Feisty Females: Cornelia Clark Fort
Cornelia Clark Fort was born February 5, 1919 in Nashville, Tennessee to parents Rufus Elijah and Louise Clark Fort. Her father was a successful physician and businessman who had already made his fortune long before Cornelia was born. In 1909 he married Louise Clark and together they raised their family at Fortland, a sprawling 365-acre estate.
Although the family was wealthy, Cornelia’s father made sure his children weren’t “spoiled rich kids”, insisting that they attend public school in order “to know people and learn to get along with everybody,” her brother Dudley said. In school, Cornelia excelled in her favorite subjects of history, literature and English and loved to read – math and science she barely passed. The family chauffeur, Epperson Bond, schooled her in Latin as he drove her to school (her father never learned to drive).
By the time she was thirteen years old, Cornelia was 5 feet, 10 inches tall which made social situations a bit awkward for her – she towered over her peers, male and female. Neither did she inherit her mother’s social finesse and grace, being more fun-loving and carefree. Cornelia was enrolled in a finishing school in seventh grade, but she managed to cultivate her own circle of friends, eschewing the more popular sororities.
Her parents insisted on a very strict Southern upbringing. When Cornelia, age seventeen, wanted to join her girlfriends for a trip to Europe, her father sternly refused. Upon graduating high school, however, she began to exercise more individual freedom. She spent one year at a junior college in Philadelphia and then on to Sarah Lawrence, an all-female college. There she excelled and flourished – a friend would later remark that “she became self-confident because she was successful and happy at Sarah Lawrence.”
As with most young ladies from wealthy Southern families, Cornelia made her official debut into Nashville society on December 29, 1939 while home on Christmas break during her senior year at Sarah Lawrence, perhaps reluctantly, according to her family. Southern women, after graduation, were expected to do all the “right things” like join the Junior League and other elite societies, all of which Cornelia did. Then she discovered flying.
Her friend Betty Rye was dating Jack Caldwell who was part-owner of a flying service. Cornelia had wanted to find out what it was like to fly and whether she would like it. After one flight, she was hooked. Caldwell remarked, “she just ate it up like it was jelly or something. She got up and didn’t want to go back.” Betty and Cornelia began their first lesson together, but Cornelia was the one who wanted more – Betty was finished with flying after one lesson.
Her father died on March 21, 1940 and one month later she flew her first solo flight. Given how stern her father was, her father might not have been comfortable with her choices. She was exhilarated after her first solo flight, but her mother was said to have been less than thrilled, remarking, “how very nice, dear. Now you won’t have to do that again.” Of course, given her enthusiasm and rebellious streak, Cornelia was not deterred – by June she had her private pilot’s license.
With license in hand, she could fly anywhere she wanted in the United States – the first week she flew two thousand miles! She soon graduated from flying a Piper Cub to a Waco UPF7 which was larger and more powerful. Upon completion of that training, she received her commercial pilot’s license which would allow her to instruct others. She became Tennessee’s first female flight instructor on March 10, 1941.
Even though the United States had not yet entered World War II, President Roosevelt kept a wary eye on Adolph Hitler’s mushrooming power, especially his air force. In response, the Civilian Pilots Training Program was established in 1940. One of the designated training sites was Massey Ransom Flying Service in Fort Collins, Colorado. You might guess that, of course, Cornelia applied for a job there and was hired.
Her mother again expressed her disapproval for her daughter’s pursuits, however. She was mortified that Cornelia planned to drive across the country from Nashville to Colorado alone. Epperson Bond, the family chauffeur, accompanied her instead.
During her training in Colorado she flew sixteen hours a day for six months. In October of 1941, she took a job in Honolulu, Hawaii teaching defense workers, soldiers and sailors. She loved her job. Writing to her mother she said, “[I]f I leave here I will leave the best job that I can have (unless the national emergency creates a still better one), a very pleasant atmosphere, a good salary, but far the best of all are the planes I fly. Big and fast and better suited for advanced flying.”
Two months after arriving in Hawaii she was an eyewitness to the horrors of Japan’s sudden attack on Pearl Harbor. Cornelia penned an eyewitness account which later appeared in the July 1943 issue of Woman’s Home Companion:
I knew I was going to join the Women’s Auxiliary Ferry Squadron before the organization was a reality, before it had a name, before it was anything but a radical idea in the minds of a few men who believed that woman could fly airplanes. But I never knew it so surely as I did in Honolulu on December 7, 1941.
At dawn that morning I drove from Waikiki to the John Rogers Civilian airport right next to Pearl Harbor, where I was a civilian pilot instructor. Shortly after six-thirty I began landing and take-off practice with my regular student. Coming in just before the last landing, I looked casually around and saw a military plane coming directly toward me. I jerked the controls away from my student and jammed the throttle wide open to pull above the oncoming plane. He passed so close under us that our celluloid windows rattled violently and I looked down to see what kind of plane it was.
The painted red balls on the tops of the wings shone brightly in the sun. I looked again with complete and utter disbelief. Honolulu was familiar with the emblem of the Rising Sun on passenger ships but not on airplanes.
I looked quickly at Pearl Harbor and my spine tingled when I saw billowing black smoke. Still I thought hollowly it might be some kind of coincidence or maneuvers, it might be, it must be. For surely, dear God.
Then I looked way up and saw the formations of silver bombers riding in. Something detached itself from an airplane and came glistening down. My eyes followed it down, down and even with knowledge pounding in my mind, my heart turned convulsively when the bomb exploded in the middle of the harbor. I knew the air was not the place for my little baby airplane and I set about landing as quickly as ever I could. A few seconds later a shadow passed over me and simultaneously pullets splattered all around me.
Suddenly that little wedge of sky above Hickham Field and Pearl Harbor was the busiest fullest piece of sky I ever saw.
We counted anxiously as our little civilian planes came flying home to roost. Two never came back. They were washed ashore weeks later on the windward side of the island, bullet-riddled. Not a pretty way for the brave little yellow Cubs and their pilots to go down to death.
After the attack, there was no more need for civilian pilots in Hawaii – reluctantly, she had to leave. The only way to fly after returning home was to go back to work for the Civilian Pilots Training program. In September 1942, the Women’s Auxiliary Ferrying Squadron (WAFS) was established. Cornelia received a telegram inviting her to report within twenty-four hours – she left immediately.
Mrs. Nancy Love had been appointed Senior Squadron Leader of the WAFS by the Secretary of War. Cornelia praised her qualifications, saying “[N]o better choice could have been made. First and most important she is a good pilot, has tremendous enthusiasm and belief in women pilots and did a wonderful job in helping us to be accepted on an equal status with men.”
Cornelia had no illusions about the challenges she faced as a female pilot in the service of her country. She knew at that time in history there was no hope of replacing male pilots. She was content to play her part by ferrying trainers or delivering planes to military bases. Cornelia was proud to serve her country and it brought her satisfaction like nothing else she had ever experienced.
On March 21, 1943, three years after her father’s death, Cornelia took off from San Diego along with seven other pilots (male and female) to deliver planes to Love Field in Dallas. A friend would later relate the events of that flight:
Some of [the male pilots[ began teasing [Cornelia] and then they began to pretend that they were fighter pilots. She was easy game for them, for she had never had any evasive training in military maneuvering. By the time they got to Texas, a few of the men has become too bold and were flying too close. A joke had become harassment.
