Harley M. Kilgore

Harley Martin Kilgore
United States Senator from West Virginia
In office January 3, 1941 – February 28, 1956
Preceded by	Rush D. Holt, Sr.
Succeeded by	William R. Laird, III
Personal details
Born	(1893-01-11)January 11, 1893 Brown, West Virginia
Died	February 28, 1956(1956-02-28) (aged 63) National Naval Medical Center, Bethesda, Maryland
Political party	Democratic
Profession	Lawyer, Judge, Military

Harley Martin Kilgore (January 11, 1893 – February 28, 1956) was a United States Senator from West Virginia.

Born in Brown, West Virginia, he attended the public schools and graduated from the law department of West Virginia University at Morgantown in 1914 and was admitted to the bar the same year.

He taught school in Hancock, West Virginia in 1914 and 1915, and organized the first high school in Raleigh County, West Virginia in the latter year. He was the school's first principal for a year, and commenced the practice of law in Beckley, West Virginia in 1916. During the First World War he served in the infantry from 1917 and was discharged as a captain in 1920; in 1921 he organized the West Virginia National Guard and retired as a colonel in 1953.

He was judge of the Raleigh County criminal court from 1933 to 1940, and was elected as a Democrat to the U.S. Senate in 1940, and won re-election twice. He was a member of the Senate from January 3, 1941 until his death in Bethesda Naval Hospital in 1956. From October 1942, he chaired the Subcommittee on War Mobilization of the Military Affairs Committee, otherwise known as the Kilgore Committee, that oversaw U.S. mobilization efforts for World War II. He also helped establish the National Science Foundation in 1950.

Senator Kilgore was West Virginia's favorite-son candidate in 1948 Democratic presidential primaries and won his home state unopposed.

He died in 1956, aged 63 and was interred in Arlington National Cemetery.

References

• Harley M. Kilgore at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress

United States Senate
Preceded by Rush D. Holt, Sr.	United States Senator (Class 1) from West Virginia 1941 – 1956 Served alongside: Matthew M. Neely, Joseph Rosier, Hugh Ike Shott, W. Chapman Revercomb, Matthew M. Neely	Succeeded by William R. Laird, III
Political offices
Preceded by William "Wild Bill" Langer	Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee 1955 – 1956	Succeeded by James O. Eastland

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