Memorial Record of Western Kentucky, Lewis Publishing Company, 1904,
pp 594-596 [McCracken]

     YOUNG TAYLOR.  Some men succeed in a certain chosen avenue of
life by reason of most favorable circumstances and environments
afforded them in the early portion of their career, in the way of
affluence, given or inherited capital or established business.  An
individual of such splendid opportunity and auspicious entry upon a
business or professional life of course deserves praise for
improvement of opportunity and for successful achievement, but he
who began the battle of life for himself under unfavorable circumstances
and attains success is surely entitled to much more
credit.  Such a man is frequently styled a self-made man.  Young
Taylor, whose name introduces this biographical sketch, is a type of
the self-made man.  Born of humble yet respectable parentage, he had
not the advantages of schooling and capital in early life to equip
him for attaining the gratifying success which has, nevertheless,
attended his career.
     Mr. Taylor was born October 6, 1857, in the town of Smithland,
at the mouth of the Cumberland, in Livingston county, Kentucky.  His
father was a farmer and ship carpenter, giving less attention in
farming than to his trade.  The son as one of a family of thirteen
children was reared on the farm which adjoined the village of
Smithland, and was past twenty-one years of age when he abandoned
farm life.  His parents were William C. and Mary A. (Dilwood)
Taylor, the former a native of Illinois, and resided there for a
short time after their marriage, and then lived for a time in
Paducah, which was then not much more than a wood yard and river
landing.  Then they removed to Smithland, where they spent the rest
of their days, the father dying in 1877, aged about fifty-seven
years.  The greater part of his life was devoted to ship
carpentering at Smithland, in those days a thriving town, where one
of the most important steamboat building and repair concerns on the
Ohio river was located.
     Perhaps the father's trade had an influence in determining that
of the son, for in 1879, with a young wife and child, in poor
circumstances, the latter left the farm, and, purchasing at
Smithland a small open flat-boat, ten by thirty feet, transferred
down the river to Paducah his scant household effects.  He and his
family landed in that city with but thirty-five cents.  Finally he
found employment, and eventually engaged in ship carpentering. 
Later he embarked in boat and barge construction on his own account,
and in 1898, upon the organization and incorporation of the Paducah
Dry Docks Company, Mr. Taylor secured stock in the company and has
since then been its vice president and general manager.  This
company has the largest dry docks on the Ohio and its tributaries,
and does a vast amount of business, constructing steamboats and
other river crafts and repairing the same under Mr. Taylor's
management, and already the company has experienced a steady growth and
increase of business and profits.
     Mr. Taylor gained only a limited common school education in
life, but he has applied himself industriously to his work and what
ever business was on hand, and as mechanic and business man in his
line he has gained a wide-spread reputation.  Among his fellow
citizens he is popular, as was shown in November, 1902, when he was
elected city alderman on the Democratic ticket by the largest
majority ever given a candidate for a like office in the city of
Paducah.  Fraternally he is a Master Mason, and is a member of the
Independent Order of Odd Fellows and several fraternal insurance
orders.
     When twenty-one years of age Mr. Taylor married Miss Laura St. John,
who was born in Smithland, Kentucky, October 7, 1857, and is
but a day younger than he.  Their paternal homes were adjoining. 
With the exception of eight years spent with her parents in
Evansville, Indiana, when a girl, Mrs. Taylor has lived in Kentucky
all her life.  She has borne her husband seven children as follows:
Iva, William, Allice [sic], Young, Myrtle, Henry and Annie.

Taylor Dilwood St._John
=
Livingston-KY IL IN

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