A Tribute To The Life Of William Bernard Tracy (1867-1920)

William Bernard Tracy was raised on his father's farm at Saranac, Clinton County, New York. At the age of six he would lose his mother, and a few years later, his father remarried and relocated to Kansas. He grew up under the care of his older brothers and sisters. He was rather short and stood 5 feet 4 and 5/8 inches tall, had gray eyes and short light brown hair. Tracy enlisted in the U.S. Army at the age of 20 and served in the last of the American Indian wars of the late 1880s. While in the army he developed a great interest in music and also served as a musician playing the saxophone. After his military service in South Dakota, he traveled east to Chicago, Illinois where by this time some of his siblings were already residing. While in Chicago, he met a young woman named Mary Ann Cron