Born in Dergalt, County Tyrone, Kingdom of Ireland (in modern Northern Ireland) in 1787,[1] Wilson emigrated in his youth to the United States. He settled in Philadelphia, where he found work as a printer in the office of the Aurora, a Jeffersonian newspaper edited by William Duane. He rose to the position of foreman, publisher, and then editor.[2] Continuing his journalistic career in Steubenville, Ohio, he purchased the Western Herald, which name he changed to Western Herald & Steubenville Gazette.[3] He became involved in state politics, representing Jefferson County in the Ohio House of Representatives in 1816–1817, 1820–1821 and 1821–1822.[4] In 1832, he founded the Pennsylvania Advocate, a newspaper serving Pittsburgh; he owned and edited it for a year before turning it over to his oldest son William Duane Wilson.[5] Though not a lawyer, James Wilson served for several years as an associate judge for the Jefferson County common pleas court.[6] Wilson died in Steubenville on 17 October 1850 from an attack of cholera.[7] He was elected to the Ohio Journalism Hall of Fame in 1933.[8]
Family
Wilson married Ann Adams in Philadelphia in 1808. Both were of Scotch-Irish origin.[2] They had seven sons and three daughters. The youngest son, Joseph Ruggles Wilson, born in Steubenville in 1822, was the father of Woodrow Wilson.[9]
Walworth, Arthur (1965). Woodrow Wilson (Second Revised ed.). Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
Weisenburger, Francis P. (December 1936). "The Middle Western Antecedents of Woodrow Wilson". The Mississippi Valley Historical Review. 23 (3): 375–390. doi:10.2307/1886371. JSTOR1886371.