BIO: Alvin Samuel WILLIAMS, Blair County, PA

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Donehoo, George P., Editor-in-Chief.  Pennsylvania, A History, 
Vol. 3, Biography.  New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Co., Inc., 
1926, page 100.
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  REV. ALVIN SAMUEL WILLIAMS, minister of the gospel serving the Eighth 
Avenue Methodist Episcopal Church in Altoona, was born in Oliphant, October 
10, 1868, but was reared in Southern Luzerne County, or the town of  
Jeanesville.  He acquired his education in the public schools of 
Jeanesville, Coleman's Commercial College, Newark, New Jersey, and 
Williamsport Dickinson Seminary, Williamsport, Pennsylvania.  He was 
admitted on trial to the Central Pennsylvania Conference of the Methodist 
Episcopal Church in March, 1896, in Williamsport, Bishop John H. Vincient, 
the presiding officer.
  Mr. Williams during his ministry has served charges in Williamsport, York, 
Harrisburg, Roaring Spring, Chambersburg and Altoona.  During the thirty 
years of his ministry his business and executive ability has made him 
successful in church building and the promoting of good causes.  He 
dedicated The Market Street Church, Williamsport, promoted the building of 
the Methodist Episcopal Church in Picture Rocks, and the Camp Curtin 
Memorial Church, Harrisburg.  He was also pastor of the Epworth Methodist 
Church in York, when its parsonage was erected.  He inaugurated the 
Conference Home Missionary Society of the Central Pennsylvania Conference, a 
Sustentation Fund, which has partially supported seventy of the pastors of 
the conference during the last fourteen years.  He initiated the movement 
which resulted in a State Commission to purchase a lot and erect a monument 
in Harrisburg, in honor of the soldiers of the Civil War who camped in Old 
Camp Curtin.  By appointment of governors Brumbaugh and Sproul he retained 
membership of this commission until its work was accomplished.  He was 
honored in this conference by being elected to the general law-making body 
of the Methodist Episcopal Church which was held in Des Moines, Iowa, in 
1922.  His father, Samuel Williams, was a Civil War Veteran and held the 
position of mine foreman in the anthracite coal region, near Hazelton, for 
thirty-five years.  His mother was Sarah (Probert) Williams.  The parents 
were members of The Methodist Episcopal Church.
  The Rev. Mr. Williams was married in Williamsport, December 27, 1897, to 
Emma Fraim Stadden, of Williamsport, daughter of W.B. and Ella Stadden.  
They are the parents of four children:  W. Stadden, of Harrisburg, a 
graduate of State College; Alvin Samuel, Jr., with the Bell Telephone 
Company, Williamsport; Charles Scott, a senior of Dickinson College; Emma 
Fraim, attending Wilson College.