Week 4: Education

 Week 4:  Education

Irene Shumaker Scott was the first educator and the only Scott grandma I ever knew. In 1942 when she was a 37-year-old grade school teacher, Irene met and fell in love with my grandpa, A.C. Scott.  By marrying him, Irene took on the responsibility of a family of four sons, ages 12, 14, 18, and 19 and a man who had been divorced once and widowed once.  Many women might have thought twice before this marriage, but Irene took on the challenge.

Irene was born on 31 Mar 1904 in Stueben County, Indiana, the oldest daughter of Elijah and Emma Wolf Shumaker.  Elijah had been previously married in 1895 but was widowed with three children by 1901. Six months after losing his first wife, Elijah married Emma Wolf.  She was only twenty at the time but just like her daughter would do forty years later, Emma took on the responsibility of raising children who weren't her own. Emma and Elijah went on to have five children together.

When I was learning to read, Grandma Irene Scott gave me a book that she had used when she was teaching.  I felt special to own that book and read and reread it many times. When I was older and thinking of becoming a teacher myself, Grandma gave me the school bell that used to sit on her desk.  She lived long enough to know that I had graduated from college with a teaching degree but by the time I started my job that fall, Grandma had died.

When I think of Grandma Scott I remember how she loved costume jewelry; baked the most amazing gigantic soft sugar cookies topped with sugar and a raisin; insisted on good table manners; and had a no-nonsense personality.  She was never a warm fuzzy grandma but she took an interest in me when I stayed on the farm and I knew she loved me.  I have a long string of wooden beads she gave me one day, saying they were her "flapper beads" from the 1920s.  I only wish I could have seen my proper school teacher grandma dancing with her flapper beads.

the beads

  

young Irene

                                                           Irene and A.C. at Dewart Lake

Week 3: Out of Place

 Week 3:  Out of Place

   

One day as I was working on my Williams line I concentrated on Byard Williams (1838-95), my second great-granduncle.  Byard and his wife Anna Partington had five children: Sophronia Elma; Ulysses Grant; Oscar; Rose; and Henry Babe.  I was intrigued by the unusual name of Sophronia so I looked it up and found that the name had Greek origins and meant "prudent" or "wise".  

That same day on the Williams tree I noticed the name Sophronia again.  Henry K. Williams (1858-1951), who was Byard's youngest brother, had married a woman named Sophronia. Maybe that name wasn't so unusual after all. Then I noticed that both Sophronias had the middle name of Elma.  

Hmmm.

Then I noticed that both Sophronias had the same birth and death dates (1867-1927). Could it be that they were the same person?  

Yes, it turns out.

Henry K. Williams had married his oldest brother's daughter---his own niece! That sent me down a rabbit hole where I found that marriage between an uncle and his niece (or marriage between an aunt and her nephew) is called an "avunculate marriage".  Avunculate marriages are explicitly illegal now in most English-speaking countries but in that time period, there were fewer laws against them. What I haven't been able to find out is what the laws were at the time that Henry and Sophronia married in Delphi, Indiana, in 1885.

Was their marriage legal?  Was it talked about?  Would it be prudent or wise to have children in an avunculate marriage?  The partners of a marriage like theirs share, on average, 25% of their genetic material, the same genetic relationship as half-siblings or a grandparent and grandchild. In contrast, first cousins only share 12.5% of their genetic material.

Henry K. and Sophronia had just one child. Their son was born in October of 1889 but died on 7 Sep 1890.  His grave is only marked as Male Child Williams and is located in the Cooper Cemetery in Fairbury, Illinois.  He is buried next to Byard Williams.  Was Byard his uncle or his grandfather...or both?

Week 2: My Favorite Picture

 

Week 2:  My Favorite Picture

I've always loved this picture of my great-grandparents,Walter and Martha (Rakestraw) Cartwright.  I estimate by the children's sizes that the photo was taken in either 1908 or 1909. The family looks happy, healthy, and even prosperous.

In 1896 soon after Walter and Martha were married, Walter's brother Francis and his family traveled on an emigrant train with other relatives to North Dakota to apply for claims for 160 acres of land in Towner County.   The Homestead Act of 1862 granted 160 acres of unappropriated public lands to anyone who was the head of a family, 21 years old or older, and who could pay a small filing fee.  In return, the claimant agreed to work on the land and improve it--including construction of a home--over a five-year period. About 270 million acres were distributed under the Homestead Act between 1862 and 1988.  

In 1898 Walter, Martha, and their firstborn son Clifford followed the others to North Dakota where Walter applied for a U.S. patent land grant of 160 acres in Rolette County, near the county where Francis and his family were.  Rolette County shares a border with Manitoba, Canada.  On 21 Mar 1898 Walter paid $14.00 in fees and signed his "X" for the land described as the NE ¼ of Section 24 in Township 160 of Range 70W.  Over the next six years Walter built a frame house; built a sod and frame barn; constructed a frame granary; dug two good wells; and cultivated 90 acres.  On 21 Mar 1904 Walter and two friends gave Testimony of Witness that detailed his improvements to the land and not long after the land became officially his. 

Rolette County, ND---Towner County is the next county to the east

The boy shown in the picture is my grand-uncle Clifford Loyd "Pete" (born in 1897) and my grand-aunt Clara May (born in 1905).  Their little sister-to-be Irene Eldora (born in 1909) was my maternal grandmother.  Shortly after Irene was born the family moved back to Indiana.  I've always wondered if it was homesickness, the harsh winters, or a bad series of crops that drew them back home to Indiana. Did they work the land and make the necessary improvements to fulfill the requirements of the Homestead Act only to sell it for a profit before moving back home? I wish I had known to ask my grandma these questions before she died in 1977.   

Week 1: I'd Like to Meet

Week 1:  I'd Like to Meet

I’d like to meet Caleb Scott, my third great grandfather.  Caleb was born in Gloucester County, New Jersey, on 27 Sep 1799, a twin to Margaretta Rockhill Scott.  The twins were the second and third children born to Quakers Abraham Scott Jr. and Mercy Rockhill Scott and would later have eight younger siblings. At some point before Caleb was of marrying age he emigrated from New Jersey to Stark County, OH.  When he was 24 Caleb married Rebecca Garwood but they were married a tragically short time.  Within four years of their marriage they had a two-year old daughter and a newborn.  Only a month after the second birth, Rebecca died. Caleb was a widower for a little over five years before marrying Mary Ivins, my third great grandmother. At some point after 1850, Caleb and Mary moved their family of 11 surviving children several hundred miles west to Kosciusko County, IN, where he bought 200 acres of land for $4.50/acre. By the time of the Civil War, six of Caleb’s sons enlisted in the Union Army: Samuel, Isaac, Joseph, Joshua, William and Caleb Shreve Scott.  Five returned home but Caleb Shreve, his namesake, died of disease as a prisoner of war in a Confederate hospital.

I’d like to meet Caleb to tell him that I gave birth to twin girls 178 years after he was born.  Twins aren’t common in my family research so I think he’d be proud to know about them.

I’d also like to tell him how sorry I am about Caleb Shreve’s death in the dreadful conditions of that prison camp where he contracted smallpox and to promise him that I’ll visit Caleb Shreve’s grave someday in Danville National Cemetery to pay my respects.

 

 

 

Me at Caleb and Mary Scott’s graves at

Pleasant Grove Cemetery in Warsaw, IN.