Biography of Elijah A. Woolverton - Conway Co, AR

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Submitted by: Cathy Barnes <bbarnes@cswnet.com>
        Date: 21 Jun 1998
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SOURCE: Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Western Arkansas.
Goodspeed Publishers, 1891.

page 124

Elijah A. Woolverton, among those prominently and successfully engaged
in agriculture in Conway, and one of the representative citizens of
Lick Mountain Township, owes his nativity to McNairy County, West
Tennessee, where he was born in the year 1851. He was reared on a
farm, receiving his education at the best schools of Henry County,
Tennessee, where he was reared from about 12 years old, and in 1871
came with his parents to Conway County and homesteaded 160 acres of
land on Woolverton Mountain, where he has since resided, being the
present owner of 200 acres of land. His marriage occurred in 1873 to
Miss Lydia Grayson, a daughter of Daniel and Mary Grayson. The former
was born in middle Tennessee, and the latter in Lawrence County,
Arkansas. They married in Craighead County, and from there they
removed to Phelps County, Missouri, thence to Howell County, but are
now residents of Van Buren County, Arkansas. Mr. Grayson was a soldier
in the Southern army. Mrs. Woolverton was born in Craighead County in
1858, and on April 5, 1890, was called to her eternal home, leaving a
family of five children, viz.: Garland H., Mary A., William A.
(deceased), Wister and Houston. Mrs. Woolverton was a devout member of
the Missionary Baptist Church, and was a lady of culture and
refinement. Mr. Woolverton is a practical surveyor, and has followed
the art of surveying in nearly every section of Arkansas, but chiefly
in the Counties of Van Buren, Conway, Ashley, Desha, Arkansas,
Jefferson and Chicot. In the last named county he spent nearly one
entire year surveying for an English company. He is perhaps more
familiar with the topography of Arkansas than any other man in Conway
County. In 1882 he was elected Surveyor of Conway County for a term of
two years, after which he served two years as deputy County Surveyor,
and since that time has done the principal part of the surveying for
the county. He is an active member of the Democratic party and of the
Missionary Baptist Church. His father, William L. Woolverton, a
prominent farmer of Woolverton Mountain, was born in Maury County,
Tennessee, in 1822, being a son of James and Aggie (Williams)
Woolverton, who were born near Lexington, Kentucky, in 1797 and 1800,
respectively. When young they went to Maury County, Tennessee (the
mother with her parents). There they married, and in 1833 removed to
Hardeman County in West Tennessee, but in 1842 removed to Tippah
County, Mississippi, and about 1854 to McNairy County, Tennessee,
where Mr. Woolverton died about 1879. and Mrs. Woolverton died about
1875. Both were Missionary Baptists, the former for probably 60 years.
He was a son of Andrew Woolverton, who was a native of England, where
he served seven years as an apprentice at the tailor trade, and
while yet a young man immigrated to the United States, married in
Virginia, and about the last of the last century removed to Central
Kentucky, when the principal inhabitants of that State were Indians.
Here he spent the remainder of his life at his trade. He died about
1812. His parents came to the United States and settled in
Pennsylvania, but it is not known whether Andrew came with them or
not. Robert Williams, the maternal grandfather of W. L. Woolverton,
was born in Indiana, but in quite an early day removed from Kentucky
to Maury County, Tennessee, where he died between the years 1835 and
1840. He was of Irish descent. His wife died there also. W. L.
Woolverton received a common country school education, and was married
the first time in 1844 to Eliza J., a daughter of Joshua and Martha
Curtis, who died in Maury County, Tennessee, where Mrs. Woolverton was
born. She died in McNairy County, Tennessee, in 1855 and was the
mother of five children, three of whom survive, Elijah A., being the
eldest. Mr. Woolverton married his present wife (Lutitia E.
Goodgoin) in the latter part of 1855, and by her he has two surviving
children. Mr. Woolverton resided in McNairy County till 1863. when he
removed to Henry County, and in 1871 came to Conway County and pitched
his tent on top of the mountain that bears his name. He at once built
a cabin in the woods, where he has since lived, although the forest
has been converted into a fine farm, and the cabin long since
supplanted by a fine frame residence, making one of the most beautiful
and attractive country homes in Conway County. Mr. Woolverton is one
of those noble-hearted, industrious citizens whom every body esteems
and nobody despises, and his chief aim in life has been to educate and
make good citizens of his children. His politics have been Democratic
all his life, and for about thirty years has been a prominent member
of the Masonic fraternity, and for forty years a Missionary Baptist.