City: Maryville
PARHAM, William Edmund, manufacturer; born Knoxville, Tenn., March 9, 1860; son of William Thomas and Mary Jane Susan (SNODDY) PARHAM; paternal grandfather Edwin Nelson PARHAM, paternal grandmother Mary Ellen (DUNN) PARHAM, maternal grandfather Rev. Robert Henderson SNODDY, maternal grandmother Nancy Hawkins (MOORE) SNODDY; English, Scotch-Irish descent; educated Maryville public, private schools and Maryville College; father’s occupation, woolen manufacturer; married Ida Constance BAKER Feb. 8, 1881; member K. of P., Knoxville No. 234, Jr. O. U. A. M. McKinley Council No. 53; elected Justice of Peace in 1900; re-elected 1906; served two years as school director; elected Senator of 4th District Tenn. In Nov. 1908; voted to put intoxicating liquors out of Tenn.; was salesman in father’s general merchandise store until 1877; bookkeeper for woolen mill 1877 to 1884; peddler of woolen mill products 1879 to 1885; worked in every department of woolen mill since; planned and superintended erection present plant; connected with Maryville woolen mills 1879-1901; with Riverside woolen mills, Knoxville, Tenn., since 1901, in which his father and four brothers are also interested; elected chairman of Blount County Court January 1911, while State Senator, 1909-1910, passed an enabling act for Blount county to build 82 miles of pike road; county issued $300,000.00 for doing this work and sold the bonds at a premium of $6,010.00; has been a resident of Maryville, Tennessee, since December 23, 1865; by his efforts the court granted longer terms for schools, higher salaries for teachers, superintendent of public instruction put upon a higher salary and devotes all of his time; through his efforts a ten-acre park was purchased and one of the finest court houses in East Tennessee built on the same with its own water works for county buildings supplied by its own water power; member M. E. Church.
