Kentucky:  A History of the State, Battle, Perrin, & Kniffin, 3rd ed., 
1886. Warren County.

WILLIAM H. COOKE ranks among the wealthy and most prominent citizens of 
Warren County.  He was born August 20, 1849, in the south part of 
Edmonson County, on the Louisville & Nashville Pike, and is the youngest 
of three sons born to Israel A. and Nancy (White) Cooke.  The latter was 
an adopted daughter of John White.  Israel A. Cooke was born in 
Louisiana, about 1816, and lost his parents when he was but four years 
of age, after which he was brought to Warren County, Ky., by an uncle, 
Peyton Cooke, who was a large land and slave owner.  He died March, 
1852, and his wife two days later.  Both were of English descent, and 
their parents came from Virginia.  John White (Mrs. Nancy Cooke's father) 
came from where the battle of Manassas was fought, in Virginia, and 
settled near Smith's Grove, they had one negro man, one gray mare and 25 
cents in money.  He was an excellent manager and succeeded in 
accumulating a fortune of upward of 10,000 acres of land and about 100 
negroes.  He set free about thirty negroes and willed them about 2,000 
acres of land in Warren, Edmonson and Barren Counties.  He was an ardent 
member of the Baptist Church, and built a church edifice with his own 
means.  When about seventy-five years of age, he married his second 
wife, Mary A. Wallace, a young lady of about twenty.  He had adopted 
twins, Elizabeth and Nancy, both of whom the father of our subject 
married.  William H. Cooke was reared on a farm, and received a liberal 
education at Bethel College.  At the age of eighteen he commenced 
farming on his own account, and at twenty-three years of age engaged in 
the mercantile business at Smith's Grove.  In 1881 he went to 
Louisville, and engaged in the wholesale grocery trade, in which he was 
very successful.  In the spring of 1885 he returned to Smith's Grove, 
where he at once commenced to erect a fine residence, in a beautiful 
grove, which is one of the finest residences in the county.  Mr. Cooke 
is the owner of 1,000 acres of fine land near Smith's Grove; he also 
owns 1,000 acres in Kansas, and eighty acres of fine orange land in 
Florida.  His land near Smith's Grove is in a high state of cultivation.  
October 18, 1870, he married Estelle L. Riger, a daughter of James L. 
and Anna M. (Violet) Riger, who were born, respectively, in Bardstown 
and Logan County, Ky. Mr. Riger was a prominent and leading merchant of 
Russellville, Ky.  He was a son of Mathias Riger and Catherine 
(Limbaugh) Riger, natives of Maryland and of German descent.  He was a 
blacksmith by trade, and an early settler of Kentucky.  Mr. and Mrs. 
Cooke have had born to them three children, two now living:  Myrtle and 
Mattie L.  Mr. Cooke is a member of the Baptist Church and his wife of 
the Methodist Episcopal.  He is vice-president of the State Sabbath 
School Union, and a member of the Commandery of the F. & A. M.  He cast 
his first presidential vote for Horace Greeley.

Cooke White Wallace Riger Limbaugh Greeley
=
Edmonson-KY LA VA Barren-KY Louisville-Jefferson-KY KS FL Bardstown-
Nelson-KY Russellville-Logan-KY MD

http://www.rootsweb.com/~kygenweb/kybiog/warren/cooke.wh.txt