Welcome to the biography of William L. Naylor!

William L. Naylor

The oldest son of James P. Naylor and Sarah Naylor, William L., was born near Dayton, Ohio, in 1821 and came to Eugene in 1828 with his father, mother and brother Wilson Naylor.  His mother dies shortly after coming here and his father was married to Hester  Rebecca Givens about 1831 and four daughters were born, half sisters to William L. and Wilson.

William L. and a partner Gabriel Van Sant in 1846 bought a store on Lots 25 and 26, in Eugene and this was the beginning of a successful business career.  Two years later Gabriel Van Sant had evidently died as William L. bought VanSant's interest from his heirs.  He probably felt confident then of being able to make a living as he married Martha J. Iles, a sister of James H. and Jacob B. Iles.

In the photograph looking north on Main Street in Eugene in 1890, the two story building on the left was the William L. Naylor store.   It is not known when it was built but when it burned in October of 1892, the Cayuga Herald said it was reported to have been built in 1829.

The story of this business has already been told in the chapter 'Eugene Merchants' but will be repeated here as a part of the Naylor story.

The store was a very large one with a large warehouse at the west end of the lot.  The second floor was used as a hall for meetings and entertainment's and was known as Naylor Hall.

William L. was postmaster in 1860 and 1861 and the post office was in the store.

In 1860 William C. Towle came to Eugene from Maine and was employed by Naylor as clerk.  A year later Towle married Naylor's half sister Eliza Jane.  Naylor took in Towle as a partner a few years later and at Naylor's death in 1875, Towle took over the management of the store.

This store was the training school for some young clerks who later were in business for themselves.  H. O. Peters began there in 1870 and six years later married Mrs. Naylor's niece Nora Iles.  Henry Hosford worked in the store in 1877.  Henry Sturm also came into the store after Naylor's death while Towle was running it and Sturm succeeded Towle when the Towle family moved to Chicago (Evanston) in 1889.  It was during Sturms operation of the store in 1892 that it burned as a result of a safe blowing attempt.

William L. and Martha J. had no children.   However in the 1860 census, Albert Hewitt age 17 and Eliza Hewitt age 13, are shown living with them.  Albert went to St. Louis later and died there after just getting well started in business.  Eliza Hewitt became William L. and Martha's foster daughter and, when after William L.'s death she married Dave Duncan a new comer to Eugene, Martha set Duncan up in the store business, too.

Something during the 1860's William L. and Martha built the house on Lot 27, just south of their store.  After William's death in 1875, she became dissatisfied living there and about 188 built the large brick house on Lot 86 now owned by Floyd Bandy.  The old home was rented for a few years then in 1889, her brother James B. moved in from the farm and at her death in 1905 she willed it to him and he spent the rest of his life there.

William L. and Martha became quite wealthy, Martha having had a large inheritance from her father Jacob Iles, Sr. and the two of them acquired a large part amount of property.  In William L.'s will he left his wife several hundred acres of farm land and some town property.  He left land to his cousin Lewis T. Naylor, a son of his father's brother, Benjamin; left the store to his half sister Eliza Towle; land in Missouri and Iowa to his brother Wilson living in Terre Haute; cash bequests to James . Naylor, Wilson's son in Colorado; to his half sister Sallie Ann Schlossman in Chicago' to his half sister Rebecca Jones of Perrysville; to Wm. L. Naylor a son of his cousin John and to cousin Wilson G. Bratton of Texas.

Martha was a good business woman and managed to hang onto some of her property despite the financial misfortunes of her brother James B. Iles and nephew-in-law, H. O. Peters.