His father later remarried, to Susan "Susie" Ann Philpott, and the couple then had six children by that marriage.

John W. Shumate worked in tobacco Sharecropping, and the early years of his life was spent living in a log cabin alongside the Rock Run.

After a few years as a letter carrier in Martinsville, he began selling furniture and household goods.

He also was involved in development, and constructed over 100 homes in Henry County for lower and middle class owners, both black and white.

Several hundred residents had visualized everything from screaming comets, earthquakes, rebel air raids, bursting boilers and bank robbers with machine guns.

He was present at the county jail every Sunday morning to help release the Saturday night drunks.

He also worked on the local Democratic Party (United States) offices, and was a member of the Martinsville Development Council.

Whitney Shumate was an early advocate of Affordable housing and slum clearance, especially for the black community in Henry County.

Growing up in a log cabin, he was always acutely aware of the terrible effects of poor housing and a lack of electricity, water and sewage or even paved roads.

During the 1950s when segregation was still legal, and when many banks habitually refused loans to black families, Whitney Shumate worked to provide modern housing for the under-served population.

What had originally been considered a depressed civic area rapidly became a center of progress as middle class blacks finally began to prosper.

As an editorial in the local newspaper noted, "One of the projects which won him considerable attention and praise was the instigation of the redevelopment of what was once known as Martinsville Cotton Mill Village.

The Martinsville Bulletin newspaper had an editorial that said: "Such was the nature of this unassuming man, whose integrity and ability were widely recognized and highly respected.