One of the male pilots took his plane into a rolling dive, frightening Cornelia. She tried to evade him, but instead the two collided – his landing gear snapped off the top of her plane’s left wing and peeled it back six feet. Cornelia’s plane rolled, went into a dive and slammed into the ground. The plane did not catch fire, but the engine was buried two feet into the ground and Cornelia Fort had died. The crash occurred near Merkel, Texas.
Her squadron leader wrote to Cornelia’s mother: “My feeling about the loss of Cornelia is hard to put into words – I can only say that I miss her terribly, and loved her…If there can be any comforting thought, it is that she died as she wanted to – in an Army airplane, and in the service of her country.” Although Cornelia was not to blame for the crash, the program was never the same. The WAFS was disbanded in 1944 and members were not eligible for benefits. Belatedly, in 1977 Congress did finally declare they were indeed part of the military.
Cornelia was only twenty-four years old when she died, a short life, but one well-lived. The final paragraph of the Woman’s Home Companion article (which was published after her death and perhaps penned a short time before her death), summed up her passion:
I, for one, am profoundly grateful that my one talent, my only knowledge, flying, happens to be of use to my country when it is needed. That’s all the luck I ever hope to have.
When I ran across Cornelia’s story, I realized that her story was the basis of an excellent book I had just read, The All Girls Filling Station’s Last Reunion, by Fannie Flagg. It’s a great book and you can probably find it at your local library or online at Amazon ($6.49 Kindle) or Barnes and Noble ($6.49 Nook).
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Wild West Wednesday: Elsa Jane Forest Guerin (a.k.a. Mountain Charley)
She was born under less than “normal” circumstances. Her birth mother had fallen in love with someone who promised to marry her upon his return from a trip to Kentucky. When his trip was extended, she despaired and thought that she had been betrayed. She settled for a “drunken, worthless vagabond” who was overseer of a neighboring plantation. But then her true love returned, and upon finding her married, promptly left for France. Some time later, her birth mother and her first love had an extramarital affair which resulted in Elsa’s birth. Elsa, however, was turned over to her mother’s brother to raise.
Elsa remembered that as a young girl she was adored by both her uncle and his negro servants, and often her mother, “Aunt Anna”, would visit. At the age of five, Elsa was sent to New Orleans to attend school, and only saw her uncle on occasion – they communicated mostly through letters and he always made sure she was well provided for.
At the age of twelve, something changed because Elsa, according to her autobiography, “developed with a rapidity marvelous even in the hotbed, the South, and upon reaching the age of twelve, I was as much a woman in form, stature and appearance as most women at sixteen.” She met a man who she thought handsome and they began to meet on the sly, since he was not allowed to visit her at the school. He won her heart and one morning she packed everything she could carry and made her escape through a window. Not long after she was, in her words, “standing before a clergyman and was united for better or worse, to him to whom I had given the first fruits of my affections.”
She soon learned that her new husband was a steamboat pilot on the Mississippi – something she had not thought to inquire about before her marriage. They had a pleasant honeymoon traveling through the South and after a month they settled in St. Louis. She settled into her new life as a wife, happy and content and not the least bit regretful of her decision. In her words, “My happiness was, if possible, made greater when at the end of about a year after my marriage, I found a breathing likness [sic] of my husband laid by my side. Three years after my marriage, another stranger came among us – this time a daughter.”
Life was good — what more could a woman ask for than a loving husband and two beautiful children. Tragedy struck, however, just three months after the birth of her daughter. One day while playing with her son a knock was heard at the door – the news was not good. Her husband had been shot, mortally wounded, by a fellow shipmate named Jamieson who was settling a grudge.
Still reeling from shock and grief, a few days later she received a letter informing her of Anna’s death. Anna’s last letter to Elsa was also enclosed and in it “she revealed to me the sad secret of my birth, but told it such loving words that it took away the sting of its illegitimacy.” Two blows in a short time, but one more shock was coming. She was soon informed by her attorney that her husband had spent money as he had earned it, never setting aside any for the future. Elsa was financially crippled, “completely a beggar”, in her words.
By this time, Elsa was probably only sixteen years old and faced with a seemingly insurmountable situation. She did not allow it to get her down, but instead began to develop a bitter hatred for the person who had made her a widow and a beggar – Jamieson! The more desperate her financial situation became the more hate she felt for the man. She searched for a way to get retribution for Jamieson’s crime against her husband and was eventually forced into pawning her possessions and taking a life-altering and drastic step.
She being so young had never learned any sort of trade and knew that her gender and age would be held against her, preventing her from supporting herself and her children. So, she determined to do something “so religiously closed against my sex” – she began to dress herself in male attire. She also thought it would give her better chance to carry out her desire to some day get revenge for her husband’s death.
Jamieson had been tried and convicted but had managed to escape punishment because of a legal technicality. She approached a friend of her late husband and asked for his help. Although he was reluctant to be involved in her plans to disguise herself as a male, he eventually relented when she convinced him it was her only means to avoid starvation. He purchased her a suit of boy’s clothes.
To put her plan into operation, Elsa turned her children over to the Sisters of Charity. She cut her hair to the normal length of a man’s, donned the suit and “endeavored by constant practice to accustom myself to its peculiarities and to feel perfectly at home.” She looked like a boy of fifteen or sixteen years old and a previous asthmatic condition which left her with a bit of hoarseness in her voice was a perfect way to complete her disguise. Elsa became Charley.
After several fruitless attempts to find employment, Charley finally found a job as a cabin boy on a steamer that ran between St. Louis and New Orleans. She would earn $35 per month, determined to endure a life as the “stronger sex”. Luckily, her job was menial in nature so that she could quietly attend to her work without drawing attention to herself. Once a month she would visit her children, first stopping at the friend’s house to change into a dress. It was difficult, but she remained on the boat for almost a year before she found another job as second pantryman. She changed jobs about every six months for a period of time. After she left her last river boat job, she became a brakeman for the Illinois Central Railroad in the spring of 1854.
She was still supporting her children and knew that if she reverted back to life as a woman she would never be able to support them in the manner she had become accustomed to in the four years since donning male attire. But then again, she liked the freedom that the male disguise gave her – she could go anywhere she chose – and “the change from the cumbersome, unhealthy attire of woman” was more suited to her.
While working for the railroad, her boss became suspicious of her gender and plotted to trick her into revealing her true identity. She overheard the plot and was able to escape, this time heading to Detroit. After a tour that took her to Niagra Falls and Canada she decided to return to St. Louis with and eye to eventually head to St. Joseph and westward. While in St. Louis she visited her children, but also ventured out in male attire to walk the streets of the city. One day she overheard a name – Jamieson. As she turned to look she contemplated whether to pull the trigger on the concealed revolver she carried. But then she thought really there was no need to hurry – he wasn’t going anywhere and if she acted it “would end the sweet anticipations of revenge which filled my soul.”
So she followed him to a gambling hall and watched him for hours. When he finally departed, Charley caught up to him and revealed her true identity to him. She pulled out her revolver and shot at Jamieson who immediately drew his gun and fired at her – neither was harmed. Jamieson fired again and Charley was hit in her thigh – she fired again and shot Jamieson in his left arm. The whole scene had lasted about five seconds and both managed to escape, although Charley passed out in an alley.
Upon awakening she found herself in a clinic, attended by a physician and an elderly woman. Her thigh was broken and required six months to completely heal. The elderly woman cared for Charley and her children came to visit. But when her recovery was complete she found her finances depleted and resumed her disguise. Gold fever had still not subsided and Charley joined a party of sixty men headed to California. Leaving her children was difficult, but she saw no other means to provide for them.
