Bio of Allen WILLIAMS (b.1856), Yellow Medicine Co., MN

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ALLEN WILLIAMS (1878)

Allen Williams. One of the best known and prominent citizens of western
Yellow Medicine county is Allen Williams, proprietor of a Canby jewelry
store.

Mr. Williams was born March 18, 1856, at Saratoga, New York.  At the age 
of seven years he moved with his parents to Wisconsin, where his boyhood 
days were spent on the farm.  He received his education in the schools 
there and soon after becoming of age came to Minnesota.  He arrived in 
Yellow Medicine county in 1878, at the age of twenty-two years, and 
located at Canby.  The town was just then started, and for the first 
ten years of his residence there he was engaged as a carpenter and builder.

In 1888 Mr. Williams started in the jewelry business, and for a quarter 
of a century he has been continuously so engaged.  He owns the store 
building, a two-story brick, and a fine residence.  He has a large stock 
of jewelry, china, cut glass, etc.  When he opened in 1888, he occupied 
the corner just north of his present location, remaining there one year.  
He then moved to the Norton bank building in the center of the block, 
where he was burned out in the big fire of 1893.  Mr. Williams immediately 
commenced the erection of his present building, completing it in 1894.  
The watch department in his establishment is presided over by G. A. 
Davis, of Lake Crystal, who has been with him four years.  Mr. Williams 
served three terms on the council as recorder.

Mr. Williams was married February 19, 1889, at Marshall, Minnesota, to 
Eva J. Wadleigh, who was one of the first teachers of the Canby school.  
She is a native of Minnesota, having been born at Kasson January 5, 1865; 
the family moved to Canby in 1879.

Mr. Williams is a son of George H. and Phoebe A. (Cadman) Williams, 
natives of New York State.  They located near Beloit, Wisconsin, in 1863, 
where they engaged in farming.  In 1880 they moved to Delavan, Wisconsin, 
where the father died May 24, 1894.  The mother continued to live at 
Delavan six years and then came to Yellow Medicine county, making her 
home with her sons, Allen and William C., to the time of her death, 
April 19, 1909.

Source: "A History of Yellow Medicine County" by Arthur P. Rose
Published 1914