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Clayton Williams, Sr. (view source)
Revision as of 23:08, November 17, 2019
, 23:08, November 17, 2019Created page with "{{Infobox person | name=Clayton Wheat Williams, Sr. (Texas oilman, engineer, geologist, farmer, rancher, historian, county commissioner, and philanthropist) | birth_dat..."
{{Infobox person
| name=Clayton Wheat Williams, Sr.
(Texas oilman, engineer, geologist, farmer, rancher, historian, county commissioner, and philanthropist)
| birth_date=April 15, 1895
| birth_place=Fort Stockton, Pecos County, [[Texas]], [[United States|USA]]
| death_date=September 9, 1983 (aged 88)
| death_place=Fort Stockton, Texas
| spouse=Chicora Lee Graham Williams,<br/> known as "Chic" Williams<br/> (married 1928-1983, his death)
|children=Clayton "Claytie" Wheat Williams, Jr.<br>
Janet Williams Pollard<br>
Seven grandchildren<br>
'''Parents''':<br>
Oscar Waldo and Sallie Wheat Williams
|alma_mater=[[Texas A&M University]]
|religion=[[United Methodist]]
}}
'''Clayton Wheat Williams, Sr.''' (April 15, 1895 – September 9, 1983),<ref name=ssdi>{{cite web|url=http://ssdi.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/ssdi.cgi|title=Social Security Death Index|publisher=ssdi.rootsweb.ancestry.com|accessdate=September 12, 2009; under pay wall}}</ref> was an [[engineer]], a [[geologist]], an [[oil]]man, a [[World War I]] military officer, a rancher, a county commissioner, an [[historian]], a philanthropist, and a civic leader from Fort Stockton in West [[Texas]].
==Background==
Williams was the fourth child of Oscar Waldo Williams, a [[Harvard University]]-educated [[lattorney]] who would serve for a decade as the Pecos county judge, and the former Sallie Wheat, hence his middle name. Williams was born in an officers’ building of the former Fort Stockton [[United States Army|Army]] base, which had housed the Buffalo soldiers of the [[American West]] from 1867 to 1886.<ref>Mike Cochran, ''Claytie: The Roller-Coaster Life of a Texas Wildcatter'' (biography of Clayton Williams, Jr.) (College Station, Texas|College Station]]: [[Texas A&M University]] , 2007), pp. 30, 381; hereinafter cited as Claytie .</ref> O. W. Williams had prospected for [[gold]] and [[silver]] in Silver City, [[New Mexico|New Mexico Territory]], before he came to Fort Stockton. O.W. was in New Mexico during the heyday of [[Geronimo]] and [[Billy the Kid]]. He was also a suspect in the shotgun death of a "rogue" sheriff named A. J. Royal, but the killer was never apprehended, and Clayton Williams, Sr., insisted that his father was not the culprit.<ref>''Claytie,'' p. 15.</ref>
After attending Fort Stockton public schools, Williams enrolled in 1911 at [[Texas A&M University]] in [[College Station, Texas|College Station]]. To reach TAMU, he travelled by [[stagecoach]] north to Monahans in Ward County (known for its sand dunes) and then took the [[railroad]] nort-east to [[Dallas]] and south to College Station. In 1915, Williams received a Bachelor of Science degree in [[electrical engineering]].<ref name=handbook>{{cite web|url=http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fwi77|author=[[Ernest Wallace]]|Williams, Sr., Clayton W.|publisher=Texas State Historical Association: ''The Handbook of Texas''|accessdate=November 17, 2019}}</ref>
He was then employed for two years in New Mexico as an electrician for a mining company. In 1917, he joined the officers’ training camp at Leon Springs near [[San Antonio]] and soon procured a commission as a second lieutenan] from the artillery school at Fortress Monroe, [[Virginia]]. He volunteered for duty in [[France]]. Until the end of the war, he was an instructor in military schools in Langres and Cleremont-Ferrand, France.<ref name=handbook/> In 1919, Williams was in [[Paris, France|Paris]], where he joined a group of veterans who formed the American Legion.<ref>''Claytie'', pp. 30-31.</ref>
==Marriage to Chicora Graham==
On September 10, 1928, Williams married the former Chicora Lee Graham (December 17, 1905 – April 13, 1998)<ref name=ssdi/> of Sterling City near [[San Angelo, Texas]|San Angelo]], Texas. Chicora, known as "Chic," was the daughter of Oscar H. Graham (died 1949) and Evie Lee "Mernie" Graham<ref>''Claytie'', p. 32.</ref> (1878–1972).<ref name=ssdi/> Chicora attended Trinity University, then in[Waxahachie in Ellis County, and graduated from Sul Ross State University in Alpine, Texas. She taught school in tiny Gail in Borden County on the South Plains even before she obtained her degree. Chicora was named for an [[Native American]]girl, who slipped food to Chicora’s paternal grandfather, Captain Joe Graham of the [[Confederate States of America|Confederate]] Army, while he was a Union [[prisoner of war]]. Chicora’s aunt was the first to bear the name, and Chicora’s granddaughter, known as "Chim," is the third Chicora in three generations of the Williams family.<ref>''Claytie,'' p. 33.</ref>
