Spotlight on Bill Rife from the 1941 Martinsburg High School yearbook
"Quiet ... but a worker ... soda jerker down town."
As shared over the past few weeks here, this 1941 snippet from the Martinsburg High School yearbook offers a glimpse into American youth culture on the cusp of a world-altering decade.
Back in those days, high school students were summarized by pithy one-liners meant to encapsulate their entire personalities in a few short words.
Today, on Memorial Day, we’re taking a closer look at the third student in the photo, Bill Rife. After high school, he would serve in the U.S. Army. As a teen, he is lauded for his work ethic — "quiet but a worker" — a model of dependable masculinity rooted in labor. He's painted as part of the silent backbone of society.
Charles William "Bill" Rife, like his classmate Catherine Rentch, was descended from some of the region's most-established families. His ancestors included the Nicodemus and Lewis families, who'd been in Hedgesville since around 1800 or earlier; as well as the Ward, Kearns, Whittington, Linton and Ramsburg families.
The family Bill grew up in was small. He was the older of two brothers. His father had a production job at the woolen mill. The family lived at 328 South Church Street.
Bill was 16 when his father died of an aneurysm. He had to become the man of the house, so it's no surprise that he had a job in high school. His widowed mother also found work, as a "specker" at a woolen mill, perhaps the same one that had employed her husband. Her job was to mark or remove specks embedded in the fabric.
After his teen job at the soda fountain, Bill worked at Interwoven Mills and took some classes at Shepherd University. He enlisted in the Army in December 1942 and rose to the rank of corporal. He served in WWII for three years, primarily in New Guinea and the Admiralty Islands. After the war, in 1950, at age 27, he was still single, and had moved back in with his mother. At this point they were renting a home at 102 Adams Street, and Bill worked as a painter.
Bill eventually married, to a Hedgesville woman 14 years younger than him, Millie Barrett. Bill’s main career was for Western Union, from which he retired in 1983 after 36 years. He rose to manager of the Martinsburg Western Union Telegraph office.
Like his classmate Johnny Reynolds, Bill enjoyed singing. Later in life, he joined the Morris J. Young Retired Men's Chorus. Bill and his wife had a son, Billy, in 1959. They lived on Woodbury Avenue in Martinsburg.
Bill died less than one month before his classmate Johnny and was buried at Rosedale Cemetery in Martinsburg. He’s the only one of these three classmates to be buried in the same town where they all went to high school.
About this series in They Lived in Berkeley County
May 6: An overview of the series
May 13: Catherine Rentch’s family history and what became of her after high school
May 20: John Reynolds’ family history and what became of him after high school
Today: Bill Rife’s family history and what became of him after high school
