Ohio County, West Virginia    Biography of Charles D. RITTER

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Submitted by Sue Schell <ms_schell@hotmail.com>, March 2000
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The History of West Virginia, Old and New
Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc.,
Chicago and New York, Volume II,
Pg 327

BIO: Charles D. Ritter, Ohio Co., WV

	Charles D. Ritter for thirty-five years has had an active participation in 
the industrial and commercial affairs of Wheeling.  He is head of the 
Ritter-Smith Motor Company, one of the chief organizations distributing 
motor cars in this territory.
	Mr. Ritter was born at Wheeling, June 20, 1868.  Ritter is a name of 
Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry.  His grandfather was a Pennsylvanian, and soon 
after the discovery of gold in California set out for the Pacific Coast and 
was last heard from near Denver, Colorado.  His widow subsequently died in 
Wheeling.  Charles Ritter, father of Charles D. Ritter, was a native of 
Pennsylvania, and moved when a young man to Wheeling, where he married.  For 
a number of years he was a steward on Ohio River steamboats.  He was a 
member of the Masonic fraternity, and died at Wheeling in 1887.  His wife 
was Miss Minnie Vaas, who was born in Germany in 1845, and died at Wheeling 
in 1914.  She was the mother of four children, the oldest, Will, dying at 
the age of eight days.  Charles D. is the second.  Harry is a clothing 
merchant at Wheeling and Louis is a member of the Wheeling Axle Company.
	Charles D. Ritter grew up at Wheeling, attended the public schools and 
Fraizer’s Business College, and at the age of sixteen entered the world of 
industry in the shops of the Baltimore & Ohio Railway Company.  For eight 
years he was a machinist in the railway shops, and for five years was 
similarly employed by the City and Elm Grove Railway Company.  In 1897 he 
went with the Spears Axle Company, and had a prominent part in that 
manufacturing concern for twenty-two consecutive years eventually becoming 
superintendent of the plant.
	In 1919 he bought the Eureka Motor Car Company, changing the name to the 
Eureka Garage and a year later C. A. Smith, of Bellaire, Ohio, came with him 
as partner, they organizing the Ritter-Smith Motor Company.  This company 
has well equipped garage and offices at 1517 Eoff Street, and besides 
operating a public garage they do an extensive business as distributors 
throughout the district of the Cole, Hupmobile and Maibohm cars.
	Mr. Ritter is a republican in politics.  For two years he was town recorder 
of his home village at Edgewood, now a part of Wheeling.  He is a deacon in 
St. James Lutheran Church.  September 20, 1893, at Wheeling, he married Miss 
Mary Elizabeth Bayha, daughter of Gottlieb and Mary Elizabeth (Hayner) 
Bayha, both deceased.  Her father was a well-known Wheeling baker.  Mr. and 
Mrs. Ritter had two children, Carl and Clara, but the latter died at the age 
of nineteen years.  Carl married Marie Doepken, and they live in Bae Mar, 
Wheeling, where he is a baker.  Mr. and Mrs. Carl Ritter have two children, 
Dorothy and Charles.