Photo by Eric Ayres From left are council members Jerry Sklavounakis, Rosemary Ketchum, Warwood Tool President Chris Azur, Mayor Glenn Elliott, Vice Mayor Chad Thalman and Councilman Dave Palmer.

WHEELING — The city of Wheeling today is celebrating what would be the 200th birthday of a man whose company has served as one of the pillars of success that hold up the town’s rich history – Henry Warwood.

The namesake of Wheeling’s northernmost neighborhood, Warwood was a native of Staffordshire, England who was born on Feb. 23, 1823. The son of a skilled English tool maker, Warwood began honing his own skills at a young age and brought them to the United States when he emigrated to Western Pennsylvania at the age of 25.

In 1854, he relocated to Martins Ferry, where he established a garden rake business which ultimately developed into a successful tool making business, specializing in tools for the mining industry. The tool shop in Martins Ferry was located in the block where the U.S. Post Office is now situated, according to historic documents detailing Warwood’s biography.

As his business expanded, he established a large factory on First Street, where his mining tools were manufactured and shipped to customers throughout the United States.

His coal picks were well known to be “regarded among miners as the standard of excellence,” according to Warwood’s customers and peers at the time.

After Warwood retired from his business interests, he sold his company. Because of the company’s well-established reputation for quality, the new owner kept the name – Warwood Tool – when he relocated the business to Wheeling. In 1905, the company moved to the neighborhood where it still operates today. The area that was once riverside farmland with an established tool factory in the heart of it saw a residential neighborhood spring up around the site over the decades. The neighborhood was later named after Warwood Tool and helps pay tribute to the local company and the business icon who founded it.

“Today is Henry Warwood’s birthday,” said Wheeling Mayor Glenn Elliott. “Some local historians – Margaret Brennan and Chaz Julian – helped us put together a proclamation to honor him. If you’ve heard of Warwood, you may not know how Warwood came to be, but he played a pretty big role in that.”

Warwood moved to New York to live with his daughter, Emily, during the last years of his life. He died in 1900 and is buried in Cypress Hills Cemetery in Brooklyn – the same cemetery where groundbreaking baseball legend Jackie Robinson and iconic early Hollywood actress Mae West were later laid to rest.

Since relocating to Wheeling, Warwood Tool has thrived and has left its mark on the city of Wheeling, the Ohio Valley and the nation over the years.

“From coal mining tools that helped fuel the industrial revolution to railroad and other tools used to rebuild the U.S. Transportation infrastructure to our famous entrenching mattock used extensively in World War I and World War II for digging fox holes and trenches, Warwood Tools have been trusted by generations of hard-working Americans,” according to the company’s posted history. “In fact, American soldiers have relied on Warwood Tools in every war since the Civil War.”

Throughout its nearly 170-year existence, Warwood Tool has “positively contributed significantly to the economic, political and social successes of its employees, neighbors, customers and local citizens,” according to the proclamation that was passed by Wheeling City Council this week.

Chris Azur, who today serves as president of Warwood Tool, accepted the proclamation declaring today, Feb. 23, 2023, as “Henry Warwood Day” in the city of Wheeling.

“The bicentennial of Henry Warwood’s birth warrants special recognition of the positive influence he and Warwood Tool have had upon the growth and development of both Warwood and the city of Wheeling,” Elliott said.