Henry Gassaway Davis started as a farmhand and worked for the B&O Railroad, where he noticed the wealth of forestlands in what would become West Virginia. He used his savings to buy land cheaply and left the railroad in 1858 to focus on business.

Davis knew that political power could help business, so he entered politics, serving in the House of Delegates and State Senate. He sponsored bills to create Mineral and Grant counties and chartered for himself a corporation with vast powers to build railroads and exploit the natural resources in north-central West Virginia. In 1870, he helped lead the Democrats to victory and became West Virginia’s first Democratic U.S. senator. He served from 1871 to 1883, pushing for agriculture support, opposing the Republican Radical Reconstruction program, and denouncing corruption in Grant's administration.

From this point on, the politics of West Virginia government became the politics of big business.