Johnson, Clyde Beecher
     The eldest son of James L. and Anna C. (Martin) Johnson, Clyde Johnson, was born June 17, 1871, on a farm in Pleasants County, West Virginia, near what was then Twiggs Post Office. His father, at the age of 74, is yet living at Ellenboro, Ritchie County, West Virginia, and has for many years been an active farmer and business man in that section of the State.
     In conversation with the writer Mr. Johnson talked of little else than his mother, who died in 1909. He attributes to her any degree of success that has come to him, and among other things said:
     "My mother was a queen among women. She was one of the early female graduates of Marietta College, and I yet believe she was the most thoroughly cultured and educated woman I have ever met. Her knowledge was encyclopedic, her memory marvelous, and her judgment of persons and situations unerring. After her graduation she taught in Mississippi, and later in Texas and during a portion of the War Between the States she was principal of the Huntsville Female Academy, now, I believe, a Texas Normal School. After the close of the war she came back north to care for her aged parents, and in 1866 opened "The Cedars," one of the first exclusive finishing schools for young ladies west of the Allegheny Mountains. In January, 1870, she married my father, and in addition to her duties as a wife and mother she found time to teach what was in fact a private college almost up to the time of her death in 1909. I have spoken thus at length of my mother because she deserves it. She is by far the most important part of this sketch, as whatever of success has come to me is almost wholly due to her example and teaching, and to such of her high ideals and splendid mind as I inherited."
     Mr. Johnson was educated in the common schools of West Virginia, later spending some time both at Marietta and at West Virginia Wesleyan Colleges, but is not a graduate of either. He taught public schools for a number of years, in the meantime devoting himself to the study of law, being admitted to the Bar in 1895. He is proud of the fact that Arthur I. Boreman, the first Governor of West Virginia, and then Judge of the Third Circuit, was the first Judge to sign his law license. His first year of practice was at Sistersville in Tyler County, at the end of which he returned to Pleasants County and was the nominee of his party for Prosecuting Attorney in the election of 1896. He says that his defeat in that election at once curing him of running for office, and forcing him to settle down to hard professional work was a blessing in disguise.
     He practiced in the town of St. Marys from 1896 until July 1, 1913, when he removed to Charleston and formed a partnership with Hon. William G. Conley, who had just finished his term as Attorney-General of the State. This firm represents The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Company in many matters in West Virginia, and has a wide general practice in both State and Federal Courts.
     In 1898 Mr. Johnson married Miss Anna Grace Hart, of Randolph County, West Virginia, and with their two children — Myra and Bosworth — they reside in a pleasant home in the City of Charleston. At this home with his family and in his modest home library Mr. Johnson finds his greatest pleasures. Amid pressing duties of a general law practice he has found a few spare hours to devote to literary pursuits, and in addition to some editorial work has written occasional bits of verse. Some of these were published in 1914 in a little volume entitled "Rhyme and Reason."
     He is a member of the American Bar Association, the West Virginia Bar Association and the local Bar Association of the City of Charleston. His highest ambition is to be remembered when his life is finished as a lawyer worthy of fellowship in these associations, which include the great legal minds of America.
     In politics Mr. Johnson is a life-long Democrat of the school, he says, that trusts the popular judgment and believes that no cause or party emergency is great enough to demand a sacrifice of candor. While never himself a candidate for public office since 1896, until the present year, being the nominee of his party as a candidate for State Senator, he has always taken an active interest in the affairs of his party, and has as wide an acquaintance throughout the State as perhaps any man of his age. He is a believer in Government by party, and it is never difficult to know where he stands on any public question. He is one of the ablest stump speakers in the entire State in all of the political parties.
     Mr. Johnson confesses of having lived the quiet life of the country lawyer who must live by his work, and assures the biographer that there is little to tell about it that would seem of importance except to his family and intimate friends. He is an orator of high grade, and is a trial lawyer of pronounced ability and is a sound pleader as well.
[Bench and bar of West Virginia by George Wesley Atkinson, 1919 – Transcribed by AFOFG]