JOHN WEST OLDSHUE, M.D., a skilful physician ofPittsburg, is also a native of the city. He was born August 31, 1848, son of Dr. Lincoln and Martha Ann (West) Oldshue. The grandfather, Colonel John Oldshue, was a war officer, and known for his great vocal power. His wife was a Lincoln and a relative of the martyred President.

Dr. Lincoln Oldshue, whose birth occurred in Ashland, Ohio, December 8, 1820, was a teacher for some years in Ohio and Indiana. He obtained his medical education at the Central Medical College of New York, graduating with the class of 1839. Soon after he came to Pittsburg, and began the practice of his profession, which he followed here until his death in 1886 after many years of conscientious toil. A scholarly man, he devoted considerable time to literary work on medical subjects. The highest compliments have been given him for his work entitled "Urino-Pathology." He was the first professor to lecture on that subject in any college in the United States. Some of his inferences proved prophetic. When an old man and almost paralyzed, he loved to talk to young men of what they might live to see, such as communication by speaking over long distances, sending messages by means of pneumatic tubes, which were then looked upon as wild vagaries, but are now realized. He was the first man in this part of the country to refine oil, carrying it on in the basement under his office. He was constantly engaged in chemical experiments. In his daily life he was a man of exemplary habits, using neither liquors nor tobacco. He was chairman of the first meeting held in behalf of the Virginia & Charleston Railroad, and the first subscriber to the enterprise. The Castle Shannon Railroad Company purchased forty-six acres of coal from him, for which they paid forty thousand dollars cash. The land is still owned by his heirs. His wife, Martha Ann, bore him eight children, namely: Thomas L. Oldshue, M.D., who practised in Pittsburg, and died June 3, 1877; John West, the subject of this sketch; Anna Louisa, the wife of C. E. Owens, a civil engineer and attorney; Martha Agnes, the wife of W. C. Stillwagen; Ida Helen, the wife of Frederick Robert Shaw, a resident of East Pittsburg; Mary and Frances Josephine Elizabeth, both deceased; and James Alfred, who was police surgeon in Pittsburg, and died in 1890.