Page:Portland, Oregon, its History and Builders volume 3.djvu/230

224 One of the strongly marked characteristics of Mr. Chapman has been his final love and devotion to his parents, to whom he was especially attentive and helpful in their last years. When young he promised his mother not to marry while she lived, and he kept this promise. On the 21st of December, 1908, he wedded Miss E. E. Crookham of San Francisco, a daughter of Judge J. A. Crookham of Oskaloosa, Iowa. She is a lady of high educational attainments, who was graduated from Mt. Holyoke College, visited England and other countries of Europe a second time in pursuing her studies. For several years she was a successful teacher in the Portland high school, and afterward accepted a position in the city schools of San Francisco, where she lived and experienced the terrors of "the great fire" in that city. While Mr. Chapman has at times met reverses in his business enterprises owing largely to conditions over which he had no control, he has nevertheless done an important part in the upbuilding of the northwest and his service as a public official has been marked by a fidelity that none have questioned.

To the energetic nature and strong mentality of such men as William K. Smith is due the development and ever increasing prosperity of Portland. His career has been one of activity, full of incidents and results. In every sphere of life in which he has acted he has left an indelible impress through his ability and tireless energy that never stops short of the attainment of its purpose. He first visited Portland in 1854. Returning in 1869, with the experience of previous residence in Oregon and in California through the days of pioneer development, he joined his interests at once with those of the growing city and his efforts have since been a resultant feature in its further progress and promotion. He is today numbered with Portland's capitalists, and the most envious cannot grudge him his success so worthily has it been won through activity in industrial and financial circles. At the age of eighty-four years he remains one of the city's most honored and venerable residents.

Mr. Smith was born in Fayette county, Pennsylvania, August 3, 1826, a son of Peter and Barbara (Showalter) Smith, the former of English lineage and the latter of Holland Dutch descent. The birth of James G. Blaine occurred in the same town where Mr. Smith spent his early youth. The father was a farmer and carpenter who removed from the Keystone state to Ohio when his son William was but six years of age. He settled upon a tract of land in Clermont county, where he engaged in farming until his removal to Indiana. He was afterward a resident of Illinois and later of Texas, his death occurring in the Lone Star state, while his wife passed away in Ohio.

The removal of the family made William K. Smith at different times a pupil in the public schools of Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, Illinois and Alabama. With the family he went to Texas and there worked upon the home farm until eighteen years of age. Then leaving the parental roof, he went to Alabama, where he again attended school and also engaged in clerking for his uncle, a merchant and physician, with whom he also read medicine. After five years spent in Alabama William K. Smith went to La Grange, Texas, where he was employed as a clerk in a mercantile establishment. Before he left Texas he had earned a cow and calf by splitting rails. He left the cattle there and went to Alabama. When he returned he invested in a drove of cattle and was engaged in live-stock business for some time but subsequently sold out and went to St. Louis for the purpose of improving his education. His life experiences had taught him the value of intellectual training as an element to success in business, and making his way to St. Louis he pursued a course in a commercial college of that city and also attended Shurtleff College at Alton, Illinois.