William Henry Bentley passed away at the family home, Woodlawn, Pulaski, Saturday evening, June 25, 1921, aged 88 years. After the sun went down and a beautiful day closed, ended a long and useful life. He was born in the town of Sandy Creek, Oswego county, N.Y., on the 14th day of June, 1833 the son of Elias Bentley and Sarah Seymour Bentley.
His parents had some years previously, moved from Saratoga county to make their new home on a farm in Oswego county. The deceased was one of nine children. He received his education in the district school, near his home, and later at Belleville Academy. At the age of seventeen he commenced teaching school and in a few years became principal of the Academy at Waterford, N.Y. From there he went to Albany Law School, from which institition he received the degree of LL.B and was admitted to practice law in New York state.
The death of his father just as he completed his law course, necessitated a change in his plans. It became necessary for him to enter business in order to support himself and a sister in the support and care of a widowed mother and a large family of younger brothers and sisters. He moved his father's family from the Sandy Creek farm to Pulaski, where he entered into a business partnership with the late Bronson Meacham. A few year later be became associated with the firm of Bentley, Hollis & Co., of which the late Col. H.H. Lyman was a member. In the late sixties, Mr. Bentley went to New York where he engaged in the wholesale grocery business with the firm of Bentley Brothers & Co. About 1875 this firm was dissolved and Mr. Bentley returned to Pulaski and entered business in his home town in association with his brother-in-law the late C.C. Woods. Their business was burned out in the big fire of 1881, and soon after Mr. Bentley became deputy sheriff and jailer at Pulaski.
From 1889 to 1895 he resided at Toronto, where with his brother-in-law, the late C.C. Woods he conducted the American Fair in that city. In 1895 he retired from the merchantile business and upon the death of his father-in-law, the late Gilbert A. Woods he took charge of and has since conducted the farms known as Woodlawn and Woods Lake Farm.
From early youth the deceased had been a devout member of the Pulaski Congregational church. In 1865 Mr. Bentley was married to Carrie Estelle Woods. He is survived by one son, Attorney Norman S. Bentley, of Oswego, and three daughters, Carrie W. Bentley and Mary F. Bentley of this village and Helen E. Bentley, a teacher in the Lincoln High School at Jersey City, N.J., and one sister, Mrs. Malcolm L. Hollis, of this village.
The funeral will be held at Woodlawn on Wednesday afternoon, June 29th at two o'clock, (standard time).
Interment will be in the Pulaski cemetery