Clayton and Chicora married immediately after her graduation from Sul Ross, and the couple honeymooned in the [[Grand Canyon]] of [[Arizona]], with Chicora’s mother, "Mernie," accompanying them. Mernie lived with the Williamses after her husband's death and later with their only son, Clayton Wheat Williams, Jr., an oilman who was the 1990 Texas [[Republican Party|Republican]] [[Governor|gubernatorial]] nominee. lost to [[liberal]] [[Ann Richards]]. Clayton, Jr., is wed to the former Modesta Simpson, and he has five children from two marriages. Clayton and Chicora also had a daughter, Janet W. Pollard (born 1935), the widow of [[Midland]] oilman Robert W. “Bob” Pollard (1935–2004),<ref name=ssdi/> and the mother of four sons.<ref>''Claytie,'' p. 16.</ref>
==Business ventures==
From 1919 to 1920, Williams worked as an engineer for the Oil Belt Power Company in [[Eastland, Texas|Eastland]], the seat of [[Eastland County, Texas|Eastland County]] east of [[Abilene, Texas|Abilene]], Texas. For four years, he was a surveyor and an engineer for the Texas and New Mexico state highway departments. In 1924, he became the chief engineer for the Texon Oil and Land Company, in which position he developed an interest in geology though he had no formal training in the field. He became one of the earliest licensed geologists in Texas,<ref name=handbook/> having taken the lead in the discovery of the Settles and Harding oilfields in [[Howard County, Texas|Howard County]] near [[Big Spring, Texas|Big Spring]] and the first discovery well in the Ellenburger field. Upon Williams’ recommendation, Texon in 1926 drilled the deepest well in the United States until that time, the University 1-B well.<ref>Today in Texas History: Carl G. Cromwell drills world's deepest oil well [http://blogs.chron.com/txpotomac/2008/12/today_in_texas_history_carl_g.html]</ref> In 1927, he established a water and ice works plant in [[Crane, Texas|Crane]], Texas, which he operated until 1935, having resigned from Texon.<ref name=handbook/>
In the late 1920s, Williams enrolled for a year of law school at the [[University of Texas at Austin]]<ref name=c31>''Claytie'', p. 31</ref> but returned to his independent oil and ranching business.<ref name=handbook/>
Outside Fort Stocktown, where the family had an in-town residence, Williams maintained a ranch of thirty-five [[Section (United States land surveying)|sections]] and an [[irrigation|irrigated]] farm of about three hundred to four hundred acres.<ref>''Claytie'', pp. 14-15</ref>
==Civic contributions==
Active in community affairs, Williams served for eighteen years as an elected Pecos county commissioner,<ref name=c31/> having been elected in 1936. He was defeated in the 1954 [[Democratic Party|Democratic]] primary in a contest that focused on declining water resources in the Trans-Pecos country.<ref>''Claytie'', p. 332</ref> For several years, Williams served on the Fort Stockton School Board.<ref name=handbook/> He was a member of the [[United Methodist]] Church and the Masonic lodge in Fort Stockton.<ref name=handbook/>
Williams achieved distinction as a historian of West Texas. His publications include several scholarly articles and five books: ''Never Again ''(3 vols., 1969), ''Animal Tales of the West'' (1974), and ''Texas' Last Frontier: Fort Stockton and the Trans-Pecos, 1861-1895'' (1982). The latter work was edited by [[Ernest Wallace]], a late professor of history at [[Texas Tech University]] in [[Lubbock]].<ref name=handbook/> Janet Pollard said that her father "not only wrote history, he made history."<ref name=c31/>
Williams gave generously to charitable and civic organizations in Fort Stockton, to his ''alma mater,'' Texas A&M, and the Permian Historical Society, of which he was a fellow. He also contributed to the Fort Stockton Historical Society and the West Texas Historical Association, both of which he served an annual term as president. In addition to his role in the establishment of the national organization, Williams was the commander in Fort Stockton of the American Legion and was further involved with the Veterans of Foreign Wars. His name is engraved on a plaque on the ''USS Texas'' (BB-35) battleship and at the [[Alamo]] in San Antonio. In 1974, he was named Fort Stockton's "Outstanding Citizen." In 1982, the year before his death, the West Texas Historical Association dedicated its ''Yearbook','' now known as the ''West Texas Historical Review,'' in his honor.
