1907 History of Allegan County, Michigan Illustrated Compiled under the Editorial Supervison of Dr. Henry F. Thomas Allegan Lewis Publishing Company Transcribed by Sue Baroski

Frank Hawley Williams

Frank Hawley Williams is serving for the third term as a judge of the probate court of Allegan county, and is secretary and treasurer of the State Association of Probate Judges. He has a wide and favorable acquaintance throughout Michigan, and is recognized as one of the distinguished citizens of Allegan county, who ! has left and is leaving the impress of his individuality upon public thought and action for the betterment of the interests of this part of the state. His record stands in contradistinction to the old adage that “ a prophet is not without honor save in his own country.” and therefore there is particular interest attaching to his career since he is a native son of the place where he has passed his entire life and so directed his ability and force as to gain recognition as one of the representative citizens of the county. He is actively connected with the profession which has important bearing upon the progress and stable prosperity of any section or community and one which is considered as conserving the public welfare by furthering the ends of justice and maintaining individual rights. Judge Williams was born in Allegan, July 12, 1864, and is a grandson of Deacon Erastus Williams, a descendant of one of the earliest settlers of Massachusetts. The grandfathe! r was a farmer by occupation and at one time lived in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, but subsequently removed to Pittsfield, New York, about 1822. He served as captain of a volunteer company at Stockbridge in the war of 1812. His wife, who bore the maiden name of Elizabeth Lumley, was a native of Wales.

Their son, the late William B. Williams, the father of the judge, was born in Pittsfield, Monroe county, New York, July 28, 1826, and died in Allegan on the 4th of March, 1905. He acquired a common school education in his native state and also attended the high school at Pittsfield. In early manhood he followed agricultural pursuits through the summer months, while in the winter seasons he engaged in teaching. In 1850 he entered upon the study of law in Rochester, New York, and in 1851 was graduated from an institution then known as the State and National Law School, at Ballston Spa. In the spring of 1852 he became a partner in a law firm, with which he had studi! ed for two years, and in January 1855, he removed to Allegan, where he remained until his death, continuing in active practice of his profession until about three years prior to his demise.

In 1856 he was elected judge of probate of Allegan county and was re-elected in 1860. In August, 1862, thinking that his first duty was to his country, he enlisted as a private of Company B, 19th Michigan infantry, of which he was elected first lieutenant. Before reaching the rendezvous of the regiment he was ordered to bring a company to Detroit and as Company I of this command was attached to the 5th Michigan cavalry with Captain Williams in command. In 1863 he resigned on account of physical disability caused by serious illness, and in 1864, as commander in camp, he organized the 28th Michigan infantry, of which he was in charge until the regiment left for the front, when he was appointed by the governor to take the vote of the regiment and that ! of Michigan soldiers at Louisville, Kentucky. He was also appointed a member of the board of visitors of the University of Michigan.

In 1866 he was elected on the Republican ticket to represent the Allegan district in the state senate, and in the spring of 1867 he was elected a member of the state constitutional convention and aided in framing the organic law of the commonwealth. He served in that body as chairman of the committee on miscellaneous provisions and was on the committee of the judiciary. As a member of the latter he submitted a proposition for division of the state into judicial circuits for the purpose of providing three judges for each circuit which should alternate with one another in holding terms of court en banc which would relieve the supreme court of a very large amount of business at a very little expense. After some slight changes this proposition was adopted by the committee and became a part of the ill fated constitution of 1867. In 1868 Mr. Williams was re-elected a member of the state senate and served in that body as president pro tem and as chairman of the judiciary committee. He was very active in the senate in this term, being recognized as one of its leaders and leaving the impress of his individuality upon the legislation that was enacted during that time. In 1868 he was made a delegate at Chicago, and in 1872 he was appointed a member of what is now known as the state board of corrections and charities, in which capacity he served for about two years. Following the death of Congressman Foster he was elected to congress by the Republicans of the fifth district and served for two terms, retiring on the expiration of that period, on the 4th of March, 1877. In 1843 he was a member of the committee of the Pacific Railroad. In May, 1877, he was appointed commissioner of railroads of the state of Michigan and held the office for about six years. He was a Republican from 1855 until his death, and pr! ior to the organization of the party he was a Whig, casting his first presidential ballot for General Winfield Schott, and loyalty and patriotism guided his every public act and he the keen common sense that enabled him to use the practical means at hand in working toward the ideal, so that he accomplished results and promoted the best interest of the commonwealth. He held membership in C.J. Bassett Post No. 56 G.A.R., and was a member of the Protestant Episcopal church serving as vestryman of the church of Allegan from 1858 until his demise. He was also a member of the board of trustees of the Ackley Institute, a church school at Grand Haven, Michigan for young ladies, acting in that capacity from the organization of the institution.

