attending many national conventions. McDonald turned his energies to business, though he retained an interest in politics. He moved to Fort Worth in 1906, where he became manager of the Fraternal Bank and Trust Company, founded by the Masons as the city's first African-American-owned bank. For a time, it was the bank used by most of the black Mason chapters in the state. With their deposits, McDonald had capital for providing loans to African-American entrepreneurs and could encourage development of their businesses. In that segregated era, blacks had great difficulty gaining financing from white-owned banks. Under McDonald's management, the bank survived the Great Depression, when many other banks went under. According to a 2008 report by the Dallas Morning News, McDonald was "probably Texas' first black millionaire." Disappointed with Texas Republicans, McDonald increasingly exercised independence in supporting presidential candidates: favoring Progressive Robert M. La Follette, Sr. and Democrats Al Smith and Franklin D. Roosevelt. He returned to the Republican Party to support Thomas E. Dewey in his presidential bid against Harry Truman. McDonald died on July 5, 1950, in Fort Worth, where he was buried in Oakwood Cemetery. He was survived by his fifth wife. His only child, Harry Manack McDonald, had predeceased him by thirty years. Legacy and honors In 2002, Forney, Texas, erected a historical marker to acknowledge native son McDonald and his achievements; its text includes the following: "Throughout his life, McDonald was a leader in the struggle for social justice, advocating persistence and civic and moral responsibility as the steps to equality." References Further reading Barr, Alwyn. Black Texans: A History of Negroes in Texas, 1528–1971 (Austin: Jenkins, 1973). Bundy, William Oliver. Life of William Madison McDonald, Ph. D. dissertation, Bunker (1925). ASIN: B00085TUVW Casdorph, Paul D. A History of the Republican Party in Texas, 1865–1965 (Austin: Pemberton Press, 1965). Glasrud, Bruce A. "William M. McDonald, Business and Fraternal Leader", Black Leaders: Texans for Their Times, ed. by Alwyn Barr and Robert A. Calvert, (Austin: Texas State Historical Association, 1981), pp. 83–112 Rice, Lawrence D. The Negro in Texas, 1874–1900 (Baton Rouge: Louisiana State University Press, 1971). 1866 births 1950 deaths African-American businesspeople American businesspeople African-American people in Texas politics People from Forney, Texas Texas Republicans 20th-century African-American people