Charles Knowlton Willard was born December 7, 1871, son of Myron Gilbert Willard and Julia E. Knowlton. Julia died July 8, 1876. (Willard Genealogy, Joseph Willard and Charles Wilkes Walker, The Willard Family Association, Boston, Massachusetts, 1915, Page 471)
The 1880 United States census showed Charles Willard (age 9, born in Minnesota) living with his parents M. G. (age 36, born in New York, lawyer) and Mary (age 32, born in New York) in Mankato, Minnesota.
The Mankato Knitting Mills was incorporated in 1892 by J. A. Willard and M. G. Willard as principal stockholders, capital stock $100,000.00. J. A. Willard, President; M. G. Willard, Treasurer and Manager, and C. K. Willard, Secretary. (Mankato, Its First Fifty Years, Prepared for the Fiftieth Anniversary of the Settlement of Mankato, 1852-1902, Free Press Printing Company, Mankato, MN, 1903, Page 98)
Mankato Assignment. A Result of the Recent Failure of Mr. Willard. Special to the Globe. Mankato, Minn., Dec. 7. – The Mankato Knitting mills, owned by J. A. and C. K. Willard, filed a deed of assignment today. The liabilities are estimated at $85,000. The mills started five years ago, and gave employment to a large number of people. The recent assignment of John A. Willard is the cause of this crash. (The Saint Paul Globe, Wednesday Morning, December 8, 1897, Volume XX, Number 342, Image 6)
J. A. Willard as president and C. K. Willard as secretary of the Mankato Knitting mills, made an assignment. Liabilities are estimated at $85,000; not yet known. (Warren Sheaf, Thursday, December 16, 1897, Volume XVIII, Number 3, Page 3)
The 1900 United States census showed Charles K. Willard (age 28, born in December 1871 in Minnesota, manager telephone) married to Alice M. (age 24, born in November 1875 in Minnesota) and living in Mankato, Minnesota. A son, Arthur C. (age 2 months, born in March 1900 in Minnesota), also lived with the couple.
The 1905 Minnesota census showed Charles K. Willard (age 33, born in Minnesota, telephone manager) married to Alice M. (age 29, born in Minnesota) and living in Mankato, Minnesota. Children Arthur C. (age 5, born in Minnesota) and Gerald W. (age 3, born in Minnesota) also lived with the couple.
MANKATO, Minn. – The Citizens’ Telephone Company has elected the following officers: President, J. H. James; vice-president, H. A. Patterson; secretary and treasurer, W. D. Willard; manager, C. K. Willard. (Telephony, The Telephony Publishing Company, Chicago, IL, May 1906, Volume XI, Number 5, Page 337)
Mankato Business Man Buys Farris Lath Mill. C. K. Willard, Former Telephone Man, Will Remove With Family to Bemidji, Soon. Charles K. Willard, formerly a prominent telephone man of Mankato, has purchased a lath mill at Farris, Hubbard county, and will remove to Bemidji with his family in the near future. The Mankato Free Press says, speaking of the enterprise: "The opening is a good one, and with the application and business ability which Mr. Willard will devote to the management of the mill, he is sure to make a success of the enterprise. He has made a success of whatever he has gone into thus far, and Bemidji and Farris will find him a desirable acquisition to their business circles, and his family a most estimable one." (The Bemidji Daily Pioneer, Thursday Evening, October 11, 1906, Volume 4, Number 149, Page 1)
Page 613. Willard, Myron G. (Charles K. Willard’s father) – To an unusual degree the city of Mankato has been fortunate in having a citizenship composed of progressive, public-spirited men, whose abilities have been
Page 614. enlisted in behalf of civic improvements, whose sympathies are on the side of beneficial enterprises, and whose time has been given unreservedly to the development of the local welfare. Numbered among these citizens may be mentioned Myron G. Willard, whose identification with the city as an attorney and as a man of large commercial interests has been helpful to the growth of his adopted town. The date of his arrival in Mankato, December 1, 1868, marked his association with the vital interests of the growing place, and from that time to this he has been regarded as a man of talent, commercial acumen and genial social qualities. While life has not been without its misfortunes, he has weathered every financial storm and has won an important standing financially among the people with whom he has had years of association.
