Representative Micajah T. Williams View All Years
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Micajah T. Williams
Mahaska County
Born in Butler county, in the old Buckeye State, May 29, 1820. During his early boyhood his father removed to Indiana and settled near Terre Haute. Here young Williams enjoyed the benefits of a common school education until he was sixteen years of age, when he attended Wabash college, at Crawfordsville, during two years. After leaving school he engaged in engineering in Hoosierdom, in employ of the State of Indiana, for a few months, when the internal improvement work on which he was engaged was suspended. While yet eighteen years of age, young Williams returned to Ohio and studied law in Cincinnati with Judge O. M. Spencer, and afterward graduated at the Ohio law school. He was admitted to the bar April, 1842. Believing that the best place for a young man was on the frontier, on the second day of the following month Mr. Williams started for Iowa, coming across Illinois in a wagon. Arriving at Mt. Pleasant, he formed a partnership with G. W. Teas, a somewhat noted character in that day, a partnership which lasted about one year. He first came to Mahaska county in December, 1848, and shortly afterward went to Iowa City, where he spent the winter, and in the following spring, as has been elsewhere related, he became organizing clerk of the county, with Win. Edmundson as first sheriff. He continued to fill the office of clerk of court until 1854, when at the August election of that year, he refused to become a further candidate. During the latter part of this service he was also clerk under John A. L Crookham, county judge, and in accordance with the law, in the absence of the latter, was acting county judge. At this time, and in this way, he acquired the title of Judge Williams, by which he was known. In the fall of 1854, Mr. Williams was elected to the state legislature, where he represented his county during the succeeding term. September 1st, of this same year he engaged in the practice of law in Oskaloosa, with Wm. T. Smith as partner. On March 1, 1855, these gentlemen opened the first banking house in Mahaska county, and continued to do a general banking and land business. Judge Williams was elected to a second term of the Legislature in 1861. He served with great credit six years as trustee of the Iowa Asylum for the Insane, at Mount Pleasant from 1868 to 1874. He was locating commissioner in 1846, of the county seat of Polk county. In 1850 he became a member of the Masonic fraternity and is now a prominent Sir Knight in that order in Oskaloosa. During quite a number of years he was a member of the vestry of St. James Episcopal church. In September of that year he married Miss Virginia Rebecca Seevers.
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