From "History of Wheeling City and Ohio County, West Virginia and 
Representative Citizens," by Hon. Gibson Lamb Cranmer, 1902.

Typed by E.J. Heinemann

p. 631

JACOB HUBERT HENRY BEU,  an expert modeller of chinaware, enjoys the 
reputation of being one of the best workmen in his line, not only in 
the city of Wheeling, West Virginia, where he resides, but in the 
United States as well.  He was born in Germany, November 7, 1855, and 
was educated in private institutions of learning.  He served in the 
German army during 1876-1878, being enlisted in the 2nd Hanover 
Infantry Regiment No. 77.  He learned the modeller's trade under the 
tutelage of his father and other noted modellers of the old world, and 
in 1881 left his native soil to seek a home in the United States of 
America.  He located at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, subsequently in New 
York City and Trenton, New Jersey, the pottery center of the East, and 
thence came to Wheeling, West Virginia, where he has since resided in 
the first ward.  Soon after his arrival, his ability as a modeller of 
chinaware was recognized and his services sought by many of the leading 
potteries of the country.  His designs were so unique and original that 
he is now employed exclusively by one firm, the Wheeling Pottery 
Company, of Wheeling, West Virginia.
     June 4, 1881, Mr. Beu was joined in marriage with Elizabeth Meinel,
who was born August 16, 1858, and is a daughter of Jacob August Meinel, 
born in Mecklenburg, and Maria (Buckholtz) Meinel, born in Lauenburg, 
Germany.  Mr. Meinel learned railroad engineering, which he followed on 
the Berlin & Hamburg Railroad for a period of twenty-five years without 
an accident.  He finally discontinued railroading and went into a 
cement factory at Luneburg, which proved a most unfortunate change for 
him.  January 21, 1875, while about his work, he was caught in the 
machinery and killed, having attained the age of forty-eight years. 
Henry Buckholtz, the maternal grandfather of Mrs. Beu, remained in 
Germany, where he conducted a jewelry store, which has been in the 
family and has passed from father to son for a period of seven hundred 
years.
     Mr. Beu's paternal grandfather, Wilhelm Beu, was a farmer by 
occupation; the King of the Prussia served as the godfather at the 
baptism of the latter's seventh son.  Twelve children have been born to 
Henry Beu and his faithful wife: Mary E.; Annie S.; Harry O.; Charles 
F.; Frank C.; Elizabeth; Hugo; Bertha; Clara; Martha; and Alma.   The 
family belong to the St. John's German Independent Protestant church of 
Wheeling.
     Mr. Beu is not unmindful of his duties as a citizen and entered upon 
his political career, January 26, 1901, when he was elected on the 
Republican ticket, a member of the second branch of the city council. 
     He is now serving on the important committees of finance, water and 
real estate, being chairman of the latter.  He has distinguished 
himself by his zealous work for the new electric town clock and the 
wiring of the city building for the use of electricity.  Mr. Beu is a 
prominent member of the German Reading Society of Wheeling, an 
organizer of the German American Soldiers' Association, and belongs to 
the Royal Arcanum.