She made the long and arduous journey, keeping a journal as the group made their way across the vast prairies and mountains between Missouri and California. Upon reaching her destination, she found the job of gold miner unsuitable and instead found a job in a Sacramento saloon which paid $100 per month. She later invested and became part owner of the saloon, followed by a successful business in the speculation of buying pack mules. She later left her business in the care of someone else, deciding she was homesick to see her children.
She stayed in St. Louis for awhile, but two years after she made her first trip to California she started another one. The trip, however, did not go well. The party included fifteen men, twenty mules and horses and her cattle. When they reached alkali waters she lost 110 cattle, unable to prevent them from drinking the poison. Further down the trail, near the Humboldt River, they were attacked by Snake Indians. The party was forced to fight them off, Charley doing her part by shooting one Indian and stabbing another. One of the men was killed and Charley was severely wounded in her arm.
Upon reaching the Shasta Valley, Charley bought a small ranch to feed her stock until she could sell them. She returned to Sacramento to check on the business she had left behind, finding that it had done quite well. When she sold the business, her stock and the ranch, she had a tidy sum of $30,000 to send on to St. Louis. St. Louis, however, was not as exciting as the life Charley had found out west. She joined the American Fur Company and headed west again.
Charley returned to St. Louis for a time before heading out once again for Pike’s Peak and another gold rush – but not finding much gold for her efforts. She moved to a location closer to Denver and still not having much success, decided to open a bakery and saloon. After contracting mountain fever, she was forced to move to Denver. She rented a saloon and called it the “Mountain Boys Saloon” and kept it through the winter. By the spring of 1859 she was again restless, and deciding to try gold prospecting again she made $200 by the end of the summer. Returning to Denver she bought back her saloon, but soon events would take a disastrous turn for someone and her long-held secret would be revealed. In the spring of 1860, Charley was riding about three miles out of Denver and encountered someone she knew – Jamieson!
He recognized me at the same moment, and his hand went after his revolver almost that instant mine did. I was a second too quick for him, for my shot tumbled him from his mule just as his ball whistled harmlessly by my head. Although dismounted, he was not prostrate and I fired at him again and brought him to the ground. I emptied my revolver upon him as he lay, and should have done the same with its mate had not two hunters at that moment come upon the ground and prevented any further consummation of my designs.
Jamieson was not dead, however. The hunters made a litter to carry him back to Denver. Jamieson had severe wounds, although not fatal. He recovered and journeyed to New Orleans only to die of yellow fever soon after his arrival.
Charley’s identity had been revealed by Jamieson and he explained to the authorities the circumstances, relieving Charley of any blame for the attempts she had made on his life. Her story soon made the headlines – Horace Greeley wrote from Pike’s Peak to the New York Tribune about her story.
Charley continued dressing in male attire and during the winter of 1859-60 operated her saloon. She soon fell in love and married her bartender, H.L. Guerin. In the spring of 1860 they sold the saloon and moved to the mountains to open a boarding house and mine. That fall they returned to Missouri to be reunited with her children, which is where her memoir ended.
Quoted material in this article are excerpts from Charley’s memoir, Mountain Charley, or the Adventures of Mrs. E.J. Guerin, Who Was Thirteen Years in Male Attire. It’s an interesting read – especially the chapter (which I didn’t elaborate on) of her first trek to California. The book is a free download here and only 52 pages.
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Tombstone Tuesday: One Moment – 293 Tombstones
It has been said that the tragedy that occurred seventy-seven years ago on Thursday, March 18, 1937 was the “day a town lost its future, the day a generation perished, the day when angels cried.” (Gone at 3:17). On that day, just minutes before school was to be dismissed for a much-anticipated three-day weekend, Lemmie R. Butler, a manual arts teacher, turned on a sanding machine and a spark escaped into the air, which unbeknownst to anyone was also mixed with gas.
The school had been built three years earlier and it was a show place, built not with taxes from the hard-working oil field families, but with money from the oil companies. It was possibly the wealthiest school district in the country, if not the world, at that time. Superintendent William Chesley Shaw was proud of his school, and even though the school was well-funded he still fretted over cost-savings – something that would prove fatal on that day in 1937.
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Surname Saturday: Isham
Some of the earliest records of this surname (pronounced EYE-sham) occurred in eleventh century England. There are two Isham families that settled in the Colonies, one in Massachusetts and one in Virginia. The families migrated from Northamptonshire in England, where there was a village called Isham, near the Ise River, which is possibly where the family name was derived. Adding the suffix “ham” which means “home” to “Ise” would result in the family name of Isham.
Both of the American Isham families have interesting histories. One married into a well-known Virginia political family, the Randolphs, whose descendants include Thomas Jefferson and Edith Bolling Wilson (Woodrow’s second wife), Chief Justice John Marshall and General Robert E. Lee.
Captain Henry Isham
Henry Isham was born circa 1626-1628 in Northamptonshire to parents William and Mary Brett Isham. He migrated to Bermuda Hundred, Henrico, Virginia, situated along the James River, in 1656. He married Katherine (or Catherine) Banks, daughter of Christopher Banks, and they had at least three children: Henry, Mary and Anne.
Son Henry died young in 1678 and never married. Mary and Anne married prominent men, however.
Mary Isham Randolph
Mary Isham was born circa 1658 in Bermuda Hundred. In 1678 she married Colonel William Randolph, who had immigrated in 1674 and settled on “Turkey Island” in Henrico County, Virginia. William was a member of the House of Burgesses and served as its Speaker in 1698.
Mary bore nine children – seven sons and two daughters: William, Thomas, Isham, Richard, John, Henry, Edward, Mary, and Elizabeth.
Isham’s daughter, Jane, was the wife of Peter Jefferson and mother to Thomas Jefferson of Monticello.
Richard’s family intermarried with the Bolling family (Edith Bolling Wilson). Sister Anne’s family also intermarried with the Bollings.
Daughter Mary’s son William Stith was the third president of William and Mary College from 1752-1755. His grandfather William Randolph had helped found the College and also served as a trustee.
Anne Isham Eppes
Anne married Colonel Francis Eppes and to their marriage were born seven children, according to one family historian: Francis, Isham, William, Elizabeth, Mary, Sarah and Anne.
Martha Eppes, Francis and Anne’s granddaughter, married John Wayles and they were the parents of Martha Wayles, wife of Thomas Jefferson, so they were cousins having the same great-great grandfather, Captain Henry Isham. Henry and Katherine were also third great-grandparents of Chief Justice John Marshall and fourth-great grandparents of General Robert E. Lee.
John Isham (Massachusetts)
John Isham of Barnstable, Massachusetts was born on March 31, 1654, either in England or Virginia — I could not locate any sources that knew for sure. According to A Survey of The Ishams in England and America published in 1938, at that time there had been three traditions about John’s origin and how he came to New England, although only one seemed probable. One tradition was dismissed as “worthless”, another was described as “concocted by some unscrupulous genealogist for consumption by credulous and trusting Americans.”
The third tradition, according to author Homer Brainard, seemed to indicate the possibility that John might have been in Virginia before going to Massachusetts. Records indicated that in 1670 Virginia authorities demanded from Plymouth authorities that James Percival be extradited, he being accused of running away from Virginia with a boat. Brainard thought it possible that if Percival had companions, perhaps John Isham was one of them and that they might have wanted to escape political tensions and antagonisms which were brewing during that time in Virginia.
John married Jane Parker, member of a prominent Barnstable family, on December 16, 1677. John and Jane had ten children: Jane, John, Isaac, Sarah, Mary, Patience, Hannah, Joseph and Thankful. John became a freeman in 1691 under a new charter uniting Plymouth with the Bay Colonies (Puritans vs. Separatists).
