For twenty-one years W. M. Tate has been engaged in farming in Nowata county, residing all of this time on his present farm of one hundred and forty acres, four and one-half miles southeast of Nowata.
He was born in western Kansas on the 4th of December, 1873, a son of P. A. and Margaret (Barnes) Tate, the former a native of Kentucky and the latter of Indiana. They moved from Iowa to Kansas one year before W. M. was born and located in Lincoln county, where they lived two years. At the termination of that time they went to Osborne county and the father took up a homestead and timber claim there, acquiring three hundred and twenty acres in all. For eight years they resided on that farm and then sold out, removing to Nemaha county, where they rented farm land until 1894. In that year they came to Indian Territory and located on the Verdigris river, three and one-half miles east of Watova. Leasing land from the Indians, they cleared it and brought it to a highly cultivated state during the eight years of their residence thereon. After two years on a farm in Chautauqua county, Kansas, Mr. and Mrs. Tate returned to Indian Territory and for two years resided on a farm three and one-half miles east of Bartlesville in Washington county. Subsequently they removed to the farm on which W. M. now resides, and the father engaged in farming here until his demise on the 1st of February, 1918, at the advanced age of eighty-one years. Mrs. Tate is still living, being now in her seventy-fourth year, and she makes her home with her son, Jesse Roy Tate, in Marshall County, Kansas.
W. M. Tate received a limited education and at an early age put his textbooks aside and engaged in farming. For twenty-one years he has resided on his present place of one hundred and forty acres, four and one-half miles southeast of Nowata, and during this time he has won for himself an enviable position among the representative farmers and stockmen of the state. He has one hundred acres under cultivation and he raises high grade beef stock and hogs. In addition to the original tract he leases three hundred acres. He has a modern two-story residence on the farm with substantial outbuildings and well repaired gates and fences.
Mr. Tate has been twice married. His first wife was Dora Wing and their marriage was celebrated in 1891. She became the mother of one child, William J., now twenty-one years of age. In 1906 Mr. Tate was married to Sarah Estes and to the second union seven children have been born: Jennie May, Gladys Marie, Mildred Margaret, Ruby Paulinq, Alfred B., Opal Clata and Charles Rea.
Mr. Tate gives his political allegiance to the Democratic Party and the principles for which it stands and for many years he has been a director of the school board of District, No. 39. He is one of the public spirited and progressive citizens of Nowata County, and his influence has been felt in many movements for the development and up building of the community.