From HISTORY OF THE PAN-HANDLE, West Virginia, 1879, by J. H. Newton, 
G. G. Nichols, and A. G. Sprankle. Page 264  

Contributed by Linda Cunningham Fluharty.


JOHN M. BIRCH, Principal of the Lindsley Institute, is a native of Claysville, 
Washington county, Pennsylvania, and was born July 7th, 1851. He received a 
thorough education in Lafayette and Washington and Jefferson colleges - 
graduating at the latter, in the class of 1872. The following year he taught in 
the Classical Institute, Columbia, Lancaster county, Penna, and in September, 
1875 was chosen principal of the Lindsley Institute, which position he still 
retains with much enterprise and success.