One of the striking characteristics of American life especially in the newer country of the West is the bountiful and fruitful field of opportunity it furnishes for youthful enterprise nerve and capacity. In the Old World and in the older parts of our own land youth is beautiful with its aspirations hopes and undeveloped powers but it I barred in the main from the domain of responsible activity and control in leading lines of business. But in the great Northwest every man is estimated by the capacity and willingness to labor, which he exhibits and every door is open to his efforts. The country itself is young and has done wonders and the question of age is eliminated from all calculations and measurers of value. It is in such a land therefore that the qualifications for the successful management of great commercial agencies and industrial forces such as are possessed by men of the type of Frank M. Williams of Cody fine their proper field and market. Me. Williams is veritably a Centennial child of the Republic having been born on July 4, 1876 in Buena Vista County, Iowa. His parents Marion and Minnie (Tinkcom) Williams were respectively born and reared in Iowa and New York and when their son Frank was seven years old they removed from their Iowa home to Montana where the father was in charge of the engine that drove the first sawmill operated on Rock Creek. In 1887 they came to Wyoming locating on the South Fork of the Shoshone River in Bighorn County where the father took up a homestead and a desert claim and engaged in farming and stock raising. He has now a beautiful and valuable ranch of 4,000 acres, which he conducts with vigor and success and the mother is the receiver of the U. S. land office at Lander. Their family consists of two sons, Frank M. and Clarence A. Almost from the time he was ten years old Frank has lived in this county. Here he was educated in the public schools going outside only for his commercial training, which he secured at the Omaha Business College from which he was graduated in 1898. After completing his commercial course he at once entered upon his life work by taking a place as bookkeeper in the First National Bank of Lander. After three years of experience in this position in which he mastered all the details of the business he came to Cody and established the banking institution in that place and of which he is the active head. He bought the lot and built the banking house furnished the building throughout and thus fixed the enterprise on a firm and secure bias opening it for business in September 1901. The business has prospered from the beginning and expended rapidly for it need has been long felt and its benefits has been more then realized in the community. The capital stock is $10,000 paid up with plenty more available when the business requires it. The institution is conducted with great skill and breadth of view and is one of the most reliable and useful enterprises of the town having passed in its short life already from the domain of a convenience to that of being a recognized necessity. Mr. Williams also owns a ranch of 320 acres homestead and desert claims on which he has proven up and he conducts the business, which belongs to it with the same spirit and energy that he displays in his bank. His early life was passed in herding and caring for stock riding the range and doing everything else that belongs to such employment. He is one of the most graceful fearless and accomplished riders of Wyoming having an excellent record for breaking in young and unruly horses which he made on the ranch of Colonel Torrey and other places. He takes an active interest in the affairs of the Modern Woodmen of America to which he belongs holding membership in Cedar Camp at Cody and serving at this writing (1902) as the venerable consul of the camp. He is young popular and successful showing superior ability in several lines of commercial enterprise and holding a high place in the best social circles. The future would seem to have in store for him great business success the most exalted social standing and prominence and renown in public life all proper rewards for his excellent character mercantile enterprise and business capacity.
