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WILLIAM L. CHAPMAN
Vol. 5, p. 1860

As part of the political machinery methods necessary to the
establishment of state government in Oklahoma and as an official of
that government after it was established in 1907, William L. Chapman,
the well known lawyer of Shawnee, has contributed much to the welfare
of the state. Equipped with a literary and commercial education he
has successfully filled the positions of editor and banker, and a
legal training has enable him to make a success in the law

For six years prior to and subsequent to statehood he was secretary
of the Territorial and State Democratic Central committees, serving
in that capacity during the campaigns for the election of delegates
to the Constitutional Convention, the adoption of the constitution
and the election of the first state officials. After statehood he was
the first secretary of the Corporation Commission and in that
position laid the foundation for a systematic and methodical keeping
of the records of that department of state government.

Born in Wingo, Kentucky, October 12, 1867, a son of Thomas and
Nannie (HATCHELL) Chapman, William L. Chapman having completed the
public school course in his native state entered Marvin College at
Clinton, Kentucky, from which he was graduated in 1888 with the
degree Bachelor of Arts. He holds the degree Ph. D. from Cumberland
University at Lebanon, Tennessee, awarded him in 1895. While in
Marvin College he swept floors and worked in a chair factory at odd
times to pay expenses, and during part of the time helped out his
sister who was in the same college. On leaving school he was for ten
years a successful teacher in Kentucky, Texas, Arkansas and Oklahoma,
was at one time superintendent of city schools at Stephenville,
Texas, and at another time president of Willie Halsell College at
Vinita, Oklahoma. He is a graduate of Hills Business College at Waco,
Texas, having completed the course there as preparation for a
clerical position that was waiting him in Oklahoma.

On leaving college work at Vinita Mr. Chapman entered the First
National Bank of that city as a clerk and afterwards became assistant
cashier. Later he moved to Shawnee, was in the banking business and
for four years was editor of the Shawnee Herald. For sixteen years he
was a member of the Democratic Territorial and State Central
committees and was secretary of that committee during two national
campaigns. In these campaigns he was in charge of special trains that
toured the state with W. J. BRYAN as the speaker. Only a brief
summary can be made of his varied public service. At Vinita he was a
member of the board of education that established one of the first
public schools in Indian Territory. He was city clerk of Norman,
Oklahoma, and city treasurer of Shawnee. He resided at Norman when
the University of Oklahoma was founded and there became associated
with F. S. E. AMOS, now of Vinita, who was then a member of the
faculty of the university and is an advisory editor of the faculty of
the university and is an advisory editor of the Standard History of
Oklahoma. Mr. Amos accompanied Mr. Chapman to Vinita and became a
teacher with him in the Willie Halsell College.

At Columbus, Kentucky, June 5, 1895, Mr. Chapman married Miss Maud
TAYLOR. Mrs. Chapman is a woman of thorough culture as well as a most
capable home maker. She graduated with high honors from Marvin
College in Kentucky and a year after graduation was given a chair in
the faculty of instruction at that institution. To their marriage
there are three living children: Merle, aged sixteen, in high school;
Marie aged thirteen, also in high school; and Vernon, aged ten. Mr.
Chapman has one sister, two half-sisters and a half-brother: Mrs. Ada
MOORE, wife of a farmer at Clinton, Kentucky; Mrs. Charles CRAWL,
wife of a lumber dealer at Eufaula, Oklahoma. Mrs. Ola PAINTER, whose
husband is an oil supply man at Wichita Falls, Texas; and H. M.
MYERS, who for seven years has been in the auditing department at
Muskogee of the Missouri, Oklahoma & Gulf railway Company. Mr.
Chapman is a member of the Masonic and the Knights of Pythias lodges,
and of the Methodist Church.

Typed for OKGenWeb by Lee Ann Collins, April 8, 2000.

SOURCE: Thoburn, Joseph B., A Standard History of Oklahoma, An
Authentic Narrative of its Development, 5 v. (Chicago, New York: The
American Historical Society, 1916).