A Warm Hearth and a Fair Shake: Laban Gwinn’s 1885 Letter

“I want a draft for the amount I Claim with interest from date of the Claim between and the circuit Court or I will have to put it in the oficers hands for collection”

Pull up a chair, friends, because I have found a real gem in the archives today. Imagine it is a biting cold February morning in 1885, and you are down in Quinnimont, Fayette County. You are holding a piece of history: a cream-colored, lined letter that has seen a few folds in its time but still carries the sharp, confident cursive of a man who knows his worth. This is not just paper; it is a voice from our past reaching out to settle an old score.

The man behind the pen is Laban Gwinn. Back in 1883, he did the community a service by hauling coal to the schoolhouse just below Stretchers Neck. He charged fourteen dollars for the work—a fair price back then for keeping the local children warm through a West Virginia winter. But by 1885, he still had not seen a dime of it. The new Board of Education secretary was trying to say the price was too high, but Laban was not about to be short-changed. He even calls on the teacher at the time, Mr. Francis Boon, to back him up on the original deal.

Reading through this letter, you can almost hear the frustration in Laban’s voice. He was not just asking for his money; he was threatening to take the matter all the way to the circuit court if he did not get his payment with interest. It reminds us that while the landscape of the Sewell District might have changed, the spirit of folks standing up for what is right hasn’t faded one bit. Even the reply at the bottom from James Sutphin, the Board President, shows the slow, careful dance of local bureaucracy we still know today.

It is a small story, sure—fourteen dollars and a pile of coal—but it is the heartbeat of our history. It shows us the everyday labor that built our schools and the grit it took to keep them running. Next time you walk near the old school sites, think of Laban and his coal, and the warmth he provided for the students who came before us.

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