James Alexander Stark, an extraordinary woman.

5 Sep 1878 - 19 Aug 1917

My great-grandmother was an extraordinary woman. She was the second daughter of James Alexander Stark and his (second) wife, Nancy Elizabeth Owsley. She had an older sister, Susan Emma, three older Stark half siblings, three older Brown step-siblings, and six younger half siblings from her mother's second marriage. 

Growing up, I had always been told her name was James Alabama Stark, but that she was called Allie. It was only a few years ago, when I started seriously researching her, that I found her actual name was James Alexander Stark, after her father who died five months before she was born. I knew she was born in Missouri, in Hickory County in 1878, so the only pre-marriage census that is extant is the 1880 one.  But I couldn't find her in any 1880 Missouri census. 

I had 2 clues to her parents. Her father's name was James Alexander Stark, and her mother signed permission for her to marry with the name Nancy E Brown. So I starting looking for Nancy Stark in the 1880 census, and found her, now a widow living on Main St in Cross Timbers, Hickory County, Missouri. She was the head of household that included the 2 Stark children, and her brother and sister with the last name of Owsley. I hadn't known her mother's maiden name, so this was a breakthrough.

The only catch was that the children were Emma, age 2, a daughter and  a son, James A., age 1. But wait, what if the enumerator just asked the ages and names of the children, and unbeknownst to Nancy, recorded her baby girl as a son? This was confirmed in her grandfather's will, written just months after she was born - as granddaughter James Alexander Stark. 

I will that at marriage or when they become of legal age that my executor pay to Susan E. Stark and James Alexander Stark, daughters of James A Stark and my grandchildren, the sum of Ten Dollars each.

From the Will and Testament of Pleasant Stark, dated 9 December 1878

Little is known of Allie's childhood. Her mother married a widower, William Samuel Brown, when Allie was about three years old, and from this marriage, six children were born. And so it was, that just after her 17th birthday, Allie married John C. Agee, age 21. For the next 12 years they remained in Hickory County, Missouri, where Allie gave birth to at least six children, two sons dying in infancy. 

In 1907 or possibly 1908, the family packed up and moved out west. We know that they took a trip in May 1907: "John Agee and son Guss and family started last Wednesday overland in a covered wagon for a trip through the Ozark country for the benefit of Guss's health." 

AI tells me a trip by covered wagon from Hickory Co, Missouri to Lemhi Co, Idaho would take between 4 and 6 months, would require meticulous preparation of up to a year in advance, and often was preceded by the family selling off their goods and property. This occurred in Oct 1907 (30 acres of land) and Nov 1907 (joint sale of goods between John and his brother-in-law Tilden Johnson). This leads me to believe that the fall and winter were spent getting ready and the two families probably left in the spring of 1908. Tilden and Ida Belle Johnson would only stay a short while out there, long enough for their son Harry Giles to be born, but they were back in Hickory County for the 1910 census and every one thereafter.

John and Allie lived on Sandy Creek and would have one more child together, Virginia Velma, who was born in October 1910, but died the same year. This is what a cabin on Sandy Creek looked like in 1934, theirs was probably less elaborate.

They separated soon after. Allie and her remaining children (Walter, Mettie, Minnie - my grandmother, and Elizabeth) moved out into Salmon, where Allie worked to provide for them as a cook, either on ranches or at the Yellow Jacket mine, according to a 1995 letter from my uncle. 

Allie, Minnie and Elizabeth Clarissa c. 1908

In 1913, a life changing event occurred. Allie was working on the Brown ranch as a housekeeper for a 60 year old man. She was by now divorced from John and keeping company with a young man named Guy Buster. One night while Allie, Guy and her 15 year old son, Walter, were out walking they met Mr. Brown, coming from the other direction.

