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Phyllis H. Arnold

Phyllis H. Arnold

2007 Inductee

Phyllis Huff Arnold is the State President of BB&T West Virginia and Regional President of BB&T West Virginia Central Region.

A native West Virginian from Parkersburg, she graduated with a B.S. in Business Administration from West Virginia University and received a M.B.A. from Marshall University. She is also a graduate from the Stonier Graduate School of Banking, Rutgers University. After graduating from WVU, Phyllis was employed by Mellon Bank in Pittsburgh as a management trainee. Three years later she acquired a job with Kanawha Valley Bank in Charleston, West Virginia. In 1979, she was appointed Commissioner of Banking by Governor Rockefeller, serving four years. Phyllis returned to banking at One Valley Bancorp as Senior Vice President. In 1988 she became Executive Vice President and was elected to One Valley Bank's Board of Directors. On July 1, 1991, Phyllis became President and CEO of One Valley Bank. In 1993, she was elected to One Valley Bancorp's Board of Directors and in 1994 was elected Executive Vice President of One Valley Bancorp and later became Chief Operating Officer. With the merger of One Valley Bancorp and BB&T, she was elected to her current position and responsibility.

Phyllis serves on the Boards of Directors of Discover the Real West Virginia Foundation, Blanchette Rockefeller Neurosciences Institute, WV Bankers Association, West Virginia Roundtable, West Virginia Venture Connection, Marshall University Foundation and Clay Center for the Arts and Sciences of WV, Inc. In 2006 she was named to the 21st Century Jobs Council by Governor Manchin, and appointed to the WV Tobacco Securitization Authority by Governor Manchin in 2007. She was featured in a State Journal Special Edition “Women in Business” in May 1994, selected as one of the winners in the State Journal’s Who’s Who in West Virginia Business in 1995, and chosen by the West Virginia Women’s Commission to receive a 1996 Celebrate Women Award. In 1997, she was inducted into the Marshall University Business Hall of Fame. She was honored as the 2001 Daughter of the Year by The West Virginia Society of Washington, DC, in 2006 by the Charleston YWCA for the Women of Achievement Award and the WV Executive's list of 50 most powerful West Virginians.