Souvenir Edition, The Williamstown Courier, Williamstown, Ky, May 30, 1901, reprinted September 19, 1981 by the Grant County KY Historical Society. HON. W. A. BYRON, who, on May 4th last, received the endorsement of the Bracken County Democracy as their candidate for State Senator from this district. He was born in Mason county, Ky., on March 23d, 1860, but his parents moved to Bracken while he was still a child, since which time he has been a resident of that county. His father was a farmer, in humble but comfortable circumstances, possessing a good common-school education, with an unusual taste for literature, and owned a small but well selected library. From him the subject of this sketch inherited a love for letters, and early in life determined to fit himself for one of the learned professions. This ambition made him a hard student while attending the country school near his home, and nerved him to heroic efforts in its attainment. Being but one of a large family, many of whom were girls, his father's income from a small farm did not permit of his receiving a collegiate education without effort upon his own part; and when he left the country district school his father had done all for him his means would allow, and he was thrown upon his own resources for further advancement. Undaunted by adversity, unfaltering in his high purpose, he labored on the farm early and late until he had accumulated a fund sufficient to pay the expense of a year's study, when he matriculated in the Augusta College, the oldest educational west of the Alleghenies, where he won the approbation of the faculty by his close application to his studies, his sobriety and gentlemanly behavior, and his courteous urbanity, qualities that have made him eminent in the field of politics. With his youthful ideal ever before him, a real entity instead of an ignis fatuous, in 1884, he entered the law office of Colonel R. K. Smith, in Brooksville, as a student of the law, and pursued his legal studies under the eminent lawyer for the ensuing two years, teaching a district school to obtain a livelihood while fitting himself for the practice of his chosen profession. At the end of the two years he had finished the usual curriculum of office study, but not satisfied with simple requirements, he determined to attain the best, and to that end entered the Law College of the University of Cincinnati, where he graduated with honor. After that he formed a law partnership with Judge J. R. Minor, which lasted for two years, after which he opened an office in Brooksville in his own name alone, and rapidly built up a large and lucrative practice, which he still holds. Naturally possessed of the faculty of oratory, his studies and literary tastes made him a fluent, logical and forceful speaker, and these qualifications having made themselves apparent to the people early in his public career, he was forced to enter the political arena as the champion of "the great common people" of his county. He was chairman of the county delegation to the Gubernatorial Convention which met in Louisville in 1899, and nominated the Hon. Wm. Goebel; and in 1896 stumped the state for Bryan during the whole of the fiercely fought campaign of that year. In 1897 he was elected County Attorney, and has ever since ably filled that office. For the past four years he has efficiently served as chairman of the Bracken County Democratic Committee. He was a delegate to the State Convention, held in Louisville in 1899, and in one of the best speeches made in that convention placed Hon. Hon. S. W. Hager in nomination for State Treasurer. He was also a delegate to the Congressional Convention of his district in 1900, and made the nominating speech for Hon. J. N. Kehoe, the present Congressman for the Ninth Kentucky District. That his talents and services are highly appreciated by the people of his county is evidenced by their action in the primary election, held in Bracken county on Saturday, May 4th last, wherein he sought their endorsement of the candidacy for State Senator. He was opposed by Hon. H. T. Armstrong, of Augusta, who represented the county in the last General Assembly, one of the shrewdest politicians in the county, and who had hitherto been deemed invincible. The fight was fierce and stubborn, but Bryon won by almost two hundred majority, notwithstanding the fact that he was hampered in his canvass by his official and professional duties in the courts. His people proudly present him to the voters of the Twenty-sixth Senatorial District as their choice for the Democratic nomination, and confidently ask of them an endorsement of that choice. Byron Smith Minor Hager Armstrong Kehoe Goebel Bryan = Mason-KY Bracken-KY http://www.rootsweb.com/~kygenweb/kybiog/grant/byron.wa.txt