The new charter no longer required church membership in order to vote, although it is uncertain what faith John Isham practiced, as the records of the Congregational Church of Barnstable have no record of his membership nor the births or baptisms of his children. One family historian noted that he was tolerant towards Quakers, having been the witness for one prominent Quaker’s will. Puritans were known to be highly intolerant of Quakers (see previous article on Puritans vs. Quakers), so it seems unlikely he was a Puritan.
John Isham died September 3, 1713 in Barnstable. His grandchildren served in the Revolutionary War, and his great-grandson Jirah was a general during the War of 1812.
I could go on extensively about this family’s history. When I selected this surname for an article, little did I know how prominently it impacted history with so many American historical figures descended from it — just another reason why I am “Diggin’ History”!
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Off the Map: Ghost Towns of the Mother Road – Glenrio, Texas (and New Mexico)
This ghost town was originally named “Rock Island” but was later changed by the Rock Island and Pacific Railroad to “Glenrio” or “Glen Rio”. The name was a curious choice, however, since “glen” means “valley” and “rio” means “river” – neither of those geographical features are anywhere near this town that sprung up in the early 1900’s.
The area was opened to farmers for settlement as early as 1905 with 150-acre tracts of land for sale. A railroad depot was established the following year, and with farmers and ranchers settling in the area, freight and cattle shipments and the introduction of farming created the need for other businesses.
This article has been enhanced and published in the June 2018 issue of Digging History Magazine. Other articles in this issue include: “On a Whim and a Bet: America’s First Coast-to-Coast Road Trip”, “Victorian Pastimes: Girdling the Globe”, “Victorian Fashion: Bicycles, Bloomers and Suffrage”, and more. Preview the issue here or purchase here.
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Tombstone Tuesday: The Preacher Sons of Enoch and Tabitha Holton
Enoch Holton was born on October 19, 1796 in North Carolina, and his wife Tabitha Pipkin was born on November 28, 1796. Enoch and Tabitha married on April 2, 1822 and had a family of at least five children (my estimates):
Elvira (1823 or 1824)
Jesse Walker Pipkin (1826)
Tabitha (1830)
Isaac Pipkin (1833)
Alonzo Jerkins (1837)
The Holtons were a deeply religious family and of the Free Will Baptist faith until they, along with others of the same faith became part of the Disciples of Christ, which at the time was attracting congregants from both the Free Will Baptists as well as the “Regular Baptists”. The transition appears to have taken place for the Holton family in the late 1830’s or early 1840’s. The Broad Creek Church was established by Henry Smith on January 6, 1844 in Craven County (later Pamlico County), and Enoch Holton was the first Elder of the church.
The Disciples of Christ movement arose out of disagreements over leadership and perhaps the rigidness of other denominations in regards to such things as baptism and communion. According to North Carolina Disciples of Christ: A History of Their Rise and Progress, and of Their Contribution to Their General Brotherhood, their slogan was “Back to Christ”. The establishment of the Disciples of Christ was an outgrowth of the so-called “Restoration Movement” with an emphasis on Christian education and an appeal to worship with both one’s head and heart.
The Holton sons took their faith very seriously and became ordained ministers (and farmers) – in 1927 one son was the oldest living Disciples of Christ minister in North Carolina, another was known as the “walking preacher” and another known as a “singing master”.
Jesse Walker Pipkin Holton
Jesse was born on April 28, 1826, the first son of Enoch and Tabitha. According to a biographical sketch written by George T. Tyson following Jesse’s death, Jesse was born into a humble Christian home. He was uneducated but learned to read and write.
On July 1, 1849, Jesse confessed his sins and was baptized by Henry Smith. In 1850 Jesse was still single and enumerated for the 1850 Census as a laborer living in Craven County. On January 19, 1854, Jesse married Barbara Eleanor Bennett, daughter of William and Barbara Brinson Bennett.
Jesse preached his first sermon (of many) on February 1, 1858 at his home church. On August 9, 1858 Jesse was “set apart to the ministry” and ordained by J.B. Respess. Jesse began his ministry and was listed as a “minister” on the 1860 census, along with Barbara and three children:
Jesse was likely both a farmer and a minister since in 1870 he is enumerated as a farmer and in 1880 as a preacher/farmer. In 1880 the children of Jesse and Barbara are listed as Sarah, Tabitha, Enoch, Jesse, Alexander and Barby, just one year old. The last census to enumerate Jesse Holton was in 1900 when he was still a farmer at the age of 74 years. He and Barbara had been married for 47 years.
George Tyson wrote his tribute to “Uncle Jesse” in the October 7, 1904 issue of the Disciples of Christ Watch Tower publication:
Uncle Jesse was familiar with the Bible. He told me he had read the New Testament through as many times as the number of years he had been engaged in the ministry.
Through rain and sunshine, through summer’s heat and winter’s cold he has gone for forty-six years, more than four-fifths of this time on foot. For thirty-eight of those years he had no team. His longest pastorate was a Bay Creek Church, for which he preached eighteen years, and never missed a visit. There was not a year during his ministerial life but that he had the care of one or more churches. He was a good preacher; but, perhaps, his strongest characteristic was his daily walk, modest in manners, and chaste in conversation. For forty-six years he has preached, in church, in school-house, in barns, and in homes; of righteousness, temperance and the judgment to come, calling people to repentance. His life was an exemplification of the gospel which he preached. His Christian life was faithful to the end, his faith unwavering from his baptism to death. And for all of this his compensation fell far behind in affording sustenance. He told me just a short while before his death that he “preached the gospel for the love of the gospel.” Not in state, but in church, his counsel was often sought.
Jesse’s first sermon was in 1858 and his last sermon, a “funeral discourse,” was preached about a month before he died on August 9, 1904. In January of that year, Jesse and Barbara had celebrated fifty years of marriage.
Isaac Pipkin Holton
Isaac was born on January 24, 1833, the second son of Enoch and Tabitha. Isaac became a Christian at the age of 22 and was baptized on July 4, 1855 by Gideon Allen. He was ordained as a minister of the Christian Church in 1861 by William Dunn, Japtha Holton (his uncle I believe) and J.W. Holton (Jesse).
Isaac volunteered to join the Confederate Army on January 24, 1862. At the time of the first muster he was listed as “absent – sick”. On March 23, 1862, the records indicate that Isaac “deserted in Craven Co.”.
Perhaps Isaac was not well-suited to Army life. On May 31, 1865, Isaac married Rebecca Ann Robinson in front of a Justice of the Peace in Craven County. Their first child, Enoch Tyson, was born in 1865 – perhaps this was a “shotgun wedding”(!?)
Isaac was enumerated as a farmer in 1870 and he and Rebecca then had three children: Enoch (5), Mary (3) and Tomlin (1). Curiously, in 1880 they have another daughter named “Mary F.” (in addition to the Mary enumerated in 1870) and one named “Mecora B.” Isaac continued to work as a farmer.
For the last census before his death in 1907, Isaac still worked as a farmer. He was a part-time minister and farmer following his conversion and ordination, according to George Tyson’s biographical sketch:
Bro. Holton was deprived of school advantages, but he was endowed with more than average natural ability, loved literature and read much. He was familiar with the Bible from the beginning of Genesis to the end of Revelation. He read many books and was especially fond of poetry. A day or two before his death, prostrate on his bed, he repeated and sang one or two hymns and preached a short sermon, using for his text, “If a man die, shall he live again?” Bro. Isaac did not give his full time to the ministry, however he did a great deal of preaching and singing (he was a singing master) until the latter years of his life. Two years before his death he had the care of a church. He was called upon to preach a great many funerals. He delivered a funeral address only about a year before his death.