All Idaho, U.S., Old Penitentiary Prison Records, 1882-1961

Guy Buster, 1913

Mr. Brown told Guy to leave, and started hitting him with his walking stick. Guy then proceeded to shoot him 3-4 times. He claimed self-defense. Both Allie and Walter supported and testified to that claim. Guy was first convicted and sentenced to 10-30 years in the penitentiary, but the conviction was later overturned, a new trial took place in 1915, and it was overturned a final time in 1917. 

It was about this time that Allie left Idaho and went to Dillon, Montana, where she worked in the Acaia cleaning establishment. In 1917, she contracted erysipelas, a Streptococcus A bacterial skin infection, and died a month later in August, 1917, leaving four minor children Walter, 19, Mattie, 17, Mattie, 14 and Lizzie, 10, and a $94.00 funeral bill. 

The funeral home still exists today, and sent me a copy of this bill, and was very helpful in trying to obtain for me the actual location of where she is buried. 

We went west this summer, and that was one of my main objectives, but all I could find out was that she was likely buried in the churchyard of the First Baptist Church, where the funeral was held. However, when the church moved into town, the marked graves were disinterred and the remains taken to Mountain View Cemetery. There is no record of her in the cemetery, so her final resting place remains a mystery. Wherever she is, may she rest in peace.

Holiday Greetings from Crossville

It's hard to believe that 2024 is almost in the books, and that we have lived in Tennessee for more than 5 years now. We may live in Tennessee, but our hearts are with our loved ones, wherever you may be. We did some traveling this year, our first trip to Florida - Pensacola, in January; Hawai'i again in February to see our newest granddaughter; Indy/NY for the eclipse, Missouri in May to see Alden graduate and do another section of Route 66, and back to NY in July for John's sister, Jean's Celebration of Life. We finished our travels with a trip to Virginia for our anniversary and a short trip to do the Illinois section of Route 66 in September. We were blessed with several visits from family, including all four grandsons and Corey and Jess at Thanksgiving. Here are a few of our favorite memories.

The Ride of Her Life by Elizabeth Letts

The Ride of Her Life: The True Story of a Woman, Her Horse, and Their Last-Chance Journey Across America by Elizabeth Letts
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

4.0/5.0 - My first thought about this book is that I wish my father-in-law was still alive because I think he (and my dad) would both have enjoyed this very much. I wish I could ask them whether they remember hearing about the journey that Annie Wilkins took across America, from Maine to California, in the mid-1950s. They both grew up around horses, and were young men at the time. I think they would have been fascinated by this, as many of the people of America were, at the time.
Annie is 63, when she is given just a few years to live, after being hospitalized for what might have been thought to be TB. She remembers a dream of her mother's, to see the Pacific Ocean, and decides that she has nothing to lose (she knows she can no longer hold on to the farm in Maine, by herself), and manages to save enough money to buy a horse and sets out in November, 1954 to ride across the country with her dog, trusting that strangers will let her sleep in their barns, etc. along the way.
A newspaper gets word of the story and she becomes something of a celebrity, people in the towns she travels through often put her up for a night, or longer, and her horse(s) are always given a place in a stable. The police act as escorts through towns and offer her a place to sleep in the jail, when needed. Overall, people are very kind to her and her animals. In Tennessee, a town gives her a second horse, a Tennessee Walker, to help her along the way.
This was an interesting book, in a simpler time, and I'd recommend it to anyone who enjoys animals, travel or history.

