Scandalized, Governor Sherman fainted dead away

Iowa's weekly newspapers of a century or more ago did an estimable job of informing their readers about the latest scandals, local and otherwise, relying on news services and exchange subscriptions for reports of statewide, national and world interest.

So when Oscar, the 24-year-old only son of Buren R. Sherman (left) --- Iowa's 12th governor --- was caught in flagrante delicto with a young lady in Waterloo during June of 1890 the headline in The Chariton Herald read, "An Iowa Sensation" with the subhead, "A Son of Ex-Gov. Sherman Brings Disgrace to the Name."

Gov. Sherman (1836-1904) served 1882-1886 and he had the distinction of being the first to occupy offices in the new Iowa Capitol building. His home was in Vinton, but after leaving Des Moines, he moved to Waterloo where from 1887 until 1891 he headed an insurance company before moving back to Benton County. His only son, Oscar, was a company employee.

Here's how The Herald reported upon the scandal:

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Waterloo is in the throes of a great sensation, of which young Oscar Sherman, son of ex-Governor Buren R. Sherman, is the hero and a Miss Griffin is the heroine. Both were employed in the office of the insurance company of which the ex-governor is president, and have been going together for some time, it being understood that they were engaged.

Miiss Griffin boarded at the house of Mr. Cutler, a relative. Wednesday night last, Sherman and Miss Griffin went to an entertainment, returning about 10 o'clock. As was often the case, he walked upstairs with her to her room, as Mr. Cutler supposed, to chat with her a few moments.

About midnight, however, not having heard the young man leave the house, Mr. Cutler went to the door of the young lady's room and rapped. He got no answer, and then proceeded to break in the door. He found a condition of affairs which led him to turn both the young lady and Sherman into the street.

Sherman and Miss Griffin went directly to the St. Paul and Kansas City depot and boarded the first train. Their destination is unknown.

Ex-Governor Sherman, when informed of his son's escapade, fell in a dead faint and is prostrated.

Both Oscar and Miss Griffin moved in the best society in Waterloo and were social favorites. The young lady is remarkable for her beauty and had heretofore borne a spotless reputation. 

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Illinois marriage records show that Oscar Sherman and Caroline E. Griffin were married in Chicago on June 4, so The Cedar Rapids Gazette was able to report soon thereafter that, "Oscar Sherman, the principal of the great scandal now occupying general attention, has returned home with Miss Griffin as his bride. They were married in Chicago and are living with his father, Ex-Gov. Sherman."

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Caroline and Oscar went on to have two children, Josephine, born during 1892, and Buren R., born during 1893, but they had divorced by 1900. By that time, Oscar was living in St. Louis where, on the 4th of May 1902, he married Salomey "Loma" May Ludlam.

Oscar's health was beginning to fail by this time as tuberculosis began to take its toll. By 1905, when their daughter, Norma, was born, they were living in Arizona, where he died three years later. The Arizona Republic, his employer, published the following report in its edition of Feb. 22, 1908:

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Oscar E. Sherman, a well known Phoenix newspaperman, passed away at his residence, 1019 South First Avenue, late Thursday night. He had been in his usual health, though not able to work for some time, but on the day previous he was stricken with a hemorrhage and died shortly afterwards.

Mr. Sherman was the son of a former governor of Iowa, B.R. Sherman, and his relatives still reside in that state. He leaves here a wife and one daughter two years of age. They have the sympathy of the community in this sad hour of irreparable loss. The funeral will probably take place Sunday.

The deceased came here about three years ago and was soon engaged locally in newspaper work. His early experience had been gained on various big dailies in St. Louis, among them the Star and Republic. He afterwards was on one of the Chicago dailies. Here his  health failed and he came to Arizona, hoping to benefit his condition. He seemed to improve and was soon able to resume his editorial duties.

Those who knew him regarded him as a most capable and discerning newspaperman, a hard conscientious worker, and a loyal friend, one commaning the respect and confidence of those who knew him.

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Some two months after his death, Loma and Norma Sherman accompanied Oscar's remains home to Vinton, where they were interred next to those of the former governor in Evergreen Cemetery.

Lucas County's coal mining industry in 1887

I've written often about Lucas County's coal industry, a major factor in our home's economics and culture for a century. The era began in January of 1876 when the first steps were taken toward opening the Whitebreast Coal Company's Shaft No. 1 near Lucas and ended during August of 1978 when the Big Ben mine ceased operations in Pleasant Township.

But I've never reproduced the following --- a verbal snapshot from The Chariton Herald of Feb. 17, 1887, of the industry's status during that year. The photograph of Whitebreast No. 1 was taken seven years earlier, during 1880, and is in the Lucas County Historical Society collection.

By 1887, the incorporated village of Cleveland had been developed by the coal company to house mining families and the unincorporated village of East Cleveland had developed immediately to the east to house, among others, a substantial population of black miners and their families. The Zero mine, northeast of Russell, never quite got off the ground.

Here's the text of The Herald's 1887 article:

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There are some 12 or 14 coal mines open in the county, those at Zero in the east part of the county employing a hundred or more men while those of the Whitebreast Coal Company in the west part of the county are the largest in the state. Two shafts are operated by the Whitebreast company, the output of which places Lucas county third in rank among the 30 coal bearing counties of the state.

