From HISTORY OF THE PAN-HANDLE, West Virginia, 1879, by J. H. Newton, 
G. G. Nichols, and A. G. Sprankle. Page 266.  

Contributed by Linda Cunningham Fluharty.


J. M. FRASHER, principal of Wheeling Business College, is a native of Fayette 
county, Pa., and was born on the 14th January, 1835. He was educated at Madison 
College, Ohio, and subsequently taught in the public schools for a number of 
years. Proving an expert with the quill, he next engaged in the commercial 
college business as a professor of penmanship, filling positions at Springfield, 
Mass.; Columbus, Ohio, and Troy, N. Y. He also held an interest in an important 
business college in Zanesville, Ohio, with Professor Chandler, for a short time. 
He came to Wheeling in 1873, and in partnership with W. W. Martin, conducted the 
present college on the corner of Market and Twelfth streets. At the end of two 
years he bought his partner out, and to the present has run the institution. The 
college has now been removed to the People's Bank building, corner of Main and 
Twelfth streets, for two years past, and never was in so flourishing a condition 
before, the average attendance being from seventy-five to one hundred young 
ladies and gentlemen, though there is actually accommodation for probably one 
hundred and fifty pupils. The college is conducted on admirable principles, and 
is yearly turning out valuable acquisitions to our commercial ranks. Mr. Frasher 
was married on the 19th May, 1859, to Grace E., only daughter of Dr. M. K. 
Johnston, of Port Washington, Ohio. They have a family of three children.