"An Illustrated History of Skagit and Snohomish Counties."  Interstate
Publishing Company, 1906. p. 708.
 
WILLIAM WOODS

     is a well-educated and well-read farmer who has resided in Skagit
county for twenty-six years and has a good stock farm adjoining Sedro-Woolley on
the east. He was born January 17, 1835, in County Tyrone, Ireland. His father,
William Woods, born in 1810, spent his life in Ireland, engaged in farming until
his death in 1843. Ellen (McLaughlin) Woods, the mother, also of Irish nativity,
was born in 1812 and died in Syracuse, New York, in November, 1891. 		
	William Woods, though only a boy of eight when his father died, bravely
shouldered the responsibilities of life and relieved his mother of much of the
care of the farm, remaining at home until nineteen, when he found he could be
spared. He then went to England and obtained a position as furnace man in
a chemical manufacturing establishment, where his work was so satisfactory that
his employers were glad to keep him four years, at the end of which time he
determined to return to America. After a visit of a month with his mother at her
home he crossed to Quebec, in which province he was employed for a year on a
farm and for another year in a mill. He then went to Syracuse, New York, and
worked twelve years there for a salt company.  In 1875 he removed to California.
He stayed in Colfax for the winter, then went to San Francisco,and thereafter he
was engaged in operating a hoisting works in Knoxville for nine months, and
spent a year in the mines of Southern California. He had heard much of the Puget
sound country and having finally determined to investigate it for himself, came
here in 1878. After working for a time in the logging camps of Hood's canal he
moved to Sedro-Woolley in the fall of that year and took 147 acres of land under
the pre-emption act. His present home is a part of this claim. During the boom
he sold ten acres of this land for $8,000, receiving one-half of the purchase
price at the time of the sale. When the financial crash came he bought back the
property on a tax sale. Later he divided the land with the man who had purchased
it and presented him with the mortgage he held on it. This transaction is
characteristic of the straightforward dealings which have established Ins
reputation. Neighbors were few in the first year of his residence in the valley,
Joseph Hart, David Batey and William A. Dunlop being the only men living within
seven miles. Mrs. Van Fleet, who came two years later, was the first white woman
on that part of the river. Mr. Woods is an independent Democrat and has been
several times the recipient of honors at the hands of his party, having been the
second mayor of Sedro-Woolley, a member of the city council and more than once
Democratic central committeeman. He is an adherent of the Catholic faith.
Prosperity has attended his efforts until to-day he is one of the well-to-do
residents of the county. He owns 100 acres, seven of which are cleared and under
cultivation, also some good town property. He raises beef cattle on the home
place.


     
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Submitted to the Washington Biographies Project in March 2007 by Diana Smith.
Submitter has no additional information about the person(s) or family mentioned
above.