1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Grafton (West Virginia)

GRAFTON, a city and the county-seat of Taylor county, West Virginia, U.S.A., on Tygart river, about 100 m. by rail S.E. of Wheeling. Pop. (1890) 3159; (1900) 5650, including 226 foreign-born and 162 negroes; (1910) 7563. It is served by four divisions of the Baltimore & Ohio railway, which maintains extensive car shops here. The city is about 1000 ft. above sea-level. It has a small national cemetery, and about 4 m. W., at Pruntytown, is the West Virginia Reform School. Grafton is situated near large coal-fields, and is supplied with natural gas. Among its manufactures are machine-shop and foundry products, window glass and pressed glass ware, and grist mill and planing-mill products. The first settlement was made about 1852, and Grafton was incorporated in 1856 and chartered as a city in 1899. In 1903 the population and area of the city were increased by the annexation of the town of Fetterman (pop. in 1900, 796), of Beaumont (unincorporated), and of other territory.