WILLIAMS D. SCOGGAN was born in Lee township, Brown county, Illinois, December 28, 1843. His father was Isham Scoggan, born 1807, in Shelby county, Kentucky. He was the son of William Dotson Scoggan, who settled in Kentucky at a very early day, living to be a very old man, rearing seven children. Isham was the eldest son and on coming to this county he bought 320 acres of land and in 1839 brought his wife and two children. They made this journey by team. Some eight or ten years later his brothers and one sister came, and with them the aged father and mother. The mother of our subject was his father's second wife and was named Eliza Jane Arnold. Her parents were Kentucky farmers who lived and died there, leaving a family of nine children. The father of Mr. Scoggan died September 8, 1861, in his fifth-seventh year, leaving 700 acres of land and other property. The mother, in her seventy-eighth year, is still living, but is in feeble health.

William received a common school education and was reared to a farm life. He is now engaged in stock farming, raising great numbers of cattle and horses. He has from 150 to 200 head of stock. His land is very fertile and he is able to raise upon it corn, wheat, oats and hay and, as it is rolling and has natural drainage, he has not been obliged to do much tilling.

He was first married in Kansas, in 1875, but he lost his wife and one child within two years. He was at that time a farmer of Labette county, and remained there nine years. He owned 320 acres, which he sold and then returned to Illinois to the old homestead. His present wife was Susie Long, a native of Morgan county, Illinois, and daughter of Andrew and Lizzie (Buckton) Long. He was married September 30, 1891. Mrs. Scoggan is a Methodist, his mother a Missionary Baptist, his niece a Campbellite, and he himself represents the outside world, supporting them all. He is an ardent Republican.