View all my reviews

2023 Holiday letter

Happy holiday, friends!
2023 was a wonderful year at our house. We joined the East Tennesee Gleaners Co-op where we taught a few classes, took a few more and enjoyed the company of like-minded people. Of course we planted a garden, focusing on tomatoes, peppers, okra, and garlic, as well as some squash and gourds, with great results. This was the first year we were able to break even on the garlic, selling about 10 pounds for seed. We also planted (with the help of a few grandsons!) 50 or so lavender for the bees.
We hosted family and friends a bunch, including friends from Texas, and most of the children and grandchildren, as well as my sister and brother-in-law. In addition to that, we did a bunch of traveling, Texas in January; Charleston in March; a quick trip to NY in April; Missouri in May, where we got to visit Alden, see where my grandmother was born and some ancestral graves, and start our Route 66 journey; Arizona in September, where I met my cousin Carl and his wife Patty for the first time, saw the Grand Canyon, and enjoyed more of Route 66!; and finally a trip to Colorado last week to see Cirque du Soleil in Denver. This was the reason I retired!
Now we are home, enjoying our Christmas decorations and the quiet until we sojourn to Hawai'i next February to see our new granddaughter, November, and her older sister, August, as well as Matt and Niah.
I'll close this letter with a few photos, and wishes for all the blessings of this holiday season for you and your loved ones.

Married at the fair

Like so many genealogy journeys, this one started with a photo.

A cute little baby on a cabinet card from Aunt Laura, circa 1902, that said Leah Linn(?)on the back. Now, I couldn't recall a Leah Linn, so I went to Ancestry and did a name search, and came up with Leah Jobes (born 2 Jul 1901) who married an Ernest Linn. That's where the story got interesting. One of my favorite sources to flesh out an ancestor's story is to try and find mention of them in newspapers of the time. I hit the jackport on this one!

What's this?

Both the Buffalo News (Aug 12, 1922 and Sep 11, 1922) carried articles that told the story of the Chautauqua County Fair Committee coming up with an idea - about a month before the fair - to hold a contest and offer $100 in gold, furniture and wedding presents to any couple in Chautauqua county who will consent to be married at the fair grounds on September 15. Couples who were interested had to send an application in for consideration. Because of the overwhelming response they got, the fair committee ended up drawing a couple's name.

As best I can tell, with the timeline from contest announcement to wedding being 30 days, the lucky couple must have had about 2 weeks to pull this together, by the time they were notified that they had been chosen.As luck would have it, Miss Jobes and Mr. Linn were planning a fall wedding, but hadn't settled on a date.

The Dunkirk Evening Observer described the wedding in a Sept 15, 1922 article:
The public wedding was the attraction at the County Fair- today. Miss Leah Jobes of Kennedy and Ernest Linn of Hanoverton, Ohio, were married on the platform before thousands by the Rev. J. Milton Harris of the Baptist church of Allegany, the bride's uncle. The wedding party drove to the fair grounds from Hotel Francis in four open carriages. Coachmen and footmen were attired in livery, with powdered wigs. The Akbar Sanctorum band of Dunkirk played the wedding march and the guard team of review escorted the bride.The fair committee provided a hotel suite and luncheon for the wedding party and family guests, and the prizes included $100 in gold, a mahagony dining set, a library table, and an upholstered chair, along with some smaller gifts.

A wedding to remember! It's too bad they never had children, that would have made a great story to pass on. I guess it's up to me to share it. But I'll leave you with this thought - can you imagine this happening today when weddings are planned months, if not a year in advance? Oh, and did you catch Uncle Milton's name?

It starts with a picture - Matt's bike accident

Often coming across a photo will trigger a memory, like this one of Matt, with his external fixator.

Matt, like his brothers before him, had a paper route when he was an adolescent. One Friday, March 1, 1996, he came home from school, hopped on his bike and was on the way home to start his route; but while crossing Center Street on his bike, he had an accident. An elderly lady, Charlotte MacDonald, was turning into the Jubilee parking lot, and Matt rode his bike into the side of her car. It chills me to think how much worse this could have been. He wasn't wearing a helmet, and suffered a compound fracture of his leg.

A neighbor kid saw Matt lying in the street after the accident, and ran down to our house to tell John. He rushed down there, told the police to let him through, it was his son, and rode with Matt to the hospital. They transferred him to Strong. After making arrangements for the kids, John picked me up in Rochester, where they performed surgery, and put an external fixator on his leg.

His brothers did his paper route that day, but that was pretty much the end of Matthew and the paper route. Come to think of it, it was probably the last time Matt ever rode a bike, as well.