Contributed to the Pierce County WIGenWeb Project by Nance Sampson nsampson@spacestar.net
@2000 by Nance Sampson

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Submitted by Debbie Barrett June 13, 2001
mrsgrinnin@home.com

Wm. D. AKERS, postmaster, Spring Valley, Pierce county, is a son of Peter
Akers, who was born in Lynchburg, Va., in 1799, and Maria Eliza, daughter
of John and Eleanor Farris.  Two children were born to them:  John B. and
William D., the latter September 12, 1820, in Flemingsburg, Fleming county,
Ky.  When about four years of age he had the misfortune to lose his mother,
so went to live with his grandmother, and received a common-school education.
When twenty-two years of age he came to Wisconsin, and worked in the lead
mines for sixteen years, then, tiring of that, he moved to Red Wing, Minn.,
and went to farming.  He married, at Dubuque, Iowa, Mary A., daughter of
Elisha and Mary Hodgdon, and four children have been born to them: Virginia
A. (Mrs. Vanasse), Julia L. (Mrs. Biedle), Peter and William, all living in
Spring Valley. After staying in Minnesota for seven years, he came to Pierce
county, Wis., and commenced to clear up a farm in the heavy timber and make
a home.  He worked in the timber two years, then sold out and went to what is
now known as Olivet, stayed there a short time, then built a store in the 
center of Spring Lake township, being the fifth family to settle in the 
township.  Three years later he moved to Spring Valley, and engaged in 
business and was appointed postmaster.  A few years later he had the mis-
fortune to burn out, but his neighbors, like true pioneers, took hold, and 
soon had a new house put up, and he has since prospered.  He has been 
postmaster for the past seventeen years, and is a notary public.  Politically
he is a republican, and has been elected to various offices, always
discharging his duties satisfactorily to all.  In religious matters he is a
spiritualist.

--Taken from the "Historical and Biographical Album of the Chippewa Valley
Wisconsin Including A General Historical Sketch of the Chippewa Valley;
Ancestral Records fo Leading Families; Biographies of Representative Citizens,
Past and Present; and Portraits of Prominent Men.  Edited by George Forrester.
Published in Chicago, Illinois by A. Warner. Publisher. 1891-2. Page #602.