Bro. Holton was one of the most active and energetic of men; a good conversationalist; and his home “given to hospitality.”
Isaac died on November 10, 1907 and was buried in Pamlico County. His wife Rebecca lived until 1916.
Alonzo Jerkins Holton
Alonzo was the youngest son of Enoch and Tabitha, born on July 20, 1837. It appears that Alonzo was perhaps named after either a family friend or relative. I found a reference to an Alonzo T. Jerkins of Cravens County who signed a bond for a negro boy in 1855.
Alonzo married Mary Frances Holton on July 21, 1860 with Jesse performing the ceremony. Whether Mary Frances was a cousin or had been married before to another Holton I do not know. Something, however, must have happened to Mary Frances because on September 19, 1867 he married Mary Jane Lewis – Isaac officiated that ceremony.
On January 1, 1866, the Broad Creek Church had been reorganized and Isaac was chosen as the pastor and Clerk; Alonzo was chosen assistant Clerk. On October 9, 1866, Alonzo was ordained to the ministry at Broad Creek. His father Enoch had died on June 9, 1865 and in 1870 Tabitha, aged 74, was living with Alonzo and Mary Jane, along with their two young children Alexander (2) and Augustus (1). Alonzo was a farmer.
In 1880 Alonzo and Mary Jane’s family had grown, adding children Ella, Isaac, Minnie and Cally. Alonzo was then occupied as both a preacher and a farmer. He had apparently become more active in ministry as he had joined the North Carolina Christian Missionary Society in 1877. In 1871, he had preached at the Antioch Convention, and “Brother Holton acquitted himself well.” In 1877 he again spoke at the annual convention and his ministry was chronicled:
On Friday night we had the pleasure of hearing Brother A.J. Holton, who preached an earnest, zealous and pathetic discourse. This is the first time I ever heard Brother Holton. I was pleased with his efforts. I have understood that much of his time is employed on his farm, which prevents him from doing what he might do under different circumstances.
Alonzo’s family continued to grow. By 1900 he and Mary Jane had added three more children: Cornelia (19), Wilford H. (16) and Hattie E. (12). Alonzo continued to farm, but according to the Chalice News, a newsletter of the First Christian Church in Richland, North Carolina, Alonzo served as pastor of that church in 1891 – as noted above he did more farming, presumably to make a living and feed his family.
In 1910, at age 72, he was still a farmer and only Hattie remained at home with her parents. His primary occupation in 1920, however, was “Preacher” and his industry was “Gospel” – he was 82 and Mary Jane 76 years old. In 1930, at the age of 92 he was still preaching, a clergyman in the Christian Church according to that year’s census.
On January 1, 1935, at the age of 97, Alonzo Jerkins Holton passed away and was buried in the Alonzo Holton Cemetery in Pamlico County. Mary Jane passed away in 1937. On his tombstone, the inscription reads: “I hope to see my pilot face to face when I have crossed the bar.”
At the time of his death he was one of the two surviving members of the original North Carolina Christian Missionary Society members. According to the Pamlico Profile, “he read the Bible religiously; a large part of his money was spent for books; he died saying he had no grudge against any person.”
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Surname Saturday: Kerfoot
The surname Kerfoot (or alternately spelled Kearfott), like many other surnames, was a locational name and would have meant “dweller at the hill-slope at the foot of the hills (or valley)” or simply a family who lived at the foot of a hill or in a valley. Surnames such as Kerfoot were used by those who lived near some landscape feature like a hill, valley, tree, etc.
As with most early surnames, there were spelling variations including: Kyrfytt, Kearfott, Kerfut, Carefoot, Carefoote, Cearfoot, Kerfoote and Kearfoote, just to name a few. There was one instance of the same soldier, William Kearfott, whose name was spelled three different ways on the historical register of Virginians in the Revolutionary War – Carefeet, Karfatt and Kerfoot.
A quick search at Find-A-Grave yielded these surnames: Carefoot, Carefoote, Kerfoot, Kearfoot, Kerfott and Kearfott. The most reliable records regarding the first Kerfoot to land in America appear to be those researched in Kerfoot, Kearfott and Allied Families in America (KKAFA). The history of that family is taken from that volume and summarized below.
According to KKAFA, there were at least three family branches in North America – one in Virginia in the mid-1700’s, one in Lancaster, Pennsylvania in 1818 and another one in Canada around 1820. These three branches are believed to have migrated from Ireland. Earlier colonial records indicate the presence of a Thomas Kerfitt (1624) who came over as an indentured servant and Elizabeth Kerfoote (1637), another indentured servant. “Margaret Kearfoote, of Wigan, (Lancashire) spinster, bound to Ezekiel Parr for 4 Yeares” appears on the ship Concord’s passenger list in 1638.
One record indicates “Thos. Buttler, Son of Wm. Butler, (bound) to Ganther Carefoot for 4 Yeares.” According to KKAFA and at the time of that research, no additional mention of Ganther Carefoote was found – no land or grant records in Virginia, Maryland or Pennsylvania from 1701 until William Kerfoot bought a plantation in 1763. From William Kerfoot onward the records appear to be the most reliable and considered by many as the founder of that family in Virginia.
William Kerfoot
It has been presumed that William Kerfoot immigrated to Virginia from Ireland, bringing with him his wife and three sons. The first evidence of his presence in Frederick County is shown on a deed for 192 acres of land along the Opequon Creek – the name on the deed was William Carefoot. The Kerfoots, along with the Glasses, Allens and Vances were named as the earliest settlers of this region of Virginia in A History of the Valley of Virginia by Samuel Kercheval.
William Kerfoot’s house was said to have been:
… sturdily built of logs after the fashion of pioneer dwellings, with doors and blinds of strong batten work made of double layers of wood strongly fastened with hand wrought nails. The strength of the doors suggest that they have been constructed with an eye to defences again the Indians who remained a menace to the settlers for some years after 1750.
The Kerfoot family were of the Baptist faith, although it is not known if they practiced that faith before arriving in America. When the Kerfoots settled in that area, Indian attacks were not uncommon. According to KKAFA, the Church of England relaxed its standards to allow what the termed “dissenters” to populate the Shenandoah Valley. Quakers came from Pennsylvania and a group of Baptists came from New Jersey and persecution ensued:
A particular victim of the Church’s wrath was the Rev. James Ireland, an eloquent and power Baptist preacher who performed the marriage ceremony for many of the Kerfoots during this period. It is related that the English authorities decided to “eliminate the Baptist from their midst” and that a Mrs. Sutherlin bribed her negro servant to poison the Ireland family. William Kerfoot, a member of Ireland’s congregation, was active in finding the poison and in securing the perpetrators of the attempt for trial. Ireland recovered only to meet imprisonment and fresh attempts upon his life.
This served to make the Baptists more determined to defend their faith and the right to worship as their consciences dictated. The Virginia branch of the Kerfoot family have largely remained true to the Baptist faith with family members serving in various leadership capacities within the denomination and local churches.
William and his wife Margaret had seven children: George, William, Samuel, Margaret, Elizabeth, Sarah and Mary. His name appears in court records, including law suits, at various times up until his death in 1779. His son George had preceded him in death in 1778.
