Harley Martin KILGORE, Congress, WV (1893-1956)

KILGORE Harley Martin , a Senator from West Virginia; born in Brown, Harrison County, W.Va., January 11, 1893; attended the public schools; graduated from the law department of West Virginia University at Morgantown in 1914 and admitted to the bar the same year; taught school in Hancock, W.Va., in 1914 and 1915; organized the first high school in Raleigh County, W.Va., in 1915, serving as its principal for one year; commenced the practice of law in Beckley, W.Va., in 1916; during the First World War served in the Infantry from 1917, until discharged as a captain in 1920; organized the West Virginia National Guard in 1921 and retired as a colonel in 1953; judge of the criminal court of Raleigh County, W.Va., 1933-1940; elected as a Democrat to the United States Senate in 1940; reelected in 1946 and again in 1952 and served from January 3, 1941, until his death in the naval hospital at Bethesda, Md., February 28, 1956; chairman, Committee on the Judiciary (Eighty-fourth Congress); interment in Arlington National Cemetery, Arlington, Va.

Bibliography

Dictionary of American Biography; Maddox, Robert F. The Senatorial Career of Harley Martin Kilgore. New York: Garland Press, 1981; U.S. Congress. Memorial Services. 84th Cong., 2nd sess., 1956. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1956.

Source: Biographical Directory of the United States Congress, 1771-Present