The History of Hendricks County (Chicago: Interstate Publishing, 1885)--Center Township, page 544
James A. Wilson, attorney at law, was born at Peoria, Ill., Sept. 15, 1854, and is the youngest son of William and Sarah F. (Hosea) Wilson. His father having gone to California and not having been heard from, was supposed to be lost, he was reared by his grandfather, W.F. Hosea, of New Philadelphia, Ind., until his sixteenth year. He worked on the farm till he was thirteen, after which he supported his grandparents, by working in a stave-mill, for three years. A fter leaving his grandparents he continued to work in a stave factory until the fall of 1870, and during that time he attended school for the first time, working for his board. During the spring and summer of 1871 he worked on a fruit farm near Seymour, Jackson Co., Ind., and in the following winter he again attended school, working on a farm for his board. In the spring and summer of 1872 he again worked on a farm in Jackson County, part of the time attending the Normal School at Little York, Ind. He again attended school in the winter of 1872-'73, working for his board as before. In the spring of 1873 he attended the Blue River Academy near Canton, Ind. During the summer of 1873, while working on a farm in Jackson County, he broke his arm, which caused him to be laid up till the following winter, when he was engaged as a teacher in a school in Du Bois, Orange, Brown and Morgan counties until the spring of 1881, and attended school at Blue River Academy or the Southern Indiana Normal at Paola, Ind. He also studied law under his brother, E.G. Wilson, and in the spring of 1880 he became associated with his brother, L.F. Wilson, in the practice of law at Nashville, Ind. After he gave up teaching, in 1881, he engaged solely in the practice of law with his brother. In November, 1881, they removed to Danville, his brother retiring from the firm in May, 1884. In connection with their law practice, he and his brother published at Danville the Hendricks County Gazette, a Democratic paper, until August, 1884, since which he has devoted his time entirely to his law practice at Danville. June 15, 1881, he was married to Miss Julia A. daughter of William B. Cooper, of near Mooresville, Hendricks County. They have one child--Grace. Mr. Wilson is a Master Mason. Politically he is a Democrat and is the chairman of the Democratic Central Committee.