchester, Virginia.

Correspondence of William A. Harrison, a Clarksburg lawyer, assistant federal district attorney, member of the Virginia Assembly, and judge of the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia; most letters are from members of the family to Mrs. Anna Robertson Harrison. Subjects include construction of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal; Civil War loyalty Oaths, Camp Chase land purchases, and road building. There are also grade school attendance certificates and notes concerning the Lunatic Asylum West of the Allegheny Mountains and Weston State Hospital.