BIO: A. C. WILLIAMS, Clearfield County, PA
 
Contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by Judy Banja & Sally

Copyright 2005.  All rights reserved.
http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm
http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/clearfield/

NOTE: Use this web address to access other bios:
http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/clearfield/1picts/swoope/swoope.htm
_____________________________________________________________

From Twentieth Century History of Clearfield County, Pennsylvania,
and Representative Citizens, by Roland D. Swoope, Jr.,
Chicago: Richmond-Arnold Publishing Company, 1911, pages 588 & 589.
_____________________________________________________________ 

  A. C. WILLIAMS, who resides on his farm of fifty-seven acres, situated in Penn 
township, Clearfield county, Pa., one and one-half miles from Grampian, on the 
east, has been in the butchering business for some twenty-three years and is 
proprietor of a well patronized market at Grampian.  He was born November 7, 
1857, in Jordan township, Clearfield county, and is a son of J. G. and Matilda 
(Knapp) Williams.
  J. G. Williams was born and died on the same farm, situated in Jordan 
township, to which his father, David Williams had come, from Center county.  
Grandfather Williams built the first grist mill in Jordan township.  He bought 
500 acres of land and cleared 200 of it.  He donated the land to the Baptist 
church on which that edifice was built and the land contained in old Zion 
cemetery, in which rest all the former members of this family.  J. G. Williams 
lived to be seventy-six years of age.  He married Matilda Knapp and they had 
eight children:  A. C., Julia, David, Chauncy, John, Mollie, Harriet and Blair.
  A. C. Williams obtained his education in the schools of Jordan township and 
when old enough to become useful to his father began to assist on the home farm 
and continued until his marriage.  Then he moved to Bower, on the John Bell 
farm, after which he bought the excellent farm on which he lives, purchasing of 
the Cochran estate.  He operates a coal mine, having a three-foot vein, and 
delivers coal in Grampian.  Mr. Williams has always remained in Clearfield 
county but his next younger brother, David Williams, has ventured far from home 
and has had a more or less exciting life.  He left his native place when 
Goldfield, Colo., came into the lime-light as the center of the gold mining 
industry, and worked there for a time.  Seeking further adventures he became one 
of a crew of forty-two men to start out in a whaling expedition, on the Pacific 
Ocean.  He was one of the five survivors who reached land.  Then he went to the 
Klondike region, in Alaska, where he met with considerable success.  Later he 
visited his kindred at Grampian and made himself so popular with friends and 
relatives that they all lamented when he returned to the West.
  Mr. Williams married Miss Mary Ellen Strunk, who was born at New Millport, 
Pa., a daughter of E. L. Strunk, and they have had the following children:  G. 
E., who is a train dispatcher for the New York Central Railroad, at Jersey 
Shore, Pa., married Edna Arnold and they have two children; Arthur, who resides 
on his father's farm, married Mabel Freeman, a daughter of Ralph Freeman; 
Nellie, who is the wife of Ollie Hendrick, who is a machinist in the shops of 
the New York Central at Williamsport; Dollie, who is the wife of Elmer Beam, an 
engineer on the Beech Creek branch railroad; and Elby, who is the wife of Orvis 
Curry, who is a brick molder, employed at Stronach, Pa.  Mr. Williams, like his 
late father, is a Republican.  He is a member of the order of Odd Fellows and of 
the P. S. of A., at Grampian.  He is one of the respected citizens and honorable 
business men of Penn township.