Please visit
bookertwashington.org & W.Va. Midland Trail Genealogical Society.
and Allied Families - Our Genealogy & History
Baptism on Kellys Creek, c 1930s
or even on one's Mother's side,
is an Introduction to any State in the Union,
a Passport to any Foreign Country,
and a Benediction from Above
...Anonymous
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Welcome to our humble little home on the internet. I hope you find it warm and inviting. My name's Tom Steele (well, Paul Thomas, to be correct), and I'm speaking on behalf of the three of us - my two sisters and myself. My sisters are Nancy Steele Regelin and Kathy Steele Hope, and while I've done most of the research and all the web work, I couldn't have done it without them. This has been a real team effort, and their support and encouragement have meant the world to me.
On accompanying pages you'll find some of the information I've managed to put together to honor our forebears, including the story of our arrival in the valley, but no attempt has been made to glorify them. They don't need it and we're proud of them for what they were - good, decent, honorable people. Rather than worrying about whether they might measure up to our standards, we should all be more concerned about measuring up to theirs. Included in this presentation are the families representing all 16 of our great-great grandparents, plus a few representing even earlier connections. The first 16 families can be found on the following pedigree chart, and we have separate pages set up for each. Even though we will be concentrating on our history in the Kanawha Valley, and more specifically in the upper Kanawha Valley, our ancestors obviously weren't always here. Some have been traced to the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, to Wythe, Giles, and Monroe counties in the New River section of Virginia and West Virginia, to Russell and Tazewell counties in Southwestern Virginia, and to Logan, Mingo, and Pike counties in the Guyandotte Valley of West Virginia and Kentucky. Since some did come from Monroe County, I thought you might enjoy The Girls of Old Monroe, a lovely poem by Roland E. Ballard, a distant cousin through our Armstrong line. |
 
For those who might want to check out our pedigree, we're "dawg-gone" proud to share it. With few exceptions, Chart No.1 represents my personal rersearch, conducted mainly at the Kanawha County Courthouse and the W.Va. Archives and History Library, both in Charleston. Additionally, I've met many new cousins, some on the internet, who have researched some of our lines far more extensively than I have, and I thank them.
While it's nice to look back, it's sometimes even nicer to look ahead. With that in mind, I want to extend a very special welcome to Holly Fairfield Steele, my eldest son's new bride. James and Holly were married in September (1998), and are making their home near Portland, Ore. May their lives be filled with love and happiness forever. Also, our love to Nancy's daughter, Missy, now recovering at home after a lengthy stay at Johns Hopkins, and busy planning for her upcoming wedding in September. It's my hope that all of your visits will leave you with a warm fuzzy feeling that these were good people that you would have enjoyed knowing. If our pages have helped you in some way, won't you please take a minute to share your thoughts in our new guestbook. I've had to discontinue posting queries, but the old ones are still available for browsing on our family pages, or you can search the entire website from the search box on this page. If you know of a direct connection between our lines and want to share it, please send me an e-mail. |
 Well, Bobby didn't have any wheelbases, and I don't have any surnames, not surname lists, anyway. I know a lot of people like them, but when I first started this crazy hobby about four years ago, I didn't have a genealogy program, and as a result, created my own along with the forms I thought I might need. Unfortunately, I don't have a means of creating surname lists, and switching over to a commercial program is very time consuming. In the meantime, all the individual pages on this site can be searched via the web browser, or the entire site can be searched with our new search box.
When I'm not working on my personal genealogy, studying for a second degree at W.Va. State College, drawing, or learning how to play the guitar, I'm usually playing with my dogs Duke and Molly. I also enjoy surfing the web some, and recently found the web site of Stevan Krajnjan. This is a very special and inspirational site and I invite everyone to visit.
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The Steeles: A Starting Point... The Steele Family Participation In The Civil War Where Are Those Elusive Sources? The Crists & Branhams Loose Ends.... With any luck, I'll resume my print publishing in the near future with "Our Kanawha Valley Heritage." |
- Cato The Elder, 234-149 B.C.
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