Source Industrial Wellsburg 1899 by Ralph S. Kerr
John C. Palmer, Esq.

      John C. Palmer, only son of James Palmer, was born in Brooke County, on October 25, 1832. His father moving to Wellsburg when the son was still a child he received his earlier education in the schools of this city. Mr. Palmer claims to be one of the oldest living graduates of the old Brooke Academy, the forerunner of our present high school.

      When the subject of this sketch was 15, his father removed to the farm in Buffalo District, which John C. afterwards operated so successfully for many years. He spent five years at Bethany College, graduating in 1852, at the head of his class. He then attended the law school of Poughkeepsie, N. Y., and graduated there in 1854. After being admitted to the bar in New York, he came to Brooke county, and was admitted to practice in the courts of Virginia, in 1854. Shortly afterwards he removed to Vincennes, Ind., where he soon gained a large practice, but was compelled to leave by the malarial climate, after a residence of four years. His next move was to Kansas, where he spent a year in the exciting ante-bellum era. Overcome again by the malarial climate he returned to Brooke county, where he married the youngest daughter of Richard Waugh and turned his attention to farming and wool growing. In 1884, after a quarter century of successful agricultural pursuits he sold most of his land and removed to Wellsburg to educate his family and devote more attention to his law practice, which he had never given up. Since that time he has become widely known as a successful lawyer, banker, manufacturer, and public spirited citizen. In 1886 he became interested in the Harvey Paper Co., of which he has been secretary for a number of years. In 1889 he became President of the Wellsburg National Bank, and has remained at the head of that thriving institution ever since. Mr. Palmer has always taken an active interest in social questions and public improvements, devoting his time and energies toward obtaining our railroad, water works, street paving, City Hall, and other improvements. He has been a life-long Democrat, and was Prosecuting Attorney for the term from 1868 to 1872. Though so intimately associated with corporations and wealthy men in many ways. Mr. Palmer has always sympathized with the masses in their struggles for political and social rights. He is fond of travel and has visied nearly every part of the United States. He is a member and active supporter of the Presbyterian church, but is liberal in his views on denominational questions.