Meet attorney Noah Linsly as portrayed by Linsly School faculty member Bill Brubaker.

A Connecticut Yankee who traveled to Virginia (what is now West Virginia) to practice law, Noah Linsly died in 1814 but his name still lives, thanks to the school which his money made possible.

Perhaps the epitaph on his tombstone in Mt. Wood Cemetery describes him best — “A Friend of Youth and a Benefactor of Mankind.”

The son of Josiah and Rachel Linsly, Noah Linsly was born at Branford, Conn., on Jan. 26, 1772. He was a graduate of Litchfield Law School and received his B. A. from Yale in 1791.

In 1799, he came as a stranger to Wheeling — just four years after the community received its charter from the state of Virginia — but in the brief span he spent in the community, he established himself as one of its leading citizens. He served as a member of council, prosecuting attorney, and mayor. When he succumbed on March 25, 1814, at the age of 42, his will provided that all of his property, with the exception of a gift of $3,000 to the Yale University Library, be used “for the use, benefit and advantage of a Lancastrian School” in Wheeling.