WILLIAM
C. BELL, retired merchant, was born in Washington County, Penn.,
January 20, 1812, and there grew to manhood. On the 4th of November,
1840, he was married in Pittsburgh to Susan Evans, a native of
Worcestershire, England, born October 12, 1812. They came to
Greenville, Penn., in November, 1840, where William C. spent a year and
a half in mercantile business, thence removed to Clarksville, and in
August, 1844, located in Sharon. He carried on the mercantile business
till 1860, and in 1866 went into the coal business, from which he
retired in 1870, after several years successful operations. He was
afterward interested with his sons, Richard E. and Robert A., for a few
years in the hardware business. To William C. and Susan Bell have been
born eight children: W. Dwight, assistant cashier of the People’s
National Bank, Pittsburgh; Richard E., deceased; Alice A., Emma I.,
William B., of Leadville, Colo.; Robert A., of Youngstown, Ohio; Mary
B., wife of F. T. Aschman, of Sharon, and Henderson D., of Sharon.
Politically Mr. Bell was an anti- slavery man, then a Republican, and
is now a Prohibitionist, and has served as burgess of Sharon one term.
Both he and wife are members of the Presbyterian Church. Mr. Bell is
one of the oldest surviving retired business men of Sharon, and has
seen the town grow from a village of a few stores to its present
flourishing prosperity.
History of Mercer County, 1888, page 707
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