W'illiam Yates lived upon and cultivated his own farm of four or five hundred acres. For nearly fifty years he was an honored deacon of Mt. Pisgah Church. Prudent, enterprising, and industrious, he was looked up to by his neighbors as one of the best farmers in that section. 11 his home was neither poverty nor riches. His was a life of labor, but it was also a life of independence. For, during the earlier years of the century, almost every thing worn or consumed by the farmer's family was produced at home.