==Death and legacy==
Janet Pollard often compares her father to the [[Atticus Finch]] character, the compassionate lawyer portrayed by [[Gregory Peck]] in the [[novel]] and the [[film]], ''[[To Kill a Mockingbird]]''.<ref name=c17>''Claytie,'' p. 17.</ref> She says that her mother, "Chic," reminds her of the [[actress]] [[Claudette Colbert]]: “uplifting, happy, inspirational, the kind of person you wanted to be around all the time."<ref name=c17/>
In 1983, Williams was diagnosed with terminal [[cancer]]. He reacted "stoically. ... All is well. I am not afraid." Shortly before his death, the family attended a [[cattle]] auction and barbecue at their ranch near Alpine in Brewster County. A photograph of the couple then taken, presumably their last in public together, is included in the Mike Cochran 2007 book, ''Claytie: The Roller-Coaster Life of a Texas Wildcatter.''. The picture is also displayed in the [[J. Evetts Haley]] Museum in Midland.<ref>''Claytie'', pp. 20-2.</ref> Williams died a few days later the day before their 55th wedding anniversary. Chicora lived another fifteen years. They are interred at East Hill Cemetery in Fort Stockton.<ref name=handbook/>
Clayton Williams, Jr., summed up his father's philosophy of life: "Heights one day, depths the next."<ref>''Claytie,'' p. 378.</ref>
==References==
{{reflist}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Williams, Sr., Clayton W.}}
[[Category:Texas]]
[[Category:Business People]]
[[Category:Engineers]]
[[Category:Geologists]]
[[Category:Farmers]]
[[Category:Historians]]
[[Category:American Authors]]
[[Category:Politicians]]
[[Category:Schools]]
[[Category:Democrats]]
[[Category:United Methodists]]
[[Category:World War I]]
[[Category:United States Army]]
| name=Clayton Wheat Williams, Sr.
(Texas oilman, engineer, geologist, farmer, rancher, historian, county commissioner, and philanthropist)
| birth_date=April 15, 1895
| birth_place=Fort Stockton, Pecos County, [[Texas]], [[United States|USA]]
| death_date=September 9, 1983 (aged 88)
| death_place=Fort Stockton, Texas
| spouse=Chicora Lee Graham Williams,<br/> known as "Chic" Williams<br/> (married 1928-1983, his death)
|children=Clayton "Claytie" Wheat Williams, Jr.<br>
Janet Williams Pollard<br>
Seven grandchildren<br>
'''Parents''':<br>
Oscar Waldo and Sallie Wheat Williams
|alma_mater=[[Texas A&M University]]
|religion=[[United Methodist]]
}}
'''Clayton Wheat Williams, Sr.''' (April 15, 1895 – September 9, 1983),<ref name=ssdi>{{cite web|url=http://ssdi.rootsweb.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/ssdi.cgi|title=Social Security Death Index|publisher=ssdi.rootsweb.ancestry.com|accessdate=September 12, 2009; under pay wall}}</ref> was an [[engineer]], a [[geologist]], an [[oil]]man, a [[World War I]] military officer, a rancher, a county commissioner, an [[historian]], a philanthropist, and a civic leader from Fort Stockton in West [[Texas]].
