Thursday, October 29, 1897
FOR a number of years, Knapps Creek has been cutting into the town of Marlinton and threatening to change its course and flow through the middle of the town. Captain Smith has had a strong stone wall with a layer of boughs built which will prevent any further encroachments.
LEWISBURG voted herself a set of $13,500 waterworks and now it would seem from an able exposition of the case by Major John W. Harris, in the Independent, that the town has acted hastily in the matter, and that to pump water from the Greenbrier River, the only available source, will cost more than all the other expenses of the town together. Water must necessarily come high when it has to be hoisted five hundred feet up a West Virginia hillside. In fact, it would seem that it would be almost as easy to move Lewisburg to the Greenbrier as to take the river to Lewisburg. The scheme seems hardly practical, for a town of 1,000 people, even though it be as wealthy as Lewisburg. The town does not promise to become great while the bonds mature, for this is the only town in the United States that has not become greater or less within the past 50 years…
FROM latest advices, the yellow fever situation has not improved very perceptibly as yet. Up to the last few days it seemed to be extending beyond the South, in spite of rigid quarantine regulations. It will be two or three weeks before frost can be expected, and until the frost line be reached the mortality seems to increase as the temperature falls. The press has evidently been reticent, and the real situation has been and is far more serious than published reports would seem to indicate, bad as that appears.
A FEW days ago a polecat was discovered in a spring house in the Levels. Confusion reigned in the housekeeping department of the farm. The spring house had lots of milk and cream in it, and the butter for a whole winter’s use was packed there in jars. The polecat was not disturbing anything particularly. He simply “perched and sat” like the raven and, also like that bird, the very fact that he was there was the disturbing element.
The people very well knew that if they resorted to any arbitrary measures, the polecat would get excited and pollute the whole building. The mephitis chinga was apparently very gentle, and might possibly have allowed them to remove all the valuables, but an element of fear remained that he might misunderstand and raise a row. He was left alone until the lord of the manor arrived and then a new council of war was held. Now “The Boss” had heard a thing or two about polecats, and, though doubting the report, he determined to try the experiment. Going to the animal, he gently took it by its tail and led it forth and to a safe distance into the orchard. There he brained it with a stick. The theory on which he acted was that the pole cat, when held by the tail, cannot send forth that pungent odor, which is its sole means of defense. The moment the animal was loosed, tho stunned, it emitted its terrible odor.
The reader is expected to believe this as it is absolutely true.
BIOGRAPHIC NOTES
Andrew Edmiston
One of the remarkable pioneer citizens of Pocahontas County.
Andrew Edmiston, Esq., late of the Lower Levels, is the subject of these notes making up this biographic paper. His wife was Mary (Polly) Gillilan, daughter of James Gillilan, near Falling Spring in upper Greenbrier county. Early in the century Mr. Edmiston settled near Locust on the farm now owned by George Callison, Esq.
James Gillialan, when far advanced in years, married Mrs. Edmiston, the mother of Andrew Edmiston, and thus became his step-father as well as his father-in-law, a relationship so unique as to challenge a parallel in the history of Pocahontas intermarriages.
Mr. and Mrs. Andrew Edmiston were the parents of five sons and four daughters. Lydia, Jane, Martha and Mary were their daughters; the sons were Mathew, James, George, Andrew Jackson and William.
Lydia Edmiston was married to Mr. Richard McNeel, a grandson of John McNeel, the original settler of the Upper Levels, and lived near Mill Point on the place now held by the Hon. W. T. Beard, whose wife, Mrs. Mary Beard, is her only surviving child. C. E. Beard and Lee Beard are her grandsons.
Jane Edmiston became Mrs. Abram Jordan… Martha Edmiston married Franklin Jordan… Mary Edmiston was an invalid all of her life and never married…
Mathew Edmiston married Miss Minerva Bland… His name appears in the history of our State as one of the most distinguished native born public characters… He was chosen to serve as circuit court judge 1852 and was appointed a judge of the Supreme Court of Appeals in 1886…
James Edmiston married Miss Mary Hill, daughter of Thomas Hill, near Hillsboro, a son of Richard Hill, the pioneer…
George Edmiston married Mrs. Nancy Callison, relict of Isaac Callison, son of James Callison, one of the pioneers of Locust, and a daughter of John Jordan…
Andrew Jackson Edmiston married Rebecca Edmiston, a daughter of James Edmiston, son of William Edmiston, brother of Andrew Edmiston…
As for Andrew, the pioneer, when the dying day came when he was to pass over to the bright forever, it was found he had nothing to do but to die.
God had not cast him off in the time of old age nor forsaken him when his strength failed, as he seemed to fear so much when depression of spirits or despondency afflicted our kind old friend. At evening time, it was light with this venerable man, and he could realize the sweet power and significance of words like these: “I will go in the strength of the Lord God; I will make mention of they righteousness, even of thine only.” Psalm lxxi. 16. ~ W.T. P.