|
|
|
|
|
Some of these recollections you already have heard but hopefully I've included some new memories. As I told Mark, I'm grateful that my Mother and Grandmother shared their stories with me and that I had sense enough to listen and remember... enjoy!
Get out a map of Wisconsin and try to follow this.. .I will refer to everyone (I hope) as they relate to our generation.......................
Your great-grandmother, Frances Melissa Webb was born a 1852 in St. Anthony Falls, Minnesota (near St.Paul), daughter of Elizabeth and James Webb. Frances had one brother, Henry, who moved to Milwaukee... Henry had several children but I've little information on them. I do know that his son James, (always referred to as Jimmie) became a mortitian and had his own funeral home in Milwaukee. Anothor son, Derby, died when he was a very young child.. .and a daughter, Beatrice, a school teacher in northern Wisconsin, came to visit my Grandma Kelley in Elmwood one summer when I was also there. (Most of that branch of the family is very vague so we won't dwel1 on that).
Your great-great grandparents, the Webbs, mooved to Elmwood (also known as "Old Elrnwood" ) , near Spring Valley (Wisconsin) when Frances was a young girl. Frances (my Grandma Kelley) used to tell me stories of her childhood.. .playinq with her dolls in the wedge of a log fence with a quilt thrown over top for a roof.. .she used the logs as shelves for her tea dishes and for a bed for her dollies.. .rag dolls her mamma made.
Well, it was in this small village that she first met young Thomas Pelton Kelley. . .a very handsome man, nine years her senior, blonde with bright blue eyes... I do believe they fell. in love at a very early age because I have, in a small yellowed envelope, a cutout of two tiny hands with fingers bent so they clasp each other. The paper was lined like a school pad and on one was written "Tom" and on the other was written "Fan"...her family called her that or "Fanny". She was very slender, with red curly hair and our guess is that Tom was smitten with her even then.
In 1861 the Civil War broke out...Frances was 9 years old, and Thomas, now 18, went to Eau Claire, Wisconsin and enlisted in the 7th Wisconsin Battery... (in the course of that war he was injured when a caisson rolled over him...he was taken prisoner in Humboldt, Tennessee, imprisoned for nine months, then was exchanged and was able to rejoin his unit and serve the rest of the war.)
And where did your great-grandfather Kelley come from? He was born in 1843 in Ashtabula County, Gustavious, Ohio... the move to Wisconsin must have been soon after that because the family story is that when ho was 2 years old, his mother,
Thomas Kelley 1860; You will see he was living at the time with his sister Mrs. Jane (Kelley) Adams
This is a daugerotype of Thomas Kelley (right) and his brother John W. (left with stripes on his sleeves!) Taken during the civil war possibly while they were on leave at home, I would guess 1863 or 1864? Note the patriotic banners embelishing the borders...very cool.
Tryon Kelley 1870 in California
Lucinda Pelton Kelley, died in Milwaukee, June 9, 1845, and Thomas, although he was only 2, said he could remember his Mother's funeral procession. The name Pelton is Lucina's maiden name and we have quite a long lineage of the Peltori family. . .there is even a book, The Peltons in America, that states all Peltons are descended from this John Pelton who was born in Essex, England in 1616.. but that too is another story.
Thomas' father, Joseph Kelley was born in Haddam, Connecticut in 1806 and I have no information about his family's move to Ohio or of the move to Wisconsin. I'm not sure what his trade was but the whole Kelley family has revolved around lumber so Joseph Kelley may have started it all.
Let's get back to Frances and Tom...in I865, Tom returned from the Civil War, courted Fan and on Jan. 1, 1870 they were married. .. .she was 11 , he was 27 . He became a millwright in Elmwood . Eventually he owned the whole operation and provided employment for several men in the area , including his sons, Milton (always called "Pat") , and Arthur (both of them inherited the mill and the lumberyard when Thomas died at 64). I have a wonderful photo of the millyard with all these family members perched on these huge piles of logs.. your qreat-qrandfather Thomas Kelley, great-uncle Art, great-uncle Pat, great-uncle Roscoe Flinn, your great-grandfather William Marion Foster, and your grandfather, Robert John Foster (who was probably about 14 when he went to work at the mill). Robert began his barbering in the lumber camps shaving burly lumberjacks with cold water and a straight razor. . .I heard this right from him.., (I think that is where he learned his effusive use of expletives). I don't know how much you remember of your Grandpa Foster but he did swear a lot especialiy when he was trying ro relate a story or got excited about something. He went only through the eighth grade and a lot of the English language bypassed him.
Your Grandma Foster (Alice Amelia Keliey) was the youngest of Tom and Frances' four living children (a filth child, Mary, died as an infant). Read the biography of Thomas Kelley, written about 1896 which provides a bit of mystery about this child's name. I must tell you of a letter written by a friend of Tom and Frances at the time of Mary's death. I read this at your Great-grandma Kelley's home when I spent the better part of a 1932 summer with her. I remember what flowerey language was used to express their sympathy. . .in part it said, "and the night little Mary died I saw her form floating over your house with her golden hair flowing behind her ". That vision stayed in my young mind for many years). To add validity to this there is in a tiny compartment of a wooden box of Grandma Keliey's, a long yellow curl of hair wrapped in paper and in her handwriting it says, "Mary Kelley's Hair', baby-fine with a touch of red. Back to the rest of the children....Milton, known always as "Pat", Uncle Art (Arthur), Bessie, and Alice (or Allie as everyone called her). Milton (Uncle Pat), and Uncle Art lived all their lives in Elmwood running the very successful lumberyard begun by their father. Bessie married a handsome young man, Walter Miller, in Stanley, Wisconsin who had a Ford agency, and was president of the only bank, so they were what we called
All of the children except Alice are shown in this picture. Next is a detail Note the dollie under Bessie's arm it must have been made by Frances in memory of the ones her mother had made for her.
well-to-do.. .Allie was the last; child, a dark-haired, blue-eyed baby. I always felt; that she was pretty special to her siblings...in her baby pictures she looked quite frail and I think they all felt they must help care for her. I remember how close she and Aunt Bessie were. . . my cousins, Marion and Lucile, were like sisters to me because our mothers loved each other so much. Allie graduated from High School and in a few months married Robert John Foster.. .they were both 18.
