Series of political articles from 1959

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Submitted by Edith Faye Redden Dickenson County Historical Society President Historical Society members find info in the strangest places. While working on another project, our volunteers located many political advertisements from the past. This week the Historical Society will begin a series of articles found in issues of The Dickensonian newspapers. The topic of these articles will be the personal stories of a few of the candidates for political offices in 1959. The party affiliation, political platforms, nor the results of the election will be given. That information is a possibility for future topics of Historical Society articles. The Historical Society does not become involved in political races and does not endorse any candidate - past or present. Milan O. Sutherland’s life story was the featured politician in the September 18, 1959, issue of The Dickensonian. Excerpts from that article are presented below. Grammar has, however, been changed to indicate the past. Milan O. Sutherland “Milan Ogden Sutherland was born September 7, 1912, at Stratton on McClure River. He was the son of Mr. and Mrs. Elihu D. Sutherland, whose forebears were pioneer settlers of Dickenson County. The Sutherland family has not only been responsible for some of the early settlements here, but some of its members were prominent in the formation of the county as a political unit and continued to help mold its destiny down through the years. Milan was one of a family of five boys. The others were Caleb Sutherland, Gaines Sutherland, Paul Sutherland, and Ferrell Sutherland. This family has long been prominent all over the county, particularly in school affairs, and some of them took leading roles in Dickenson’s educational system. “Milan grew up at Stratton where his father owned a store. Elihu D. Sutherland was also responsible for bringing the first home electrical systems to the county. He secured the agency for the Delco system and installed them in many rural homes before the Appalachian Power Company extended its lines to cover practically all of the county. “Milan received his elementary education at the public school at Stratton, then went to Fremont Junior High School for a couple of years. When he finished there, he transferred to Clintwood High School (then Dickenson Memorial High School) where he received his diploma. Then, he spent a year at Berea College, Berea, Kentucky, where he majored in Business Administration. The Depression cut short his formal education at this point. “His first job, like so many other young men of that period, was on a road construction project. He was hired as a water boy by the McCoy Brothers, who were building the highway up McClure River. This was during his school years, and he earned enough money from the job to help pay for his books and clothing. “When he came home from Berea College, jobs of any kind were few and far between. The Nation was still wallowing in the Depression, and in Dickenson County especially the money for meat and bread was hard to come by. White-collar jobs, for which he had been trained, were practically non-existent, but he was willing to take anything. He finally got a job with the Clinchfield Coal Company, loading coal in the mines at Clinchco. “This was in 1936, and he worked there for the next seven years, most of the time as a coal loader. The last two years he worked as a “company man,” taking care of timbers and track. His next job was with the United States of America - as a private in the U. S. Army. “He was called to active duty in June of 1943, and was immediately shipped to Camp Stoneman, California, where he received his basic training. Then he became a member of the 503rd which embarked for Australia even before he had time to catch his breath from the rigors of basic. In Australia he spent a week in a staging area where everyone knew an invasion was being mounted, but no one seemed to know where they were going. It proved to be New Guinea; and after the territory had been secured, his outfit settled down for a while with headquarters in Finchaven [Finschafen]. But it didn’t last long. “Soon, the familiar preparations for another invasion began, and this time it was aimed at the heart of Japan’s conquered world - the Philippines. Milan took part in the invasion of Leyte, and later of the other islands of the Philippines group. He was on Luzon when the war ended. He was discharged from the Army on January 2, 1946, and returned to his home at Stratton. “In 1938, on April 16th to be exact, he married Miss Rachel Newberry, daughter of Tom and Sylvia (Deel) Newberry. [By 1959, Milan and Rachel had two children - Anna and Sharon.] ... “After his return from the service, Milan went into the mercantile business with his father and brothers at Stratton. Then, they became truck mine operators and mined coal along McClure River for two or three years. In the early fifties, however, the coal market suffered a collapse. Not only did this end Milan’s mine operating career, but its effect was felt by the family store so sharply that he had to find another job. “He got a position as clerk in George Lambert’s Store at Nora in 1950 and held the job until 1955. By that time economic conditions in the county had improved somewhat, so he returned to the family business at Stratton. In the meantime, he and his father and brothers had purchased a small saw mill and were turning out timbers for the mines in the area... “Milan Sutherland was vitally interested in the conservation of the natural resources of this county... He early became a member of the Ervinton Sportsman Club, the organization that was responsible for turning Caney Creek into the county’s only trout stream. This group also reserved hundreds of acres of wild land in the Caney Creek area and turned it into a game refuge. “Here you could find in abundance such small game as squirrels, rabbits, quail, and grouse - much as it was in the early days of the county. The Club’s object was to let the game build up to a certain point and then allow a limited amount of harvesting each year, much as the state did with the deer herds. Members voluntarily protected the area during the hunting season, and it became a sanctuary for the small animals. Milan was proud of his part in this project. “He was the first member of his immediate family to offer for public office... Because of the recent increase in Covid19 virus cases within the county, our offices have once again been closed to the public. Assistance will be provided over the phone or by email. If necessary, individual appointments can be made. All of our newspapers articles are reprinted in the Historical Society’s Stories of Yesteryear booklets. Currently, Volumes 1-13 are available for purchase. For more information about this article, or any of our publications, or to make corrections or additions to an article, to purchase a local history book, or to inquire about a Historical Society event, please contact the Historical Society office at 276-926-6355, P. O. Box 52, Clintwood, Va., 24228, or dchs1880@gmail.com. If no answer, please leave a message (which includes your name and phone number) and one of our volunteers will return your call. Or contact Edith Faye Redden at 276-926-4117.


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