The company was organized in January, 1876, and in the following October the first shipments of coal were made. The two shafts are about three quarters of a mile apart, and around each quite considerable villages have grown up. Shaft No. 1 is in Jackson township, while shaft No. 2 is in Whitebreast township, the towns being named Cleveland and East Cleveland respectively.  The town of Lucas is a mile west and Chariton six miles east.

Shaft No. 1 gives employment to about 320 men while 600 are employed at No. 2, of which 200 or more are colored. The vein worked runs from five to seven feet in thickness, and lies about 230 feet below the surface. The equipment of machinery is of the best makes, everything being constructed with a view to strength, speed, convenience and safety.

Three kinds of coal are prepared for market, lump, nut and pea, while a ready market is found for the slack, or fine coal. All of the coal used by the Q road west of the mines and by the B. & M. in Nebraska is furnished by these mines. The first electric light in the state was put in at Shaft No. 1, the apparatus being one that received an award at the Centennial. The revolving screen for separating coal at No. 2 was one of the first erected in the state.

There are from twelve to fifteen hundred people in the two villages, many of the miners at Cleveland owning their own property while at East Cleveland the houses, seventy-five or more, belong to the company. Miners make from two to five dollar a day and not a few have laid aside handsome sums.

J.C. Osgood is president of the company and was the principal projector of the enterprise and T. J. Phillips is the gentlemanly superintendent who looks after the interests of the company in a satisfactory manner.

Take time to smell the lavender

Faced with the urge to develop solutions to all the world's problems in an afternoon on Monday, I decided to harvest a basketful of lavender from the museum garden and fashion nosegays instead, which I did while sitting at the picnic table in the shade. 

We'll most likely scatter these around the A. J. Stephens House as natural air fresheners. 

I'm not suggesting that we should give up on fashioning solutions to the world problems, but it is useful to stop now and then to smell --- the lavender.

A case of infanticide shocks Iowa in March of 1880

Abortion was illegal in Iowa during 1880; women who became pregnant outside the bonds of matrimony were scorned --- and during March of that year, these circumstances and others combined to generate a series of tragic acts that erupted into a sensation that was reported upon from coast to coast.

The setting was the village of Hartford, located in northeast Warren County about equally distant from Indianola and Des Moines. Highway 5, linking Carlisle and Pleasantville, skims alongside Hartford today.

The principals were Mary Elizabeth Henderson, born Dec. 27, 1861, and therefore 19 years old; her mother, Elizabeth (Weaver/Henderson) Wellons, age 50; Mary's older sister, Sarah Jane "Jennie" Henderson, age 21 --- and the father of Mary's child. 

The initial reporting of the case operated on parallel tracks because of Hartford's location. The Indianola Herald chose to shield the young man by not naming him. The Des Moines Register unhesitatingly identified him as William Ray, age 27, who had grown up a neighbor and was employed as a miller in Hartford when he impregnated Mary.

The Chariton Leader reprinted the initial Indianola Herald report of April 1, 1880, on the local news page of its April 3rd edition.

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Elizabeth Wellons, nee Elizabeth Weaver, had married her first husband, Isaac Henderson, in Clermont County, Ohio, during 1852, and they had relocated to Hartford by 1860. The couple had four children by August of 1862, when Isaac enlisted as a private in Company C, 34th Iowa Volunteer Infantry --- Elijah F., Thomas J., Sarah Jane and Mary. 

Isaac died of dysentery on the 16th of October 1863 at New Orleans, leaving Elizabeth a widow with four youngsters to raise. Two years after his death on, Aug 27, 1865, she married at Indianola a widower some 25 years her senior, John C. Wellons, who had a considerable number of children from his first marriage. They were estranged and living apart, however, by 1880.

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The case was reported upon in The Indianola Herald of April 1, 1880, by a reporter identified only as "Scribe" and commencing as follows:

"Last Monday morning, the 22nd inst., the usually quiet village of Hartford was suddenly thrown into a fever of excitement from the intelligence that a most horrible crime had been committed in our midst. The first impressions were from the vague and unsatisfactory reports that were being circulated, that the crime was abortion, but further development proved it to be even more horrible. As further disclosures were made, the excitement became more intense, and, had surrounding circumstances permitted, it is not improbable that mob law would have again desecrated the name of Warren.

"The history of this crime from its incipiency, the time it must have been plotted till its tragical culmination, is dark, scheming and atrocious.

"Last fall suspicions were entertained by many that Miss Mary Henderson, the deceased mother, was enciente. In fact, her mother, Mrs. Elizabeth Wellons, indiscreetly admitted the fact privately and, we are informed, even tried to secure medical aid to procure an abortion. In this she signally failed, but received some wholesome advice as to her duties in the premises which, had she entertained and been guided by, would have averted a terrible calamity.

"About the beginning of winter, she stated that her daughter had gone to Des Moines to work and denied her condition. During the winter, several parties claimed they caught glimpses of her through the window of her mother's residence. Many doubted her going to Des Moines at all."

