shortly before his death. Business career Upon his undergraduate graduation in 1882, Clements moved to Bay City, Michigan to work as an engineer with his father who was also a partner at Bay City Industrial Works (now the Industrial Brownhoist Corporation of Bay City), a business that designed and manufactured hoists, cranes, and steam shovels. Although the business wasn't very successful, Clements worked to improve the efficiency of the products and was awarded several patents for improvements to the railway cranes and steam shovels. In 1886, Clements and an associate bought out the stakeholders, and re-established the business. William Clements eventually became the president of Bay City Industrial Works in 1898. Under his management, Industrial Works became one of the most profitable institutions in Michigan as the company manufactured the construction equipment for the creation of the Panama Canal, and as such the company profits skyrocketed between 1904 and 1915. In addition, Mr. Clements saw a career in the banking industry having served as the president of First National Bank of Bay City. Clements made a fortune throughout his career, which allowed him to fund his personal passion of book collecting. Affiliations When Clements was asked what his chief recreation was he simply stated, “book collecting.” As such, he was a member of numerous societies that focused on his passion of historical artifacts and books including his appointment to the Michigan Historical Commission by Michigan Governor Fred W. Green on August 29, 1927. Additionally Clements was a member of the American Antiquarian Society, the American History Association, the Club of Odd Volumes in Boston, the Mississippi Valley Historical Association, the New England Historic Genealogical Society, and the Grolier Club. Notable collections By the 1890s, Clements started collecting rare books and works of early Americana. Fortunately, Clements was able to make many of his purchases in the “golden age” for collectors as the decades of the 1880s through the 1920s saw the break up of aristocratic British estates which contained many great libraries. In the United States many large private libraries were also sold which allowed Clements to make a series of major purchases. Among these purchases were the collections of Aaron J. Cooke, a good friend of Clements who sold him over 1,000 volumes of Americana in 1903. Clements concentrated on two periods of early American history— the colonization of America from the 15th through the 17th centuries and the