Friday, November 8, 2013

Finding Ethel - Post 2: Ethel Found. Who Were Her Parents?

After I posted Finding Ethel - Post 1: Candidate Search yesterday, I spent the rest of the evening eating dinner, watching TV news, finishing up the CVGS Newsletter for November, and did some work in FamilySearch Family Tree and tried to watch a webinar.  My plan was to work on the Ethel problem this morning.

My Genea-Musings readers had different ideas - they went to work and found several things about Ethel for me.  I posted their comments in Follow-Up Friday - Helpful and Interesting Reader Comments From the Past Week this morning.

So let's take these items one at a time:

1)  Ethel's marriage to Louis B. Powell:

As Gary noted, there are marriage licenses for Oklahoma at the On Demand Court Records website.  Once again, an informed Genea-Musings reader reaches out and helps me because I had no clue that this website exists.  On the site, I filled in the search form with the name "Hall, Ethel," picked the "Marriage Licenses" record category, and added a date range of 1920 to 1942:



There were several matches for Ethel Hall, including this one for her marriage to Louis B. Powell on 15 March 1922 in Sapulpa, Creek County, Oklahoma:


I looked for Louis Powell also, and was rewarded with another one for Ethel M. Powell and Louis Burr Powell on 11 May 1924, also in Sapulpa, Creek, Oklahoma:



Having had such good luck, I looked also for a marriage of Ethel Hall to Loy Lathem or Latham, without a result.

So the conclusion:  I have a marriage license with the names Ethel Hall and Louis B. Powell on it in Creek County, Oklahoma in March 1922.  This fits very nicely with the birth date of their daughter, Agnes Jean Powell in November 1922.  It also gives me the lead to Ethel's parents as John Hall (age 54, born in Indiana, parents born Ohio, a pumper on an oil lease) and Emma Hall (age 54, born in Ohio, both parents born Ohio) in the 1920 U.S. Census record.

So why is there another license for Ethel Powell and Louis Powell in 1924?  Did they divorce, and then get remarried in 1924?  That is a definite possibility.

2)  Ethel's Death:

As I noted in  CrowdSourcing Opportunity: When and Where did John Louis Powell Die? (posted 29 October 2013), Ethel apparently married Loy Latham after Louis B. Powell died in 1935, and they moved to Fairfield, Wayne County, Illinois and were enumerated there in the 1940 U.S. census with Ethel's two sons, Alfred and David.  

Loy U. Latham died in December 1943 in Illinois, and his Find A Grave memorial notes his burial in Del City, Oklahoma County, Oklahoma.  

My friend John had told me that Ethel's last name was Kays.  My readers searched last night for me and found Find A Grave memorials for both Ethel M. Kays and her husband, John F. Kays in Maple View Cemetery in Fairfield, Wayne County, Illinois.  Here is Ethel's memorial page on Find A Grave:



There is also a Social Security Death Index entry for Ethel Kays, born 3 October 1907, died February 1981, with the last benefit address in Fairfield, Wayne County, Illinois.

My friend John can obtain a death certificate from the State of Illinois if he wants proof of Ethel's death date, location, birth date and birth place.  Perhaps there is a marriage record for Ethel (Hall) (Powell) Latham to John F. Kays also.

3)  Who Were Her Parents?

This is the next challenge.  The 1920 U.S. Census shows Ethel Hall (age 12, born Indiana) residing with John Hall (age 54, born Indiana) and Emma Hall (age 54, born Ohio).  There is an entry in Lincoln, Oklahoma County, Oklahoma in the 1930 U.S. Census record for a John Hall (age 63, married first at age 22, born Indiana) and Emma Hall (age 63, married first at age 22, born Ohio).  I think, but am not 100% sure, that this is the John and Emma Hall that had a daughter Ethel in the 1920 Census in Sapulpa, Oklahoma.

So this should be a piece of cake, right?  Just find John and Emma with Ethel (and maybe other children) in the 1910 census, and John and Emma in the 1900 census and before.  And maybe some birth and marriage records too.

I looked in the 1910 U.S. census records for an Ethel Hall born in 1907 (plus minus 2 years) in Indiana.  There were four matches, two of them born in about 1907 or 1908.  I worked awhile trying to find both families in the 1900 U.S. census and the 1920 U.S. Census.  The John Hall (born 1873 in Indiana) family enumerated in Owen County, Indiana in 1910 is probably the one enumerated in Spencer County, Indiana in 1920, but it doesn't have an Ethel as a child.