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The Des Moines Register, in its edition of March 26 already had reported that, "Mary Henderson and her sister, Jennie, were employed as help in Des Moines houses, the latter being for some time past a dining room girl at the Sabin house. Both have always borne the best of characters, and Des Moines people who knew them since childhood in Hartford speak well of their reputations. When it was found that the result of Mary's sin was bound to be known if she staid in this city, she went home to the mother's at Hartford, and there for four months she was confined in a single room with no light but that furnished by a single window and no one in the neighborhood being aware that she was with her mother.

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The Indianola Herald report continues: "The mystery deepened and no further disclosures were made until a physician was called in professionally. At first, she denied the cause of her illness, but finally admitted having been confined, stating it took place in Des Moines and that the child was there. Fully a week elapsed after confinement before it became positively known to the public that she was at home. When the situation was made known, everything possible was done to relieve the poor girl but it was too late. From inattention and want of medical attendance at the proper time, it soon became evident she could live but a short time.

"Weighed down with grief and remorse and the certainty that her end was near, the dying girl made a full confession, disclosing some startling crimes which seem too horrible and diabolical to be true. During the winter the girl secluded herself in a dark room and, when her child, a little girl babe, was born, in order to conceal the shame, they plunged it in a red hot stove. Its agonizing cries were soon hushed by its fiery grave, and the deed was done, the most heartless, cruel and revolting ever perpetrated in this county."

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The Des Moines Register dispatch had described the killing as follows: "About two weeks ago, the child was born and on her dying bed when the neighbors were called in, she imparted the horrible intelligence, stating that immediately after the birth of the child, the girl's mother, in order to conceal the shame of her daughter, took it and killed it, and cutting it in pieces put the pieces into the stove to be burned, after which the partly burned flesh and cinders were taken and thrown into a privy vault."

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The Indiana Herald's report continued, "Scarcely had the last clod been placed on the young mother's grave when the older sister, Jane, and Mrs. Wellons were arrested. This was Wednesday the 24th inst. and the preliminary examination was set for the following Friday.

"During the interim a quantity of ashes were noticed in the privy vault, and upon further search the bones of the infant were found, burned and discolored; some entirely gone, yet easily recognized as belonging to a human being.

"On the first information the two parties arrested were charged with infanticide, and the case against the young lady dismissed. The old lady was arrested upon another information, charging her with murder in the first degree. She then waived examination to a charge of murder in the second degree, and her bond was put at $5,000, in default of which she was sent to jail."

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"The coroner's inquest was held on the remains of the child on Monday," The Herald reported elsewhere in its edition of April 1. "The evidence which was principally the statements made by the mother before her death to certain persons, tended to exculpate (Mrs. Wellons) and show that it was dead before placed in the stove and that Mrs. Wellons is not guilty of the crime charged, that of murder. The betrayer of Miss Henderson is reported to have left Sioux City in a hasty manner on Monday morning." 

The coroner's jury report stated, according to The Herald, "The said child came to its death on the 13th day of March A.D. 1880 by being smothered by its mother, Mary E. Henderson, assisted by Elizabeth Wellons willfully and feloniously."

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The Des Moines Register reports had been reprinted in The Sioux City Journal and on March 27, The Journal reported as follows:

"Yesterday morning a young man slipped out of Sioux City in a hurried manner and he was none other than Wm. Ray, the person referred to in the dispatch. It is altogether probable that the first intimation he had of the death of his victim, and of the atrocious act for which the mother and sister were under arrest, was derived from reading the dispatch in yesterday morning's Journal, and the fear which struck to his cowardly heart induced him to take hurried leave of this city, where he was known by his right name. Ray came here from Hartford on Sunday, March 7, and the next day went to work in the City mills, and during all the time he was here boarded at the St. Elmo hotel. From one who became well acquainted with him we learn that he was 27 years old, 5 feet 9 inches high and weighed about 160 pounds. He has dark hair and a small insignificant mustache. Which way he went is not known."

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I've been unable to find any indication that Elizabeth Wellons ever was indicted for whatever part she may have played in the death of her granddaughter and disposal of the remains. The Herald of June 24, 1880, reported that, "Mrs. Wellons, of the Hartford tragedy, has been removed from the jail to the county house."

Some online family databases state that Mrs. Wellons died during 1900 or soon thereafter, but I've not been able to find confirmation of that. I've made no attempt to track either Jane Henderson or the father, William Ray. Mary Henderson probably was buried in the Hartford Cemetery, but if so her grave is unmarked.

Do not be daunted ...

A highly valued cousin of mine shared this lovely advisory, attributed to the Talmud, this morning. And I wanted to pass it along.

The words seem appropriate in the aftermath of last week's Supreme Court decision, now controlled for the benefit of those who are white, evangelical and heterosexual by partisan idealogues, regarding Roe v. Wade. Having bloodied the water, it's clear now that the sharks are circling the rest of us --- including people of color and LGBTQ+ --- as well as independent minded women of all descriptions.

But before passing the advisory along, I decided to track the specific reference.

So I can tell you that this is an interpretive translation of the original found in Rabbi Rami M. Shapiro's 1995 volume, "Wisdom of the Jewish Sages: A Modern Reading of the Pirke Avot."

