A Church of Christ was also established in about 1937 or 1938.
East Mountain secured a postoffice back in the early days with H. B. Jones as first postmaster. The office was known as “Savannah” for a while, but was later changed to East Mountain. Route No. 2 was established out of Gladewater in 1906 or 1907. Mr. Graves was the first mail carrier.
Mr. Salter ran a horse-power gin back in the beginning, and a little later on, Mr. Wells put in a steam gin, and ran a sawmill in connection with the gin. About 1905 Mr. Fenton put in a steam gin. H. B. Jones and Thomas Wells both ran stores. There is one store at East Mountain now, run by C. H. Pittman.
Grice
Grice was originally Hamils Chapel. On the western border of Upshur County, at the edge of the “Big Woods,” was the modest little settlement of Hamils Chapel. Only a few people lived near here, and the community was unknown a few miles away. The land was heavily timbered, and the settlers had a task in removing this timber from the farm lands. Thousands of feet of fine pine timber was wasted and destroyed.
Settlers
Some of the settlers back in the 1880’s were: Mr. Moon and his sons, John and Robert; Daniel Burnett, Tobe Davis, Alec Davis, Mr. Grice, who ran a little store and became the first postmaster. Sam Hill, William Fennell, Ben Lankford, Will Davis, John LaRue, Mr. Holmes, Mr. Cavitt, and a number of others.
In 1891, Mr. Grice put in a little store here and got a postoffice established. The postoffice was named Grice in honor of Mr. Grice, who became the postmaster. The church and school was, for a while, known as Hamils Chapel, but was later changed to “Grice.”
Anyone was allowed to sell whiskey at that time, so Bob Moon put in a little saloon and did a big business. John Bates moved from Soules Chapel community and put in a general merchandising business. A cotton gin was put up, and new settlers moved in. For a while the school was taught in the church house, but later on a school building was erected. About this time a Rev. Weatherby, a Congregational preacher, came in here and established a church, and another church building was erected on the original church grounds.
A Mr. Cone, a sawmill man, came in here sometime in the 1880’s and bought up all this pine timber and put in a big sawmill. This added many more inhabitants to the community, and increased the attendance of the school.