 William was the son of Charles' older brother, William Oscar Rogers (born April 12, 1825, New York City, died December 17, 1919, Madison, New Jersey) who was the New Orleans superintendent of schools and Second President of Tulane University, Acting 1899–1900.Ironically and much to his New York families displeasure, he was also a Confederate soldier, having moved to New Orleans for health reasons in 1848 after a horse riding accident.As the bed business flourished due to increased availability of home oriented print advertising in publications such as McClure's, Scribner's Magazine, The Century Magazine, Harper's Magazine

World War I caused a tremendous scarcity of the materials needed for the brass and iron bed business and badly affected all metal bed makers in the world.