The Pirke Avot is part of the Mishnah --- a collection of Jewish legal discussions, stories, etc.; and the Talmud is commentary on the Mishnah.

It's not necessary to know any of this in order to appreciate the wisdom of the words, but now I do --- and so do you.

Miss Kitty Exline's fatal attempt at abortion

The family's version of what happened to Mary "Kitty" Exline, age 19, back in August of 1877 is inscribed on a small modern stone at her grave in Appanoose County's Exline Cemetery --- "Murdered in Exline, Ia."

The stone has been installed next to a repaired but indecipherable original on the lot of her parents, David and Sarah Exline, founding parents of the village southeast of Centerville that bears their surname today. It was known as Caldwell at the time of Kitty's death. 

The circumstances of the death were sensational enough to generate widespread newspaper coverage that originated with the Centerville newspapers. Unfortunately, no copies of those newspapers for that year survive, so information reprinted in other newspapers, both in Iowa and elsewhere, is our only source.

The earliest report of the death I found was published in The Burlington Hawkeye of Aug. 28, as follows:

"A terrible murder was committed Sunday night at Caldwell, Iowa, a station on the B.&S.W.R..R. The victim was a daughter of David Exline, station agent on the road at that place, aged 18 years. She left home Sunday, after supper, to visit a neighbor. Her body was found yesterday morning in a stable in the village. It seems as though her death was caused by being struck on the head with a club, and her neck had a bruised appearance, as though she had been choked. No clue to the murderer, nor no cause for the act, could be discovered."

A few days later, on Sept. 5, a follow-up report was published in The Ottumwa Weekly Courier:

"Investigation into the case of the death of Kitty Exline, who was found dead in a stable at Caldwell, near Centerville, the other day, leaves the question in doubt as to whether it was a case of suicide or murder. Her death was produced by some kind of narcotic poison but whether it was administered by her own hand or by someone else cannot be determined. She was enceinte, and a young man who has been on very intimate terms with her is suspected of having had something to do with the poisoning." 

On that same date, The Chariton Patriot contained this brief report:

"Miss Kitty Exline, of Caldwell City, Appanoose county, was found dead a week ago in a neighbor's barn. It was first thought she had been murdered, but a post mortem examination revealed that she had been poisoned by ergot taken to produce an abortion."

I found no further published mentions of Mary's death, so I'm assuming that no one was charged --- and that the Patriot report was accurate. 

It's difficult to image a time when contraception was not readily available, abortion was illegal and women who were single and pregnant were scorned ....

Young David Lancey & his death at Williamson No. 4

It's difficult to envision today, but there was a time when, as the sun was rising over the hills of east Chariton on weekday mornings, coal miners carrying lunch buckets walked from their homes in White City, along 7th Street and elsewhere in the city to a work train parked on a Rock Island Depot siding nearby.

There, commencing in the teens of the 20th century and continuing into the 1930s, they boarded cars for the brief trip northeast to the Williamson mines.

When tragedy struck, as it did in that hazardous profession, work in the mines halted for the day and the miners returned to Chariton aboard what now were funeral trains, bearing the remains of their colleague.

That was how it went on Tuesday, June 12, 1923, when a young miner named David Lancey (above) was killed in a fall of slate at Mine No. 4. David was 30, born and raised in the coal mining villages of Monroe County to parents native to south Wales, a miner since his teen-age years, married to a miner's daughter and living in one of the dozens of cottages built by the mining company in Chariton's White City --- so called because all of these nearly identical dwellings were painted white.

Here's how The Chariton Leader of June 12 reported his death:

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Again the hazards of work in the coal mine is brought to our minds by the fatality which occurred at Mine No. 4 of the Central Iowa Fuel Co., near Williamson, this morning at a little after 8 o'clock. The work train from Chariton had reached the mine at the usual time and the miners had just commenced work in their rooms when the tragedy was reported.

The victim of the accident's name was David Lancey. He and Willard Laurie were buddys and had finished the morning's work with the mining machine and were attempting to put it on the trucks when in some manner some of the equipment struck a prop and knocked it out of place. This started a fall of slate, and the lump struck Lancey on the back of the head, bearing him to the level of the room and crushing his face against the top of the machine. His position there is too horrible for description, but crushed as his head was, death was almost instantly afflicted.

The deceased was a fine quality young man,, perhaps 30 years of age, and leaves a dependent wife and three children. They resided in a cottage in White City, which is a suburb of Chariton on the east.

As is the custom in tragedies of this character, the workers throughout the mine were notified and operations of the day ceased and what was a work train a short time before became a funeral train, reaching the city between 10 and 11 o'clock a.m.

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Funeral services were held on Friday, June 15. at the Methodist Church in Chariton and burial followed in the Chariton Cemetery. Here is David's obituary, as published in The Leader of June 19:

David Lancey, son of J.W. and Elizabeth Anne Lancey, was born at Hiteman, Iowa, on November 26, 1892. His father passed away when David was two and a half years of age. His boyhood was spent in and around the Albia coal fields. When he reached the years of manhood, he found a place in the mines.

On March 26th, 1917, at Des Moines, he was united in marriage with Miss Julia Thomas, of Chariton. They made their home in Chariton, where their three little ones came to make them happy: David Thomas, Mildred Elizabeth and Helen Darlene.