==Background==
Williams was the fourth child of Oscar Waldo Williams, a [[Harvard University]]-educated [[lattorney]] who would serve for a decade as the Pecos county judge, and the former Sallie Wheat, hence his middle name. Williams was born in an officers’ building of the former Fort Stockton [[United States Army|Army]] base, which had housed the Buffalo soldiers of the [[American West]] from 1867 to 1886.<ref>Mike Cochran, ''Claytie: The Roller-Coaster Life of a Texas Wildcatter'' (biography of Clayton Williams, Jr.) (College Station, Texas|College Station]]: [[Texas A&M University]] , 2007), pp. 30, 381; hereinafter cited as Claytie .</ref> O. W. Williams had prospected for [[gold]] and [[silver]] in Silver City, [[New Mexico|New Mexico Territory]], before he came to Fort Stockton. O.W. was in New Mexico during the heyday of [[Geronimo]] and [[Billy the Kid]]. He was also a suspect in the shotgun death of a "rogue" sheriff named A. J. Royal, but the killer was never apprehended, and Clayton Williams, Sr., insisted that his father was not the culprit.<ref>''Claytie,'' p. 15.</ref>
After attending Fort Stockton public schools, Williams enrolled in 1911 at [[Texas A&M University]] in [[College Station, Texas|College Station]]. To reach TAMU, he travelled by [[stagecoach]] north to Monahans in Ward County (known for its sand dunes) and then took the [[railroad]] nort-east to [[Dallas]] and south to College Station. In 1915, Williams received a Bachelor of Science degree in [[electrical engineering]].<ref name=handbook>{{cite web|url=http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fwi77|author=[[Ernest Wallace]]|Williams, Sr., Clayton W.|publisher=Texas State Historical Association: ''The Handbook of Texas''|accessdate=November 17, 2019}}</ref>
He was then employed for two years in New Mexico as an electrician for a mining company. In 1917, he joined the officers’ training camp at Leon Springs near [[San Antonio]] and soon procured a commission as a second lieutenan] from the artillery school at Fortress Monroe, [[Virginia]]. He volunteered for duty in [[France]]. Until the end of the war, he was an instructor in military schools in Langres and Cleremont-Ferrand, France.<ref name=handbook/> In 1919, Williams was in [[Paris, France|Paris]], where he joined a group of veterans who formed the American Legion.<ref>''Claytie'', pp. 30-31.</ref>
==Marriage to Chicora Graham==
On September 10, 1928, Williams married the former Chicora Lee Graham (December 17, 1905 – April 13, 1998)<ref name=ssdi/> of Sterling City near [[San Angelo, Texas]|San Angelo]], Texas. Chicora, known as "Chic," was the daughter of Oscar H. Graham (died 1949) and Evie Lee "Mernie" Graham<ref>''Claytie'', p. 32.</ref> (1878–1972).<ref name=ssdi/> Chicora attended Trinity University, then in[Waxahachie in Ellis County, and graduated from Sul Ross State University in Alpine, Texas. She taught school in tiny Gail in Borden County on the South Plains even before she obtained her degree. Chicora was named for an [[Native American]]girl, who slipped food to Chicora’s paternal grandfather, Captain Joe Graham of the [[Confederate States of America|Confederate]] Army, while he was a Union [[prisoner of war]]. Chicora’s aunt was the first to bear the name, and Chicora’s granddaughter, known as "Chim," is the third Chicora in three generations of the Williams family.<ref>''Claytie,'' p. 33.</ref>
Clayton and Chicora married immediately after her graduation from Sul Ross, and the couple honeymooned in the [[Grand Canyon]] of [[Arizona]], with Chicora’s mother, "Mernie," accompanying them. Mernie lived with the Williamses after her husband's death and later with their only son, Clayton Wheat Williams, Jr., an oilman who was the 1990 Texas [[Republican Party|Republican]] [[Governor|gubernatorial]] nominee. lost to [[liberal]] [[Ann Richards]]. Clayton, Jr., is wed to the former Modesta Simpson, and he has five children from two marriages. Clayton and Chicora also had a daughter, Janet W. Pollard (born 1935), the widow of [[Midland]] oilman Robert W. “Bob” Pollard (1935–2004),<ref name=ssdi/> and the mother of four sons.<ref>''Claytie,'' p. 16.</ref>
==Business ventures==