In the first version of his will, William gave land to his remaining sons William and Samuel and ordered that the part of his plantation where George’s widow lived be sold “at publick vendue and the money arising by the sale thereof to be equally divided between my four daughters Margaret, Elizabeth, Sarah and Mary and each of them to have an equal share of my stocks as before mentioned and also an equal share of all my Household goods.” Samuel also received William’s “negro boy, Will” as part of his inheritance. About four months after the first will was signed, William revised his will and, instead of selling the land she lived on as stipulated in the first will, he changed his mind:
Peggy Kerfoot, widow of my late son, George, decsd, in consideration of natural love and affection and for the better enabling her to support her children and also for the sum of £1500, current money, a tract of land whereon the said Peggy now lives and all my other lands on that side of the Opequon, notwithstanding any will or bequest heretofore made.
It appears that his daughter Margaret perhaps never married or was married somewhere else other than Frederick County. Elizabeth, married twice, had no children. Sarah had eight children, two of them unmarried. Mary was the youngest daughter who married Arthur Carter, he from a prosperous Quaker family that had migrated from Bucks County, Pennsylvania to the Shenandoah Valley. Mary and Arthur had fifteen children – five died in infancy, however.
George’s children did quite well. Son John was one of the most prosperous farmers and land owners, his sons and daughters well provided for. His daughter Catherine married George Lewis Ball, whose family were ancestors of both George Washington and General Robert E. Lee. Descendant John David Kerfoot migrated to Texas, but upon hearing of the war between the states returned to his native Virginia and joined Lee’s Northern Virginia army. After the war he helped his father restore the plantation and then returned to Texas to later become mayor of Dallas.
Farther down the branch line, descendants of George Kerfoot served in World War II – one fought at Iwo Jima and Okinawa and saw the flag hoisted at Iwo Jima, another was a doctor in a Japanese prisoner camp, who on August 1, 1945 “observed an enormous white cloud in the distance which rose to tremendous height.”
William Kearfott
The spelling of surnames was so varied and uncertain in colonial times, but the gravestone of William Kerfoot’s second son’s gravestone is inscribed with “William Kearfott” and thus his descendants use that spelling. As noted above, records indicate various spellings of his name even on Revolutionary War records.
William married Mary Bryarly after the war ended and they had two children, William and Mary, before Mary died shortly after the second birth. His second marriage produced no more children. William Kearfott was perhaps the wealthiest of the three brothers, as evidenced by the taxes he paid on his various properties. William died on February 4, 1811.
His granddaughter Evaline Kearfott married Nickolas Coday, a cousin of Colonel William F. Cody, a.k.a. “Buffalo Bill”. His descendants fought and some died in the Civil War – one lived in Richmond and was a close friend of General and Mrs. Robert E. Lee. Of course, as it happened many times during the Civil War, families were divided in their loyalties. William’s son took his family, except for one son who was already a successful surveyor in Virginia, to Ohio. The Ohio Kearfoots fought for the Union and those who were still in Virginia for the Confederates. The two sons of John Piercall Kearfoot (who remained in Virginia) made their way through Union lines to visit their father only to find a Union solder already there – their first cousin from Ohio.
Samuel Kerfoot
Samuel had two sons, William S. Kerfoot and Samuel Kerfoot II. William served during the War of 1812 and remained in Virginia. Samuel, however, migrated to Kentucky in 1820 and in 1824 married Margaret Ann Lampton, sister of Jane Lampton Clemens and mother of Samuel Clemens, a.k.a. Mark Twain.
His descendants became more adventurous and continued to move further west. Great-grandsons Marion Munroe Kerfoot, George Henry Kerfoot and John Samuel Kerfoot participated in the “Oklahoma Run” in 1889 when the “Cherokee Strip” was opened for settlement, thus becoming pioneers of the Oklahoma Territory. They opened dry-goods and grocery stores and were among the founders of the town of El Reno.
Thus the descendants of William Kerfoot of the Shenandoah Valley became part of the fabric of America – they fought wars, built prosperous businesses, became doctors, ministers and educators, and were witnesses to world-changing events.
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Feisty Females: Kate Gleason
Catherine Anselm “Kate” Gleason, like her good friend Lillian Moller Gilbreth, was an engineer and businesswoman long before those career choices were considered appropriate for a woman to pursue. Her father left Ireland in 1848, three years after the potato famine, married and had a son and then lost his wife and one-year old daughter to tuberculosis. The family had been living in Chicago, but William returned to Rochester following his wife and daughter’s death to work at a machine shop and study mathematics at night school. He married Ellen McDermott, also an Irish immigrant, at the age of twenty-seven. Kate was born on November 25, 1865 in Rochester.
William established a machine shop with some other men and in 1867 he patented a device that held tools in a metal-working lathe – he called it Gleason’s Patent Tool Rest. When he and his partners disagreed on the direction of the company, William left and joined Kidd Iron Works as a supervisor. In 1875, William took over the company and renamed it Gleason Works. His oldest child, Tom, was his right-hand man.
Kate attended an all-girls Catholic school, Nazareth Academy. She is said to have resisted the stereotype of the day that girls were second best. She remarked later, “Girls were not considered as valuable as boys; so I always jumped from a little higher barn, and vaulted a taller fence than did my boy playmates, just to prove that I was as good as they.” At age nine she was reading books on machinery and engineering, hardly subjects that were considered appropriate for a young girl.
Kate was eleven years old when Tom died of typhoid fever, a shocking blow to his family and the company. At the age of twelve Kate began working for her father, first as his bookkeeper and later “tinkering” in the machine shop and running the office.
In 1884, Kate became the first woman to ever enter the engineering program at Cornell University. She excelled but Gleason Works was struggling financially as companies were failing and unable to pay their bills, a result of the recession which occurred between 1882 and 1885. Her father wrote to ask her to return for a year to assist him.
Kate never returned to Cornell, but took night classes at the Mechanics Institute in Rochester, studying mechanical engineering. Again she was running the office at Gleason Works and traveling to the Midwest to sell the machinery. At age twenty-five, Kate she was officially named the Secretary-Treasurer of the newly reorganized Gleason Tool Company. According to Jan Gleason, wife of Kate’s grand-nephew James:
… it was her business and sales sense that grew the company. Kate convinced her father to concentrate on their bevel gear planer, a machine that made gears which could work on a bend. Their machine made gears faster and cheaper than any competitor’s. Beveled gears were a very important part of the fast-growing bicycle industry, and a major contributor to the rapidly expanding auto industry. (Women of Steel and Stone: 22 Inspirational Architects, Engineers and Landscape Designers)
Even without a degree, Kate was quite accomplished and knowledgeable in the field of mechanical engineering. Not only was she able to explain the processes of the products she was selling, she also possessed a breadth of knowledge about the engineering processes of the companies she was selling the products to. Fred Colvin, machinist and author, gave her the title “the Madame Curie of machine tools”.
At age twenty-nine her doctor recommended some rest and relaxation in Atlantic City, but Kate decided to board a cattle steamer and head across the ocean to Great Britain and Europe, the only woman passenger on the ship. By the time she arrived she felt better and set out to visit potential clients in Scotland, England, Germany and France. It was a successful trip with several large orders secured and Gleason Works became part of the first wave of American businesses to expand overseas.
Rochester played a major role in the women’s suffrage movement and Kate was undoubtedly influenced by it, perhaps emboldening her to step out and pursue non-traditional roles. Susan B. Anthony, a resident of Rochester, cast votes along with fourteen other women in the 1872 elections – she was later arrested for breaking a federal law. At age twenty-two Kate joined a business women’s club, the Fortnightly Ignorance Club, of which Anthony, a friend of her parents, was a member as well.