Their father found his greatest pleasure in this home. He loved it above everything. He was industrious and ambitious and all his plans and ambitions centered around the home and loved ones. It was surely a terrible tragedy when, in the fullness of manhood's strength, this life so full of hope and promise was struck down. The falling slate in Mine No. 4 brought instant death on June 12, 1923. His age was 30 years, 6 months and 17 days.

He had a host of real friends, for he was always jolly and took an interest in folks. He was always faithful to his duties as his country, his neighbors and his fellow workers of the Union. He was an enthusiastic member of the Independent Order of Odd Fellows.

He leaves to mourn his untimely departure, besides the widowed wife and three children, his mother, Mrs. Frome, of Albia; one sister, Mrs. Elizabeth Harrison, of Des Moines; one brother, William John Lancey, of Des Moines; one half-sister, Mrs. Julia Coughlin, of Buxton; four half-brothers, Alfred Frome, of Des Moines and Joseph, Ray and James Frome, of Buxton; and a large number of other relatives.

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Julia did not remarry and continued to live in Chariton where she raised her children. In later years, she moved to Des Moines, where two of her children then were living, and died there during 1981 at the age of 85. Her remains were brought home to Chariton for burial beside David.

I found the image of David used here online at Ancestry.com, uploaded quite recently by Christopher Delia and attached to his family file. I do not know exactly how the donor is related.

The wages of sin (and/or misadventure) & J. L. Reno

I'd like to be able to tell you more about J. L. Reno --- what given names those initials stood for, for example, or what his age might have been. How he came to be in Lucas County, perhaps.

But the best I can do is to report how he met his end during the summer of 1879.

A brief preliminary reference to J. L.'s fate appears in The Chariton Leader of April 19, 1879, where it was reported that "District Court adjourned on the evening of the 17th, having cleared the docket" of "interesting" cases. Among them, "State vs. J. L. Reno, burglary; jury trial, verdict of guilty; sent to penitentiary for nine months."

Several other cases had been continued during that session of court. The only other "interesting" actual  resolution came in the case of  "State vs. W. S. Farlee; seduction; case dismissed; defendant married the girl."

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Then as now, Iowa's penitentiary was located in Fort Madison, not far from the Mississippi River shoreline. The first building in the complex had been completed during October of 1841 and remains embedded in a structure still standing although no longer used to house prisoners.

Two months after he had been delivered to the penitentiary, during June, Mr. Reno escaped from that structure, as reported in The Chariton Patriot of June 25: "The man Reno, who was sent to the penitentiary from this county for burglary, made his escape on Thursday the 12th inst. He had been taken outside with some other prisoners and gave the guard the slip."

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For various reasons, some natural and some engineered by humanity, the Mississippi riverscape has changed since 1879. At that time, the Illinois shoreline opposite Fort Madison was guarded by barrier islands, as indicated on this plat map from 1874.

And so it was geography rather than human intervention that ended Mr. Reno's life a few days after his escape. The Leader reported the circumstances in its edition of June 28, just three days after The Leader had reported his escape:

"The man Reno who was sent to the penitentiary from this county last April, and who made his escape about a month ago, was found drowned about six miles below Ft. Madison some ten days after his escape. It appears that he had stolen a skiff and started for the Illinois shore, landing on the island opposite the city; and supposing he was on Illinois soil destroyed the skiff. After finding out his mistake it is supposed he undertook to swim to the main land and failed to reach it. The penitentiary officials took charge of his body and buried it."

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There was a cemetery on the penitentiary grounds at the time, later moved outside its walls and still extant. But there is no record of Mr. Reno's burial in it. Or were his remains, in deteriorated condition after 10 summer days, merely scooped into a hastily dug grave near where they were found? It's unlikely we'll ever know where he came, finally, to rest.

Never on a Sunday --- at least for a week or two ....

Blue laws --- laws that forbid specified activities on Sundays --- are for the most part a thing of the past in Iowa. But back in 1883, stringent restrictions were embedded in both the Iowa code and local ordinances, including those in effect in Chariton.

The key to their success was two-fold --- first, they were rarely enforced down to the last letter; and second, nearly everyone agreed that one day set aside each week for rest and recuperation was a good idea, even if it didn't involve going to church.

Going into June, 1883, the Sunday morning scene in Chariton probably was similar to that in nearly every other town in the state --- a few stores, shops and eating places were open for a couple of hours in spite of laws forbidding it.

That all changed briefly in Chariton during the first week of June when the City Council for reasons that are not clear adopted a resolution ordering its meager police force to enforce the Sunday closing ordinance strictly and encouraging citizens to report neighbors in violation of it.

That resulted in the following commentary, published in The Democrat-Leader of June 13:

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Curses, deep and loud, were freely indulged in on last Sunday morning in Chariton, on account of the enforcement of one of the city ordinances which provides ---

"That it shall be unlawful for any person, within the city, on the day commonly called Sunday, to sell, show, or expose for sale, any kind of goods, wares, merchandise, wines, malt or spiritous liquors, or chattels of any kind, or to open to any one any room, shop or saloon where malt or spiritous liquors are kept for sale.

