Ohio County, West Virginia    Biography of J. Frank COX

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Submitted by Valerie Crook, <vfcrook@trellis.net>, March 1999
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The History of West Virginia, Old and New
Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., 
Chicago and New York, Volume III, pg. 97

J. FRANK COX throughout his active career of thirty years
has given his skill and energies to one industry, the Wheeling
Mold & Foundry Company, of which he is now shop super-
intendent.

Mr. Cox was born in New Martinsville in Wetzel County,
West Virginia, February 13, 1876, son of James M. and
Mollie (Ruddick) Cox. He is a descendant of three notable
old families in the West Virginia Northern Panhandle. The
Cox family had early settlement in Brooke County, and he
is also connected with the Woods family of Ohio County
and the Cresap family of Marshall County, his paternal
grandmother being Jane Cresap Cox, who was also a great-
aunt of Mrs. Hannah O. Cresap Cox. Reminiscent of the
Woods family influence in this district is Wood Street in

Wheeling and also the former suburban town now incor-
porated portions of Wheeling known as Woodsdale, Wood-
lawn and Edgewood. J. Frank Cox married a member of
the Cresap family, a name that recalls the earliest recorded
history in the Upper Ohio Valley. Thomas Cresap was a
representative of the Ohio Company in building its first forts
and storehouses on the western slope of the Alleghenies.
Michael Cresap, a son of Thomas, was one of the group of
pioneers who were associated with Fort Fincastle, predecessor
of Fort Henry at Wheeling. Members of both the Cresap
and Cox families were present at the signing of the treaty
with the Indians on Piqua Plains near the old town of Chilli-
cothe, Ohio.

James Franklin Cox's mother had lived in Keokuk, Lee
County, Iowa, and her son's education was begun in the pub-
lic schools of Keokuk. He also attended school in Marshall
County, West Virginia, and spent one year, 1890-91 at
Linsley Institute at Wheeling. Soon after leaving school
Mr. Cox began his apprenticeship as a machinist with the
Wheeling Mold & Foundry Company. He was one of the
first employes of the company and is now the oldest in years
of service of any employe or official of the industry. For
a number of years he was a draftsman with the company
and now has the responsibilities of machine shop superin-
tendent. Mr. Cox is also a director of the Fulton Bank &
Trust Company in Wheeling.

In politics he is non-partisan. He is a member of the
Masonic Club of Wheeling and is affiliated with Wheeling
Lodge No. 5, F. and A. M., and West Virginia Consistory
No. 1 of the Scottish Rite at Wheeling. He also belongs
to Wheeling Lodge No. 114, Knights of Pythias. Mr. Cox
is a member of St. Matthew's Episcopal Church. October
22, 1902, at Cresap's Bottom in Marshall County, he mar-
ried Hannah O. Cresap, daughter of Quincy and Elizabeth
Cresap, of Cresap's Bottom and Moundsville. Her ancestor,
Michael Cresap, above noted, surveyed some of the first
lands along the bottoms of the Ohio River, and some of these
lands are still in the hands of the Cresap and Washington
heirs. Mr. and Mrs. Cox have an interesting family of seven
children: E. Jane Cox, a student in West Virginia University
at Morgantown, Jessie R., James F., Mary F., Robert C.,
Charles Q. and Michael Cresap Cox.