The ancestry of the Willard family is traced to Captain Simon Willard, a seafaring man who settled in New England in 1664. Myron G. Willard was born at Trenton, Oneida county, New York, October 23, 1842, being a son of Daniel S. and Catherine (Williams) Willard. During the uneventful years of boyhood he remained on the home farm and attended country schools. Later he became a student in Whitestown seminary and still later had the advantage of taking the regular classical course in Hamilton college, from which institution he was graduated with high honors in 1868. Three years afterward he received the degree of Master of Arts from his alma mater. During the progress of his literary studies Mr. Willard had carried on a special law course and after leaving college he completed his studies in the law office of Senator Francis Kernan at Utica, New York. During October of the same year (1868) he was admitted to practice in all the courts of New York, having passed a successful examination at Syracuse. The other members of the family had preceded him to the northwest and during the latter part of 1868 he joined them at Mankato, Minnesota, where on the day of his arrival he was admitted to practice in all the courts of the state. Opening an office he became successful in corporation and real estate law, in which lines he was regarded as an authority. For a time he was associated with A. R. Pfau, now District Judge of Sixth Judicial District, and later had Thomas Hughes as a partner.
In the fall of 1885 Mr. Willard gave up his law practice in order to embark in the manufacturing business. With his brother, John A. Willard, he built and equipped a plant for the manufacture of fiber ware, and became manager of the business, which was incorporated under the title of the Standard Fiber Ware Company. During 1892 he became associated with the erection of a plant for the manufacture of hosiery, operated as the Mankato knitting mills. The plant had scarcely received its equipment when the financial depression began and the infant industry was ill-fitted to withstand the storms that brought bankruptcy to many old and substantial concerns throughout the entire country. However, it weathered the storms until 1897, when the plant for knitting as well as that for the manufacture of fiber ware suffered the fate incident to financial panics. However, within one year the mills had been started again with W. L. Hixon as president and Mr. Willard as superintendent, and from that time the plant enjoyed a growing business along the line of its specialties. Mr. Willard sold out his interest and retired from the business in the fall of 1902 and is now engaged in the real estate, insurance, loan and investment business.
The first marriage of Mr. Willard took place in 1870 and united him with Miss Julia E. Knowlton, of Holland Patent, New York, who died in July of 1876. Three years later he married Mary W. Willard, of Holland Patent, a niece of the late General H. W. Halleck. Two children were born of his first marriage, both of whom are sons, namely: Charles K., formerly manager of the Mankato Citizens Telephone company, but at present engaged in the manufacture of brick, tile and building blocks at Heron Lake, Minnesota; and Elkin C., formerly assistant manager at the Mankato Mills Company, is at present proprietor of a chicken ranch near Mankato, known as "West Lawn Farm." A daughter, Clara E., was born of the second marriage. The family hold membership with the Presbyterian church of Mankato, in which Mr. Willard has officiated as a ruling elder for thirty years
Page 615. or more, and of whose Sunday school he served as superintendent for thirteen years. It has been Mr. Willard’s aim to aid all movements for the material, educational and commercial upbuilding of his home city, and while serving as secretary of the Board of Trade he was able to be especially helpful to the town, although in the capacity of a private citizen his work has been no less advantageous to local interests, and his ambition constantly has been to arouse an interest in securing for the city more railroads and more factories, for he realizes that upon these two depends the ultimate prosperity and permanent growth of the population. An everlasting monument to Mr. Willard was his beautifying the park and boulevard system and giving to the city "Willard Park-Way," lying adjacent to and abutting either side of Glenwood avenue for about half a mile. (History of Blue Earth County and Biographies of its Leading Citizens, Thomas Hughes, Middle West Publishing Company, Chicago, 1909, Page 613)
The 1910 United States census showed Charles K. Willard (age 38, born in Minnesota, brickyard manager) married to Alice M. (age 34, born in Minnesota) and living in Heron Lake, Minnesota. Children Arthur C. (age 10, born in Minnesota) and Gerald W. (age 8, born in Minnesota) also lived with the couple.
The 1920 United States census showed Charles K. Willard (age 48, born in Minnesota, manufacturer) married to Alice (age 44, born in Minnesota) and living in Heron Lake, Minnesota. Children Arthur C. (age 19, born in Minnesota), Gerald W. (age 18, born in Minnesota), and Gertrude (age 7, born in Minnesota) also lived with the couple.
The 1930 United States census showed Charles K. Willard (age 58, born in Minnesota, building and loan salesman) married to Alice M. (age 54, born in Minnesota) and living in St. Paul, Minnesota. Children Gerald W. (age 28, born in Minnesota) and Gertrude (age 17, born in Minnesota) also lived with the couple.
Charles Knowlton Willard died December 6, 1951, in Ramsey County, Minnesota.