"The provisions of this ordinance shall not be construed as preventing works of charity or of necessity.

"It shall be unlawful for any person, within the limits of the city, to purchase, on Sunday, any article or thing which by this ordinance is prohibited from being sold on Sunday."

But the curses came only from the ungodly portion of the community, those who are so void of moral and religious training that they do not know what a heinous crime it is to purchase, on Sunday, a morning paper, a cigar, a loaf of bread, a quart of milk, a few fresh rolls, a nice dish of ice cream, a glass of lemonade, a piece of fresh meat out of a refrigerator, or anything else which is calculated to produce contentment and happiness on the "day of rest."

It is high time this ungodly element in the community should be taught a lesson that they will not forget. They should be taught the great lesson that Sunday is not a day of rest and recreation from the toils and cares of the week, but that it should be observed as a day when men are required to crucify their bodies for the good of their souls.

The city council have addressed themselves to the task of teaching the people of this community that Sunday must be observed according to the peculiar views and notions of those who make the question of morals their daily study through the six days of the week, and who on Sunday devote their energies to delving into the Divine law as contained in the latest "revised edition," and formulating therefrom a code of religious rules from which there can be no appeal.

It is high time the ungodly element in this city should waken up to the fact that, instead of cursing these great and good teachers of morals, they should learn to look unto them with confidence and reverence and adopt their views with becoming meekness and humility.

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There's no indication in subsequent newspaper issues that anyone actually was charged with violating the Sunday ordinance and after a week or two, the usual Sunday morning routine resumed. 

The whole thing proved to have been a tempest in a teapot, but one that would erupt again now and then as the years passed, most often when large numbers of people developed the urge to do something forbidden together on a Sunday afternoon --- like play football or attend a movie.

A founding father of Belinda meets his maker

Many Lucas Countyans still can locate the pioneer village of Belinda, astraddle Highway 14 between Chariton and Knoxville, thanks in large part to a legendary fast-pitch softball team and its playing field, located there from the mid-1940s well into the 1960s.

But Belinda's origins are obscure and I can tell you authoritatively only that the post office of that name was established in 1858 and that the venerable Samuel Scott Walker (1807-1892) was appointed first postmaster on the 10th of September that year. He eventually moved west to Kansas. The final postmaster was Nathan N. Byers, appointed on the 9th of November 1895, who served until 1908 when the post office was discontinued.

The story in my family is that the village, never incorporated formally, was formed on land owned all or in part by Alfred S. and Sarah (Busey) Cole, who moved west to Lucas County soon after their marriage during 1854 in Morgan County, Illinois. The village was named for their first child, a daughter named Belinda, who was born on Aug. 7, 1855.

So I was especially interested the other day when I came across an account in The Chariton Patriot of June 17, 1874, of Alfred Cole's demise, which had occurred on the preceding Sunday, June 14. Mr. Cole, unfortunate in death, was doubly unfortunate because the details of his demise fell into the hands of a newspaper editor intent on using the circumstances to illustrate the hazards of strong drink. Here's The Patriot report:

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 We are indebted to Mr. F. H. Boggess of Pleasant Township for the particulars of the death of Alfred Cole, also of Pleasant township, which occurred about 2 o'clock p.m. on Sunday last. Cole unfortunately was of that class of men who imbibe too freely of intoxicating liquor when suitable opportunity offers, and his sudden death was the result of his last spree of this kind.

On Saturday last, he was in Chariton, and after getting a full supply of the beverage in his stomach, and a few days rations of the same article in his pocket, started home in company with a man by the name of Rhone, of Columbia, Marion county. They all arrived safely at Cole's when the team was changed and a more spirited one hitched up to take Rhone and his wife on to Columbia, Cole, after being disarmed of his bottle by his wife, undertaking to manage the team for the trip.

In this he succeeded until on the way back, when the horses became unmanageable and ran away, throwing the drunken man from the wagon and injuring him so badly that his death followed at the time above mentioned.

Our informant does not mention the character of the injuries, but it is enough to know that they were fatal. The man is dead, his wife is a widow, and whisky is the cause. "Wine is a mocker and strong drink is raging, and whoso is deceived, thereby is not wise."

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Alfred was buried in the nearby Columbia Cemetery where a couple of his infant children already had been laid to rest (tombstone photo here courtesy of Find a Grave). Sarah remained on the Lucas County farm into the 1890s but was much remarried --- as many as three times. She came to rest finally on the 8th of February 1911 while living at Lovilla and was buried in Woodlawn Cemetery there.

Belinda had a hard life. Two years after her father's death, on June 23, 1876, she married a distant cousin of mine, Jones S. Clair, son of Zolomon J. and Delilah (Feagins) Clair, whose marital misadventures are themselves the stuff of family legend.

Belinda and Jones had seven children, two of whom died young, but he, unfortunately, was an abusive drunk --- and she divorced him in Lucas County citing physical and mental abuse and adultery during 1894. After that, Belinda remarried at least twice. Her end came at the age of 79, on the 24th of November 1934 at the Iowa Hospital for the Insane in Mount Pleasant, attributed to senility. Her remains were buried in the hospital cemetery.