From 1919 to 1920, Williams worked as an engineer for the Oil Belt Power Company in [[Eastland, Texas|Eastland]], the seat of [[Eastland County, Texas|Eastland County]] east of [[Abilene, Texas|Abilene]], Texas. For four years, he was a surveyor and an engineer for the Texas and New Mexico state highway departments. In 1924, he became the chief engineer for the Texon Oil and Land Company, in which position he developed an interest in geology though he had no formal training in the field. He became one of the earliest licensed geologists in Texas,<ref name=handbook/> having taken the lead in the discovery of the Settles and Harding oilfields in [[Howard County, Texas|Howard County]] near [[Big Spring, Texas|Big Spring]] and the first discovery well in the Ellenburger field. Upon Williams’ recommendation, Texon in 1926 drilled the deepest well in the United States until that time, the University 1-B well.<ref>Today in Texas History: Carl G. Cromwell drills world's deepest oil well [http://blogs.chron.com/txpotomac/2008/12/today_in_texas_history_carl_g.html]</ref> In 1927, he established a water and ice works plant in [[Crane, Texas|Crane]], Texas, which he operated until 1935, having resigned from Texon.<ref name=handbook/>
In the late 1920s, Williams enrolled for a year of law school at the [[University of Texas at Austin]]<ref name=c31>''Claytie'', p. 31</ref> but returned to his independent oil and ranching business.<ref name=handbook/>
Outside Fort Stocktown, where the family had an in-town residence, Williams maintained a ranch of thirty-five [[Section (United States land surveying)|sections]] and an [[irrigation|irrigated]] farm of about three hundred to four hundred acres.<ref>''Claytie'', pp. 14-15</ref>
==Civic contributions==
Active in community affairs, Williams served for eighteen years as an elected Pecos county commissioner,<ref name=c31/> having been elected in 1936. He was defeated in the 1954 [[Democratic Party|Democratic]] primary in a contest that focused on declining water resources in the Trans-Pecos country.<ref>''Claytie'', p. 332</ref> For several years, Williams served on the Fort Stockton School Board.<ref name=handbook/> He was a member of the [[United Methodist]] Church and the Masonic lodge in Fort Stockton.<ref name=handbook/>
Williams achieved distinction as a historian of West Texas. His publications include several scholarly articles and five books: ''Never Again ''(3 vols., 1969), ''Animal Tales of the West'' (1974), and ''Texas' Last Frontier: Fort Stockton and the Trans-Pecos, 1861-1895'' (1982). The latter work was edited by [[Ernest Wallace]], a late professor of history at [[Texas Tech University]] in [[Lubbock]].<ref name=handbook/> Janet Pollard said that her father "not only wrote history, he made history."<ref name=c31/>
Williams gave generously to charitable and civic organizations in Fort Stockton, to his ''alma mater,'' Texas A&M, and the Permian Historical Society, of which he was a fellow. He also contributed to the Fort Stockton Historical Society and the West Texas Historical Association, both of which he served an annual term as president. In addition to his role in the establishment of the national organization, Williams was the commander in Fort Stockton of the American Legion and was further involved with the Veterans of Foreign Wars. His name is engraved on a plaque on the ''USS Texas'' (BB-35) battleship and at the [[Alamo]] in San Antonio. In 1974, he was named Fort Stockton's "Outstanding Citizen." In 1982, the year before his death, the West Texas Historical Association dedicated its ''Yearbook','' now known as the ''West Texas Historical Review,'' in his honor.
==Death and legacy==
Janet Pollard often compares her father to the [[Atticus Finch]] character, the compassionate lawyer portrayed by [[Gregory Peck]] in the [[novel]] and the [[film]], ''[[To Kill a Mockingbird]]''.<ref name=c17>''Claytie,'' p. 17.</ref> She says that her mother, "Chic," reminds her of the [[actress]] [[Claudette Colbert]]: “uplifting, happy, inspirational, the kind of person you wanted to be around all the time."<ref name=c17/>
In 1983, Williams was diagnosed with terminal [[cancer]]. He reacted "stoically. ... All is well. I am not afraid." Shortly before his death, the family attended a [[cattle]] auction and barbecue at their ranch near Alpine in Brewster County. A photograph of the couple then taken, presumably their last in public together, is included in the Mike Cochran 2007 book, ''Claytie: The Roller-Coaster Life of a Texas Wildcatter.''. The picture is also displayed in the [[J. Evetts Haley]] Museum in Midland.<ref>''Claytie'', pp. 20-2.</ref> Williams died a few days later the day before their 55th wedding anniversary. Chicora lived another fifteen years. They are interred at East Hill Cemetery in Fort Stockton.<ref name=handbook/>
Clayton Williams, Jr., summed up his father's philosophy of life: "Heights one day, depths the next."<ref>''Claytie,'' p. 378.</ref>
==References==
{{reflist}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Williams, Sr., Clayton W.}}
[[Category:Texas]]
[[Category:Business People]]
[[Category:Engineers]]
[[Category:Geologists]]
[[Category:Farmers]]
[[Category:Historians]]
[[Category:American Authors]]
[[Category:Politicians]]
[[Category:Schools]]
[[Category:Democrats]]
[[Category:United Methodists]]
[[Category:World War I]]
[[Category:United States Army]]