In Rochester, New York, in September, 1855, William B. Williams was married to Miss Marietta Osborn, a niece of Nehemiah Osborn, the builder of the city hall in Detroit and of the state capital in Lansing. In their family were five childr! en; Marian L., the wife of Frank L. Rudd, of Detroit; William B., who is living in Manitoba; Ella, the wife of T. S. Updyke, of this county; Theodore O., of Grand Rapids, Michigan, and Frank Hawley. The last named entered the common schools at the usual age and passed through successive grades until he was graduated from the high school of his native village in 1881. He spent the summers of 1881, 1882 and 1883 in working on his father’s farm near Allegan, and in the winter of 1881-2 he was a student under H. W. Foster, preparing for the university. He taught in district schools and also as a substitute in the normal and high schools at Allegan in the winter of 1882-3, and thus earned enough money to pay hi tuition for one year at the university, pursuing an engineering course. Because of limited financial resources he had to leave the institution at the end of the semester in February 1885, after which he became a clerk and student in the law office of his father. O! n the 21st of October 1886, he was admitted to the bar and became a partner of the law firm of W. B. Williams & Son. He had charge of the Kellogg estate, which he controlled until his election to the office of judge of probate. In the summer vacations he made use of his engineering knowledge and in the summer of 1887 was employed as transit man to survey the extension of the Columbus, Lima & Milwaukee Railroad to Saugatuck. He was also appointed village surveyor of Allegan October 3, 1887, and was reappointed each year until March, 1891, and made a compilation of village surveys and a permanent record of the same. In May, 1891, he was appointed city engineer of Big Rapids, going to that place to do such work as was required, and acting in that capacity until May, 1895. In March, 1894, he was appointed village attorney of Allegan, Michigan, holding the office for one year. In March 1896, he was re-appointed and served until March, 1898. On the 3rd of September, 1896, after a vigorous campaign Mr. Williams was unanimously nominated for the office of probate judge of Allegan county, and was elected by a majority of nineteen hundred and seventy-two. At a meeting of the judges of probate within the district of Kalamazoo asylum he was elected secretary of a n preliminary organization with a view to perfecting a state organization. At Lansing, In March 1897, he was unanimously chosen as president of the state organization of probate judges and held that office until October, 1899. In 1900 he was made secretary and treasurer of the above society, which office he still holds. At the meeting in Detroit in 1898 he recommended that a committee be appointed to revise the probate blanks of the state. The association adopted the recommendation with the provision that Judge Williams should appoint the committee and act as chairman. Judge Jewell, of Kent county, and Judge Maynard, of Eaton county, were named as his co-laborers on the c! ommittee and the second revision was carried through and adopted by the state. Judge Williams was unanimously re-nominated by the Republicans of Allegan county for a second term as judge of probate, August 22, 1900, and re-elected by majority of twenty-four hundred and thirty-six. He was again elected in 1904 with a majority of thirty-eight hundred and forty-one, and still holds the office. He was elected president of the village of Allegan in march, 1906.

Judge Williams was reared in the faith of the Republican party and has always remained as one of its stalwart advocates, casting his first presidential vote for Benjamin Harris, in 1888. He was secretary of the Republican county committee from 1894 until 1896, was chairman from 1898 until 1900, and was delegate at large from Allegan county to the state convention held at Grand Rapids in June, 1900. He was made a Mason in 1893, and held many offices in Allegan lodge, No, 111, being elected master in December 1898, servi! ng for three years. He is how high priest of Eureka Chapter, No. 50, Royal Arch Masons, and chairman of committee on appeals in the Grand Lodge of the state. He was also attained the thirty-second degree of the Scottish Rite.

The specific and distinctive office of biography is not to give voice to a man’s modest estimate of himself and his accomplishments but rather to leave the perpetual record of establishing his character by the consensus of opinion of fellowmen. That Judge Williams occupies a notable position among the able lawyers of Allegan county is shown by the many times his professional associates have honored him with official preferment in their fraternal organizations, and the public accords him prominence is demonstrated by his re-elections to the position which he is now filling and also by the respect which is uniformly tendered him.






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