Gasser's Ice Cream Parlor opens, Chariton rejoices

There was considerable rejoicing in Chariton during late spring, 1874, when George Frederick Gasser (1840-1894) added a second story to his frame building near the southwest corner of the Chariton square and created at the head of a new staircase what may have been Lucas County's first officially designated ice cream parlors.

Ice cream, a considerable delicacy in the days before modern refrigeration, had been prepared and served in Chariton almost from the start --- shallow ponds for producing ice in winter and ice houses for storing it through the summer had been among the earliest of the city's infrastructure (river ice also was harvested).

But the addition of a formal ice cream parlor notched the city up a level in some eyes, leading to this glowing review in The Patriot of June 3, 1874:

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At last Chariton can boast of a first-class restaurant. Mr. G.F. Gasser, the west side baker, who has been feeding the hungry and dealing out confectionary for a number of years has just made an improvement that is a credit to the town by adding a second story to his building and arranging as neat a set of ice cream parlors as can be found in any city. Fred's establishment may now be set down as among the first class institutions in the city.

Below is found, first, his sales room where, in addition to bread, pies and cakes and everything usually kept in a bakery, he keeps a nice fresh stock of canned and dried fruit, with green fruit in its season, also candied fruits of all kinds, candies, nuts, &c., &c. 

In the center of the lower story is his dining room, where scores of persons each day take meals served up in the best of style for the low price of 25 cents each, while the rear of the building is occupied by kitchens and bakery.

Upstairs is a nice set of well finished rooms, two of which are nicely furnished with large mirrors, handsome marble tables, and other necessary articles, and constitute his ice cream parlors. These rooms are in front and are easy of access by means of a stairway leading directly from the sidewalk thither.

The object in arranging these rooms is to provide a place where both ladies and gentlemen can go at all times and partake of ice cream and other delicacies in their season without any molestation from the crowds that visit the bakery and dining room below. And those of our citizens who have long felt the need of just such accommodations will doubtless thank Fred for his enterprise and manifest their appreciation of the same by frequent visits to his establishment. On the whole, Mr. Gasser has proved himself a success as a caterer for the public stomach, and we bespeak for him an extensive patronage.

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The Gasser building, with "Bakery" painted on its front in the 1869 photograph used here, taken some five years before the second story was added, was located third storefront north of the intersection of Court Avenue and North Main at the southwest corner of the square. Its 1889 replacement, still in use, was built of brick.

Fred Gasser continued to operate his enterprises here until Dec. 5, 1882, when fire broke out in the kitchens and rapidly engulfed the building. Flames then spread both north and south, wiping out a total of five business buildings. Court Avenue stopped the fire at the south end of the block and the brick walls of the Matson Building, now occupied by Johansen Plumbing & Heating, prevented it from spreading farther north.

Gasser relocated to the south side of the square after that, leaving to others the task of building the Good Luck Building and the two double-fronted brick blocks that now fill that section of the square.

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Although we don't know for sure, Fred probably had his own ice house at the rear of his lot. Nick Leinen, who also operated a restaurant on the square and served ice cream, too, certainly did and Gasser's was by far the larger operation.

These need not have been elaborate structures. Here are instructions for building the basic model as published in The Patriot of  Dec. 10, 1879:

The cheapest and best ice-house is made by building a shed or house with boards so set that they will hold sawdust or straw. If the space needed for ice should be eight feet by ten, and six feet high, let the house be ten by twelve and eight feet high. No double walls are necessary; they are useless and expensive. Sound boards an inch thick, properly supported will make the wall. Cover with a roof that will turn water, arrange for filling and taking out as may be most convenient, and the house is ready.

To fill it properly, the ice should be cut in square or oblong blocks, so that it will build  up as nearly solid as may be. Throw some brush or poles on the ground to provide drainage, and cover well with straw or sawdust. Build the ice so that a foot or more of space shall be left between the walls and the ice. Fill this with sawdust or straw so well put in that no air spaces will be left. Cover the ice to the depth of one or two feet with sawdust or an equivalent of straw and the work is done.

Many thanks to the stars of Art at the Museum ....

The artists, musicians and vendors were obvious stars of Saturday's Art at the Museum 2022, held on the Lucas County Historical Society's museum grounds in Chariton.

But the absolutely perfect weather starred, too --- sandwiched between extreme heat last week and more of the same predicted for this week. We had clear skies, moderate temperatures and consistent cool breezes on our leafy campus.

Our board members, staff and volunteers were the ones who made a visit to the museum a pleasure both for the hundreds of guests and dozens of participants in the show, a joint production of the historical society and the Lucas County Arts Council.

Thelma Saxton, of Carpenters Hall, very kindly deployed her people movers to help transport guests from their vehicles to the event --- and that made a big difference, too.

I'm stringing together about a dozen miscellaneous photographs from the event --- and will do my best a little later (when I've retrieved notes left at the museum) to add identifications. But for now, many thanks from the museum board, staff and volunteers to everyone involved!

Adulterous in-laws & the fornication follies of 1902

This curious little tale commences during the early spring of 1902 in the tiny village of Omaha, Missouri, northeast of Unionville in Putnam County. Putnam County is a neighbor here in the south of Iowa, located just south of the Missouri state line due south of Centerville. The Chariton River, as it flows southeasterly from Lucas County turns south by the time it passes under Highway 2 east of Centerville and then into Missouri,  where it becomes the eastern border of Putnam County.