Susan Anthony had given Kate some advice early in her life, “[A]ny advertising is good. Get praise if possible, blame if you have to. But never stop being talked about.”
Anthony gave Kate set of books, History of Woman Suffrage, in 1903 and inscribed it with the following: “Kate Gleason, the ideal business woman of who I dreamed fifty years ago – a worthy daughter of a noble father.” Susan Anthony died a few months later at the age of eighty-six.
So impressive was Kate’s knowledge of the machine and tool industry, her father’s invention of the bevel gear planer was sometimes credited to her (even Henry Ford did so). Kate left Gleason Works in 1913, some say due to a family conflict and/or gender discrimination. After thirty-five years with her family’s company she began to work for Ingle Machine Company.
She received accolades and prestigious awards through the years of her illustrious career. In 1913 she was elected to the German Engineering Society, followed by election into the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. At an ASME dance a few months later, she was the only woman among four thousand men at the event.
When Ingle Machine Company experienced financial setbacks, Kate was appointed receiver by a bankruptcy court and later restored the company to solvency. Two years after going into receivership owing $140,000, the company was worth over one million dollars at the conclusion of the proceedings. Then came World War I, and one of her friends, the president of First Bank of East Rochester, was called to duty overseas. By a unanimous vote, Kate Gleason was elected president of the bank, the first woman (without benefit of family ties) to head a national bank and holding the position until 1919 when the war ended.
For years she had a vision for low-cost housing to be constructed in East Rochester and had bought land with that project in mind. Her first projects were turning a swamp into a park and designing and engineering a country club called Genundawah. With the end of World War I came a “wedding boom” – hundreds of soldiers returning to marry their sweethearts and there was a housing shortage. Kate’s plans were for a community to be built called “Concrest”.
The community would resemble a French village and she would employ the use of concrete instead of wood and bricks. The plans were standardized, and even with the use of mostly unskilled workers, one hundred six-room cement houses were efficiently and economically built. It gained her another prestigious membership in the American Concrete Institute, and again she was the first woman member.
Kate helped to restore the war-torn French village of Septmonts, and after leaving Rochester she headed to South Carolina to develop a resort in Beaufort. Later she started a development in Sausalito, California. On January 9, 1933, however, Kate Gleason died of pneumonia. Even after departing Rochester, it was still her home and she was buried there. The Rochester Institute of Technology as well as other institutions, libraries and parks in the Rochester area were recipients of her generosity at the time her personal fortune of over one million dollars was distributed.
Lillian Gilbreth, her long-time friend, was said to have received money from Kate’s estate. In the book Lillian Gilbreth – Redefining Domesticity, it was noted of their friendship:
A memorable visit to Rochester, New York, brought her together for the first time with a rare woman engineer by the name of Kate Gleason. Lillian had never met a woman like her – an unmarried middle-aged construction expert, who thought it perfectly appropriate to climb up the side of a steam engine to drive it and to not bother with traditional feminine clothing on construction sites.
And from the book, Women of Steel and Stone: 22 Inspirational Architects, Engineers and Landscape Designers:
Frank and Lillian Gilbreth occasionally consulted with Gleason Works. On one trip, Kate and Lillian sat in the cab of a small steam engine, and Kate showed Lillian how to run it. Kate applied Frank and Lillian’s time and motion techniques to the construction of Concrest houses and saved considerable time and money. Kate and Lillian also sailed together on the Scythia from New York on Thursday June 19, 1924, five days after Frank’s death. Lillian quickly scheduled a daily four o’clock tea in the Garden Lounge for all the ladies on the ship. Libby Sanders, Lillian’s companion, wrote in her diary, “A fascinating person, Miss Gleason, held the stage. She is the jolliest and most adorable person. She knows all there is to know about building houses.” Kate, Lillian and Libby were traveling companions in Europe and also sailed home together, returning to New York in August 1924. Kate and Lillian also traveled together to the World Engineering Congress in Tokyo in 1929. The women were such good friends that Kate even left money to Lillian in her will.
Kate Gleason was an outstanding business woman whose career continued to blossom through the years as she pressed ahead in business endeavors which were traditionally male only. She never married or had children, but then it doesn’t sound like she was unfulfilled in her life’s work by not having a family of her own. A quote from Kate aptly sums up her business and personal philosophy: “I had been developing a talent that almost amounted to genius for putting myself in places where other women are not likely to come.”
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Tombstone Tuesday: Titus Walter Blessing – Medimont, Idaho
Titus Walter Blessing was born on August 4, 1855 in Dubuque, Iowa to parents Franz Joseph and Magdalena Rausch Blessing. His father, who went by his middle name Joseph, was born in Germany in 1826 and immigrated to America in 1850. His mother was born in Bavaria in 1825 and her date of immigration is unknown.
In 1860, Titus and his family were living in Porter, Freeborn, Minnesota, where his father was a farmer. In 1870, his family were still farmers and they had relocated to West Newton, Nicollet, Minnesota. Titus learned the mason trade and in 1876 he moved to Helena, Montana where he also mined and prospected across the state.
During the Indian Wars of the 1870’s, Titus fought Sitting Bull’s band of Indians and served as a private scout for Buffalo Bill, himself a scout for General Miles. When war broke out with the Nez Perce tribe, Titus joined eighty other citizens of Helena to fight, but the government wouldn’t allow them to fight unless they joined the military. They declined and returned home to Helena. Therefore, they apparently missed the Battle of Big Hole.
Titus met Anna Marguerite Hoffman, who had been born in Munster, Germany and immigrated to America in 1861, when she came from California to visit a cousin in Montana. On May 31, 1879 Titus married Anna and in 1880 they were enumerated in Helena, with Titus employed as a stone mason. Their first child, Amelia, had been born two months earlier.
In 1881, another daughter, Anna, was born. In 1883 the family migrated across the Big Bend country to Spokane. Titus left his family there and went to Coeur d’Alene, arriving before the gold rush. He assisted in drafting a resolution barring Chinamen from coming into Coeur d’Alene County. It’s quite possible that Titus might have met Wyatt Earp who came to Idaho with his brother and common law wife Josephine Marcus for the Coeur d’Alene and Pritchard gold rush.
After mining for awhile, Titus sold his claims and became a rancher when the land previously occupied by the reservation opened up. There he built a homestead in Medimont, Idaho, and by 1900 Titus and his family had grown to include five more children: Rose Elizabeth (b. 1894), Walter Louis (b. 1888), Phillip Robert (b. 1890), Bessie Katie (b. 1893) and John Wesley (b. 1896). As of 1903, when a history of northern Idaho was compiled and published, Titus had one hundred and four acres of land and was doing well. Further, according to An Illustrated History of North Idaho: Embracing Nez Perces, Idaho, Latah, Kootenai and Shoshone Counties, State of Idaho:
Mr. Blessing has held the office of justice of the peace and is an excellent officer, being faithful and impartial. He has been active in the advancement of educational facilities and is a progressive man in all lines. He has some fine placer ground in the Saint Joe region and is developing it well. Mr. Blessing and his wife are true frontier people and have done a good work in development and building up the country.
Tragedy struck the Blessing family in 1906, however. Interestingly, the story of their tragedy was found in newspapers across the country (perhaps taken from the wire service):
Titus and Anna’s three youngest children were skating on Lake Coeur d’Alene Lake on November 29, 1906. Other skaters were rescued but their children drowned along with another local resident. They were buried in the Medimont Cemetery in Kootenai County, Idaho.
