JUDGE WM. O'HAIR

Died Monday night, September 3rd, 1906, at the residence of J. H. H. Berry, in Lampasas, Judge Wm. O'Hair, one of the most prominent citizens of this section.

The deceased was born January 1821, in Floyd County, Kentucky. Thus you see he passed, by fifteen long weary winters, the biblical limit of three-score years and ten.

In the year 1822, his father moved to Edgar County, Illinois, where the subject of this sketch was raised. When seventeen or eighteen years of age he began to teach school, in Edgar County, Illinois, afterward in Moltre and other counties.

In 1840, when the Republic of Texas was attracting so much attention throughout the world, young O'Hair, at the age of nineteen, bade farewell to the broad prairies of Illinois, and came South to Texas, as at this time "Southward the course of Empire made its way."

Locating in Smith County, he began teaching again. In 1841 or 1842, he married Miss Annie Carson, daughter of a Mr. Larkin, at that time a prominent man of East Texas. From this union, four children were born&emdash;three girls and one boy, all of whom have long since crossed over to that other shore.

His former wife having died many years prior, in 1850 he was united in marriage to Miss Anos Wolf, daughter of Joseph and Anteline Wolf, who survives him, as does his only sister, Aunt Clarissa Wolf. He leaves seven children, whose names are as follows: Mrs. John Hutto, Mrs. J. H. H. Berry, Mrs. Nicks, and Messrs. Rolla, Joe, H. J. and Tom O'Hair.

December 22nd, 1855, deceased moved to Burnet County, locating near Dobyville. Moved to Naruna some eight years ago, where he lived up to the time of his death.

Wm. O'Hair held official position in this county more than twenty-one years, having held the offices of Judge, Treasurer and Assessor. 

He retired from public life on account of his hearing. Thus ends the active career of a remarkable man, remarkable in this, that during that long eventful life he was never known to do anything unbecoming a true gentleman.

Though reared in the state of Lincoln's nativity, he believed in secession as an inalienable right of the state. Though never an active participant in that great memorable struggle which set the Africans free, he fought the battles of every day life with a courage, unsurpassed by those who fell in battle's stern array and verified the truth of the statement that "He that ruleth his own spirit, is greater than he that taketh a city."

He stood high in the Masonic fraternity, with whose ritual he was buried. An active member of the Christian Church always living that each day might find him farther on the way.

An obedient and dutiful son, a kind and loving husband, and a devoted and self sacrificing father, withal: "His life was gentle, and the elements so mixed in him that nature might stand up and say to all the world, 'This was a man.'" A strict adherent of truth is gone! Sleep father, sleep; God's eternal years are yours.

"Rest on, embalmed and sainted dead,
Dear as the blood ye gave;
No impious footstep here shall tread
The herbage of your grave.
Nor shall your glory be forgot
While fame her record keeps,
And honor points the hallowed spot
Where Valor proudly sleeps
Nor wreck, nor change, nor winter's blight,
Nor Time's [unreadable word] doom,
Shall dim one ray of Glory's light
That gilds your deathless tomb."

Mark
Naruna, Sept 16, 1906