William Foster age 5. There was a family legend that William was an orphan and this document would seem to indicate that was so.
Foster family, 1900.
Foster family, 1910. Also find the Putnams, Flinns and elder Fosters
The Fosters had come to Elmwood from Milwaukee...there isn't much history on William Marion Foster (I wish I had talked with my Dad's sister, Bess Bowman about the family)... On your Great-grandma Fosters side we do know her parents Came to Milwaukee from Germany (their name was Knopps)...Mary Knopps married your great-qrandfather William Foster. . . the oldest. dauqhter , Rose, never married and remained In Milwaukee , never learning to speak English ( I recall Aunt Bess and Aunt Lil (Flinn) talking about visiting her. I'm not sure how the Fosters ended up in Elmwood. . . perhaps the Webbs in Milwaukee knew them and suggested they come to find work at the mill. At any rate, your Grandpa and Grandma Foster ended up in the same schoolhouse one room of course) and presumably took a fancy to each other. . .I don't recall either of them mentioning any other person they might have liked. Families wore very close back then. It was a small town and close friendships developed.
Robert Foster's sister, Lily, was Alice Kelley's chum. They were both talented seamstress, and often made dresses for themselves that matched. Your Great-uncle Roscoe Flinn was a boarder at the Kelley home and ended up marrying Lily Foster! Robert was the eldest of the Foster children, then came Lily.. .next was Rose...and then Bess...the last child, Helen, died when she was about 9 from either the flu or pneumonia. Rose earned a teaching certificate and taught school. for some time living in Harvey, ND. The automobile industry was catching on and Bess left Wisconsin for Pontiac, Mi where she had a successful career as an executive secretary at Poritiac Motor.. .Lily and Roscoe soon followed Bess to Michigan and Roscoe began work at Pontiac Motor on the assembly line, (he lost his hearing from the constant high-pitched noise of the factory... Rose fell in love with and married jolly, rotund, half-Cherokee, John Putnam, and they too migrated to Pontiac (they lived in Drayton Plains). Eventually the Robert Foster family followed everyone in 1926.
What about Rob and Allie's life before 1926? After their marriage in 1905 they started a family.. their first child was a girl who was stillborn... (I ‘ye always wondered what. it would have been like to have had an older sister). . .then came the first of many moves. Rob always barbered, usually setting up his own shop. Their first move was to Red Wing, MN where Lee was born in 1909.. .2 years later they were in Chetak, WI and Clifford was born two months prematurely (1911).. .(Grandma Foster used to tell me she could hold him in the palm of her hand), When Clifford was about 5 years old he was run over by a car.... he did riot seem to be seriously injuired but from that time on he would periodically have epileptic seizures. One winter after Rex and Ginny were marniod, Rex was quite ill with pneumonia and Clifford and I went to visit him. They were living with Ginny's folks in Keeqo Harbor. Cliff and I came downstairs after our visit and before we could get to the door Cliff fell to the floor. Mrs. Ball ran to get a spoon and we got it into his mouth to hold his tongue down and keep the air passage clear... stress always seemed to trigger his seizures. Well, 2 years after Clifford was born our family moved to Ladysmith, Wisconsin and Rex was born (1914). 1 believe they
stayed there a 1ittle longer because Rob's parents, William and Mary Foster were living in Ladysmith...they are both buried there. The next move was to Superior, WI.. .a barbershop was opened on the ground floor of a two-story house with an apartment upstairs on 5th St. (I know this because it's on my birth certificate)...in 1921 your Aunt June was born, Have I ever told you how I got my name? in 1921 there was a famous murder trial and the woman involved was one of the most beautiful in the world...my mother was enthralled by the pictures in the paper (have you heard of "The Girl in the Red Velvet Swing?" a showgirl who was involved with a famous man but was married to another.. .her husband shot and killed his rival and the news was full of it). Mother named me "Evelyn Nesbitt Foster", after this beautiful woman. On one of her shopping trips to the Butcher shop with me in her arms, the butcher asked my name.. .he was horrified and strongly suggested she change it to "June", so my Mother changed me to "June Evelyn"... This is all fact.. .just thought it would add a little spice to our life.
Of course that wasn't the last move.. .when I was 5 we left for Michigan. Times were good.. .the rest of the family had jobs and were making money... but there were hard times ahead, for us and for the whole country. Michigan was like a foreign land with all the industry. ..this gentle Wisconsin family had to adjust.. .Rob of course set up another barbershop; Allie found work a Waites department store in Pontiac as an alteration lady; Rex, Cliff, and I started school; Lee found work as a mechanic (he had one year of High School to finish and when he was 21 he went to Pontiac High School and graduated as the oldest member of his class).. .We were so proud of him. He had a moustache and the caption under his yearbook picture was, "Oh, that cookie duster!".
We had a lot of good times .... . and we should never forget. our heritage.. .as Ed always tells me, "We are where we were, when".