Tragedy, unfortunately, struck again just three years later when their second daughter Anna died of an infection induced by surgical thread and scissors left in her body during surgery for cancer, according to family history. Anna was twenty-eight years old at the time of her death and was married to Eugene Leslie Lamb. Their son, Harvey Allen Lamb, had been born in 1906 and in 1910 Harvey (4 years old) was living with Titus and Anna in Medimont. His father remarried but it appears Harvey remained with his grandparents – he is again enumerated as their grandson in 1920.
Their daughter Rose, who had married John Ahlstrom, passed away in 1924 – like her sister Anna she died from complications following cancer surgery. She and her sister both were buried in the Medimont Cemetery with their younger siblings.
Titus continued to farm. At the age of seventy-four, he and Anna were enumerated in 1930 and living in Medimont. Their son Walter lived nearby and was employed as a farmer as well. On July 16, 1937, Titus Walter Blessing passed away at the age of eighty-one and was buried in the same cemetery as his children who had preceded him in death. His widow Anna and their son Walter would be buried in the same cemetery, Anna in 1940 and Walter in 1967.
Titus Blessing was a pioneer settler of northern Idaho and highly esteemed by his fellow citizens:
A pioneer of the true grit and spirit, a man of sound principles and uprightness, a public minded citizen of worth and integrity, and always dominated with sagacity, keen foresight and manifesting energy and enterprise, the subject of this article is deserving of consideration in the history of this county.
A note of interest — the reader might notice links to previous articles I’ve written and published. I didn’t intend that there would so many links (Wyatt Earp, Josephine Marcus, The Battle of Big Hole) as Titus Blessing was, as is customary for the Tombstone Tuesday articles, picked randomly. I just love it when stuff like this happens though — and just another reason why I LOVE history and writing this blog!
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Mothers of Invention: Lillian Moller Gilbreth
Lillian Moller Gilbreth was born on May 24, 1878 in Oakland, California to parents William and Anne Moller. She grew up in a Victorian, German-American home, the second and oldest of ten children (the first child died in infancy). Lillie (she later changed her name to Lillian) was shy and introverted, so much so that she was schooled at home by her mother until the age of nine. Even then Lillian wasn’t able to “fit in” – academically she excelled but socially she was awkward. Home and domestic life were more suited to her, learning to sew and care for her siblings.
By the time she entered high school she was actually eager to attend, although she still experienced social awkwardness with classmates. She dreaded the day when she would have to consider delving into the world of dating and courtship – she was petrified of boys and thought herself unattractive.
While she resigned herself to perhaps remaining single, she yearned for something beyond remaining with her family to care for them and leading the life of a spinster. Writing, especially poetry, was a way for her to express herself, however. In the end, writing was what drew her out and she later found acceptance with her peers. One of her English teachers encouraged her to pursue a literary career. She admired her mother but she was inspired by her mother’s sister, Dr. Lillian Powers, a psychiatrist.
As the Victorian era came to a close in the late nineteenth century and the twentieth century dawned, there was a demographic shift in America from rural to urban – the country would soon become more mechanized. Social mores were changing as well. It became more acceptable for young ladies to pursue careers, although they weren’t welcomed as equals to their male counterparts in business and industry for years to come.
When she decided she wanted to pursue an academic career, her parents weren’t exactly thrilled, although they acquiesced when she rationalized to them that she would educate herself to become a teacher and to later care for her own children when she married. Deep down, however, Lillian hoped to avoid marriage and motherhood for awhile, if not altogether.
Lillian excelled at Berkeley, finishing at the top of her class with a degree in English. After graduating she wanted to continue her educational pursuits, but she wanted to attend school in the East, enrolling in Columbia’s Psychology Department. She had family in New York, but still her parents were concerned for her. She threw herself wholeheartedly into her studies, often skipping meals until she grew thin. When cold weather set in she became ill and had to return home to California.
Still determined to pursue a graduate education, she enrolled at Berkeley and planned to write a master’s thesis on Elizabethan literature. Having completed that degree, Lillian wanted to take a trip to Europe with friends before she began her doctoral program. Her parents would not allow here to travel un-chaperoned so one of the teachers at Oakland High School, Minnie Bunker, accompanied them. Before heading overseas, however, they made a stop in Boston to tour the city and meet Minnie’s family. There Lillian would meet her future husband, Frank Bunker Gilbreth, Minnie’s nephew.
Frank Gilbreth, being extremely gregarious and extroverted, was the polar opposite of Lillian, yet they later forged not only a strong and successful relationship as husband and wife, but as business partners. After their engagement, even before marriage, they forged a partnership. Frank was in the construction business and he relied on Lillian to edit manuscripts and prepare advertising materials. During their honeymoon trip, Frank requested of her a list of qualifications she was bringing to their “partnership”. However formal and rigid that might sound, the two made it work for years to come.
Frank wanted to excel in the field of industrial management and motion study, and he spent a considerable amount of time away from home through the years of their marriage. He published several books and training materials over the year, under his name which were in actuality largely compiled and written by Lillian (while having babies, recovering from pregnancy and having yet another child soon after — thirteen in all, with eleven living to adulthood). In those times, of course, it wasn’t acceptable for women to receive recognition for achievements outside the societal norms of wife and mother.
Their business was successful, however, and Lillian added her own theories – she injected psychology, a human touch to the field of motion study and industrial management. Her profile would eventually be raised in that field, however, after Frank died suddenly in 1924, leaving her as the sole breadwinner for her large family. Although it was a struggle at times, Lillian Gilbreth more than arose to the occasion time and again over the remaining years of her long career.
When the Great Depression hit America, she was able to market herself effectively as she helped women stretch their money farther during that trying time. In 1926 she performed market research for Johnson & Johnson (sanitary napkins) and later helped improve management practices at Macy’s. She worked as an industrial engineer for General Electric, helping to re-invent and re-design the modern kitchen. Her work was thorough and meticulous as she interviewed over four thousand women to garner information regarding proper heights for stoves, sinks and other kitchen appliances and fixtures.
She designed an electric mixer, shelves for refrigerator doors and a trash can with a foot pedal and made “tweaks” and improvements on other appliances and devices. Amazingly, as skilled as she was with innovation in the kitchen, Lillian never learned to cook (for years her mother-in-law helped with household management). According to Lillian Gilbreth: Redefining Domesticity, “[P]rivately her children had referred to one of her culinary experiments as ‘Dog Vomit on toast’”.
She was known as “Mother” for several things – “Mother of the Year” (1957), “Mother of Industrial Psychology” (1954), “Mother of Modern Management” and “the greatest woman engineer in the world” (1954). She received her doctoral degree before Frank passed away and later received over twenty honorary degrees and scores of awards for her work, even though she struggled early on to make a name for herself in the male-dominated field she chose to pursue.
Lillian raised successful children and worked tirelessly for years beyond the “normal” age of retirement. At the age of eighty-seven she was still traveling in both the United States and Europe to present lectures – even though her family encouraged her to slow down she continued to work. It was only after one of her children, Martha, died of cancer at the age of fifty-nine that her health began to decline. She moved in with one of her daughters in Arizona and later to a nursing facility. She died on January 2, 1972 at the age of 93.
In the book, Lillian Gilbreth: Redefining Domesticity, the author sums up her life this way:
Lillian Gilbreth never saw womanhood as biological destiny. As she modeled a strenuous life for her children, she proved that one could balance intellectual and family life, home and work, family and career on terms of ones choosing. She raised the status of homemakers by treating them as specialized experts of important work. But she also simplified housework enough to allow women to leave the home to achieve status and economic autonomy through other endeavors. If some of her idea seemed contradictory, she was proof of their liberating force.
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