WILLIAM L. CASON, a hardware merchant and representative business man of Haskell, Texas, dates his birth in Polk county, Georgia, June 24, 1856, and is a son of Elihu and Elizabeth (Rogers) Cason. His mother, a native of Georgia, died at the age of thirty-two years, when he was two and a half years old. She had three children, two sons and a daughter, all living at this writing. Mr. Cason’s brother, Mercer Cason, resides in Alabama near the Georgia state line, and his sister, Lizzie, is the wife of Jack Wheeler and lives in Pike county, Alabama. The Casons are of English and Scotch descent. Three brothers of this name came from England to America, one going to South Carolina another to Missouri and the third probably to Missouri, though his location is not known. One brother died in Missouri and some of his descendants came from that state to Texas and became residents here. The South Carolina brother was named Benjamin. He was the grandfather of the subject of this sketch. After some years spent in South Carolina he moved to Polk county, Georgia, where he passed the rest of his life and died. He was twice married. By his first wife he had four sons and one daughter, one son dying when young, the others reaching adult years. By the second marriage there was a son and two daughters, of whom all lived to be grown. Elihu Cason, the son by the second marriage, was born in Polk county, Georgia, in 1830. He became a merchant, having a dry goods and grocery store in a little town called Esam Hill, in Georgia, about a mile from the Alabama state line. When the Civil war came on he entered the Confederate service as a cavalryman and served in the ranks four years, participating in much hard fighting, but escaping without wounds. As a result of the war most of his property was destroyed. When he left home he had a hundred bales of cotton store and on his return he found the cotton and many other things stolen. Then he moved down to Griffin, Georgia, where he was engaged in the grocery business five years, and the next two years he was on a farm near Rome, Georgia. He came to Texas in 1872, settling on a farm in Collin county, where he remained until two years before his death, when he came to Dallas. He died in Dallas April 10, 1895. He was first married in Polk county, Georgia, to Elizabeth Rogers, and some time after her death he wedded in Cedartown, that county, Miss Olivia Weatherly, who was of German birth, and who bore him ten children, six sons and four daughters, of which number all except two grew to maturity.
William Lon Cason, after the removal of the family to Texas, worked on his father’s farm until he attained his majority. Then he hired out as a farm hand, at the rate of twenty dollars per month, and worked for one man two years. The next two years he cultivated land on the shares, afterward renting a place. He was married November 17, 1882, in Collin county, Texas, to Miss Lantie Parker. After living on the rented land two years he bought a farm, two miles north of Farmersville, which he sold at the end of three years and bought a hotel in Farmersville. He sold the hotel after conducting it two years longer, owning and renting property there, and being engaged in the grocery business in partnership with W. D. Chapman. He came to Haskell county in 1889. Here he bought a half section of land, located seven miles northwest of Haskell, three hundred acres of which he placed under cultivation, and for seven years made his home on this farm. From farming he drifted into the cattle business, dealing in cattle three years. He sold his farm and cattle about the same time, and in January, 1901, engaged in the hardware and implement business in Haskell, in partnership with B. F. McCullum, under the firm name of McCollum & Cason. In January, 1904, Mr. McCullum sold his interest to his brother, Levi McCullum, the firm style remaining the same. In the spring of 1905 Mr. Levi McCullum sold to Messrs. B. Cox, Thomas Russell and J. F. Jones and the firm name was changed to its present form, Cason, Cox & Company. An energetic man with sound business methods and good judgment, Mr. Cason has made a success of whatever he has undertaken, and he is recognized as one of the leading men of his town. For twenty-five years Mr. Cason has been a member of the Baptist church.
Source: B. B. Paddock, History and Biographical Record of North and West Texas (Chicago: Lewis Publishing Co., 1906), Vol. II, pp. 492-493.