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Art Weisberg, founder of State Electric Supply Co., and Huntington, W.Va., Service Wire Co., Culloden, W. Va., passed away Nov. 24 at age 88. He was well known throughout the electrical industry as the ultimate entrepreneur, a man who, according to an article in West Virginia’s Herald Dispatch, started up State Electric Supply 60 years ago with $2,500 and the moxie to move from his native Brooklyn to West Virginia to sell light bulbs, extension cable and fuses door-to-door from the back of his truck.
Weisberg earned an engineering degree at New York’s City College, and he and his wife, Joan, were big believers in the value of education and in 2008 donated $2.5 million to West Virginia’s Marshall University to fund the school’s engineering program. The Herald Dispatch article said Weisberg was at the groundbreaking of the engineering complex last month and served as grand marshal in Marshall University’s homecoming parade. Beneath his gruff, cantankerous outward demeanor was a heart of gold, and he gave generously of his time and wisdom to co-workers and to the West Virginia community that he adopted as his home.