The Klickitat County News, Goldendale, WA., May 14, 1934, page 8
TROUT LAKE "OLD TIMER"
William Coate, Long Time Resident of County, Active In Civic Affairs
One of the best known residents of the Trout Lake valley
is Hon. William Coate. He resides about three miles east of the Trout Lake
postoffice on one of the best known farms in the valley.
Mr. Coate was born in Miami county, Ohio, December 29,
1860, being the son of James and Mary J. Learson Coate. The family of
Scotch-English descent and of Quaker origin.
Mr. Coate grew to manhood in his native state, there
receiving a common school and business education. His father owned a large
mercantile establishment in Pleasant Hill, Ohio, and William was employed
as a clerk in the store until he reached his twenty-fifth year. He moved
from there to Troy in the same state where he was employed for two years
in the same avocation.
Mr. Coate has been a resident of Klickitat County for
forty-seven years, having settled in the Trout Lake valley in the year 1887,
his father-in-law, Harvey J. Byrkett, having preceded him a year before.
The year after his arrival Mr. Coate filed on a homestead.
Mr. Coate has seen the Trout Lake valley grow from a
virgin forest of timber and brush to one of the most beautiful valleys in
the northwest, all sections of which are under irrigation, the water coming
from the White Salmon river and Trout creek.
In the year 1893, Mr. Coate, his brother Frank and
brother-in-law, Rufus Byrkett, put in the first irrigation ditch in the valley.
His irrigated land averages 6 tons of hay to the acre and his home and barn
are lighted with electricity. His dairy herd of cows are deprived of their
milk by the same invisible power.
William Coate and Nancy A. Byrkett were married in Miami
county, Ohio, in the year 1885, two years before their departure for Washington
territory.
Mr. Coate served Klickitat county as a representative
for two years. He also served his home people as school director and clerk
and justice of the peace. He was the first Worshipful Master of the Trout
Lake Masonic lodge and is widely known among men and Masons for his excellent
rendition of the third degree lecture which he has publicly delivered some
fifty times.
The Klickitat County Agriculturist, Goldendale, WA., November 1, 1902, page 2
HON. WILLIAM COATE
Hon. William Coate, a Republican nominee for the legislature
from the twenty-first representative district, Klickitat county, is a resident
of Trout Lake. He was born December 26, 1860, on a farm near Pleasant Hill,
Miami county, O., and when he was 9 years old his parents moved to Pleasant
Hill, where he attended school and graduated with the first honors of his
class from the high school. He worked with his father, who was a dealer in
general merchandise, and left Miami county in the spring of 1887, coming
to Klickitat county, Washington, where he has resided the past fifteen years.
Mr. Coate's occupation has been dairy farming and stock raising. He has been
a lifelong republican. In 1898 he was elected commissioner from the First
commissioner district of Klickitat county for four years. In 1900 he was
elected chairman of the board of commissioners. In 1902 the republicans of
Klickitat county honored him with the unanimous nomination for representative.
He will easily be elected.
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© Jeffrey L. Elmer