William Cooper Stiles, Jr.

William Cooper Stiles, Jr.. . , William Cooper Stiles, Jr., born in Philadelphia on July 27, 1839, was one of the earliest operators in the West Virginia and Ohio oil fields., In 1863 Mr. Stiles invested a considerable sum of money to drill test wells near Fifteen Mile Creek in Ohio, but found no oil, and returned to Philadelphia a wiser and poorer man. Not to be deterred, Mr. Stiles traveled to the White Oak region of WV in 1864 where he purchased several thousand acres and began drilling. , After an ominous start, Mr. Stiles made a major strike and later revolutionized the oil industry through the introduction of the endless cable pumping system, an application conceived from the cable system powering street cars in Philadelphia. , Mr. Stiles built the Volcanic Oil and Coal Company into a major force in the local oil industry. In 1866 at a cost of $160,000, he was the driving force in the building of the Laurel Fork and Sand Hill Railroad, a standard gauge rail system for transporting oil to refineries in Parkersburg. , For his major contributions to Volcano, Mr. Stiles was known as the “father of Volcano.” He also served as a county commissioner from 1881 to 1885. , W. C. Stiles, Jr., died at his beloved Thornhill on December 17, 1896.