The John Hall (age 44, married 22 years, born Indiana) family in Blackford County, Indiana has a wife Rosa M. Hall (age 38, born Indiana), and five children with Ethel the youngest.  There is a marriage index entry for a John Hall and a Rosa Seabold in the Indiana Marriage Index, 1800-1941 on Ancestry.com for an 1887 marriage in Wells County.

The 1900 U.S. Census record for the John K. Hall (age 34, born Aug 1865 in Indiana) family in Chester, Wells County, Indiana shows wife Rosa M.L. Hall (age 29, born Sep 1870 in Indiana), and the same four older children seen in the 1910 census record for this family.

There is a Find A Grave memorial page for a John Hall in the Odd Fellows Cemetery in Montpelier, Blackford County, Indiana:


There are two names on this gravestone, including John Hall, born 23 August 1965 with no death date.  The Find A Grave memorial page for the other name is:


The memorial says Ross M.L. Hall, born 29 Sep 1870 and died 11 Jan 1909.  I downloaded the gravestone image and magnified it a bit:


I think that the gravestone clearly says Rosa M.L. Hall, not Ross M.L. Hall.  The birth date for Rosa matches the birth date in the 1900 Census record.

Note that John does not have a death date.  One conjecture is that when Rosa died in 1909, they invested in a gravestone and left his death date off of it.  Perhaps he was buried someplace else.

However, I'm not 100% sure that this is the right set of parents for Ethel Hall (born 3 October 1907 in Indiana).

I went looking in the Indiana Marriages, 1811-1959 record collection on FamilySearch, and found this marriage license record:


The record says that John Hall and Emma Abrams received a marriage license on 21 November 1911 and married the same day.  The information for John Hall says he was born 23 August 1865, son of Reuben Hall and Elizabeth Mcintire, and that his previous wife had died in 1909.

The record says that Emma Abrams was born 29 November 1875 in Indiana, daughter of Joseph Nelson and Mary Forman, and her previous marriage ended in divorce in 1906.

Based on all of the above, it appears that John Hall, born 23 August 1865 in Indiana to Reuben and Elizabeth (Mcintire) Hall, married (1) Rosa M.L. Seabold, born 29 September 1870 in Indiana and died 11 January 1909 in Blackford County, Indiana, and they had at least 6 children, including Ethel Hall born in 1907-1908.  John Hall married (2) Emma (Nelson) Abrams on 21 November 1911 in Blackford County, Indiana.

4)  The issue is this:  Is this the right family?  I think it is with about 95% confidence.  I think that it is John Hall and Emma (Nelson) (Abrams) Hall in Sapulpa, Oklahoma in the 1920 census with a 12 year old daughter, Ethel.

I'm not done researching yet - I don't know when or where John and Emma died, and would love to have a death record for Ethel that names her parents.  I'm getting closer, though!

I did all of the above without looking in online family trees on Ancestry, FamilySearch or other websites.  It is more fun that way to discover records and relationships, and download all of the images I find and save them in a separate file folder to attach to a tree.  The frustration is, of course, that we don't have ALL of the records available to us either online or in repositories.  I still need to look in other online sites for military records, newspaper records (although the Hall name will be difficult!) and other records.

Thank you to my readers for their help in advancing the Ethel marriage and death records to the goal line.  I welcome any further ideas my readers might have about the parents of Ethel (Hall) (Powell) (Latham) Kays (1907-1981).  Please note that I've found quite a bit on John Hall's father's line already.

The URL for this post is:  http://www.geneamusings.com/2013/11/finding-ethel-post-2-ethel-found-who.html

Copyright (c) 2013, Randall J. Seaver


1 comment:

Geolover said...

I am sure you noticed the discrepancy as to death of John Hall's wife Rosa. The gravestone gives death as 11 January 1909 -- yet Rosa, married once for 22 years and having borne 5 living children, is in the 1910 household of John Hall, married once for 22 years, together with 5 children.

Since the 1910 enumeration was as of April 15 (the Halls' page dated 25 April) what is going on here? Was John (or one of the older children) so distressed by Rosa's passing that he could not admit her absence? Did Rosa actually die in 1911? When was the gravestone made? Why if Rosa died in 1911 did John put on his 1911 Marriage License that his prior wife had died in 1909?