The parties involved were a gentleman named J. M. Ellenberger; his wife, whose given name never is mentioned; John Helton; and his John's wife, Anna. If reports are to be believed, Mrs. Ellenberger and Mr. Helton were sister and brother.

The first report appeared in The Unionville Republican of April 16, 1902, as follows:

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A sensational elopement has been attracting considerable attention in the east end of the county of late. We are informed that J.M. Ellenberger and Mrs. Anna Helton, wife of John Helton, of near Omaha, left their respective homes some two weeks or more ago for  parts unknown. They were traced to Mendota and thence to Albia where they registered at a hotel as man and wife, but further than that their whereabouts is unknown. Ellenberger leaves a wife and one child. The Heltons had no children. Mrs. Ellenberger and John Helton are brother and sister.

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Six weeks later, The Chariton Patriot continued the story with this brief report on the front page of its edition of June 5, 1902:

A young woman, Mrs. Ellenberger, of Omaha, a small town in Putnam county, Missouri, came on the south branch train on Wednesday in search of her husband, who had run away with another man's wife. The couple passed through Chariton about three weeks ago and were noticed by the officers. A letter written by the woman to her husband, begging him to forgive her and take her back, was in Mrs. Ellenberger's possession and located the couple at Granger, a small town 18 miles north of Des Moines. A warrant was issued and placed in the hands of Deputy Sheriff  Pulliam, who went north, accompanied by Mrs. Ellenberger and her little child,  arrested the couple and lodged them in jail here. 

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A few additional pieces of information were included in this report, included in the Chariton news column of The Tri-Weekly Ottumwa Courier on June 10:

Deputy Sheriff Pulliam arrived home on the north branch Thursday evening from Granger, having in charge a Mr. Ellenberger and a Mrs. Helton, alias Mr. and Mrs. Newman. They hail from Omaha and registered at Albia on their way up here as Mr. and Mrs. Newman. After their arrival here they went to work at the county farm, the man as a farm hand and the woman as a domestic, where they stayed for a month and left, when they were located at Granger. They were traced and arrested on a warrant sworn out by Mr. Helton, who is at present in Omaha, but will arrive here today. The date for the preliminary  hearing has not been set yet.

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The case came up for hearing later in June in the court of Winfield Scott "Fid" Long, a Chariton justice of the peace. The many twists and turns that followed were reported upon in The Chariton Herald of June 26 as follows:

There was a trial in Justice Long's court last week, in which a man named J.M. Ellenberger and a woman named Mrs. Anna Helton, of Omaha, Mo., where charged with adultery. The man had left a wife at home and the woman had left a husband, and very naturally the "left" members were wrothy at the elopement.

The eloping couple proved to be quite smooth of tongue, however, for Mrs. Helton talked her husband into forgiveness so effectually that he returned home and sent her money with which to return home also, after the trial. Ellenberger also talked his wife into a forgiving mood, and then borrowed all the lose change she had.

Everybody being forgiven, there were no prosecuting witnesses at the trial, and the eloping couple were set free. They immediately got together again and skipped for a second elopement, leaving Mrs. Ellenberger here without any money. She had to go to work for a farmer in the country near Chariton to keep from begging or starvation.

The officers watched for the fleeing couple, and last Sunday Officer Clark, of Lucas, arrested Ellenberger there, and started to drive to Chariton with  him handcuffed. Ellenberger's oily tongue here got in its work again, for he persuaded the officer to take off the handcuffs, claiming that they hurt his wrists. As soon as he was released he jumped from the buggy and fled. Mr. Clark fired five shots at him without hitting him, and then tied his horses and started to hunt him. He came to Chariton and got the officers here to help him, and they searched until late Sunday night. He was traced toward Cleveland, but could not be found, so the search was given up.

It is said that he is almost barefoot, and had poor clothing, so he must have had a damp time during Sunday night, when the rain fell almost continuously. They woman he skipped with was also said to be hard up for clothes and shoes. If they were both out in the rain Sunday night it may be that their ardor is cooled by this time and that they will be willing to return to their rightful spouses. A good soaking sometimes cures a hen that wants to set, and it might work a similar effect on eloping couples.

Later --- the officers have gotten track of Ellenberger again, and expect to capture him today.

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Despite a modestly diligent search, I was unable to find further reports regarding the parties involved in this domestic drama that had played out in several counties of two states. Was the unfaithful pair recaptured and brought to justice? I just don't know.

"Art at the Museum" rolls in on Saturday

A friendly reminder this morning that "Art at the Museum," a co-production of the Lucas County Arts Council and the Lucas County Historical Society, kicks off at 10 a.m. tomorrow, Saturday, and continues through 4 p.m. The location will be, logically enough, the museum campus at 123 North 17th Street in west Chariton.

As the graphic suggests, we're expecting 30 or more regional and local artists as well as live music performances during the day and food vendors available for those who would like to eat lunch with us --- or just enjoy a snack.

We held the first of these events five years ago, during 2018; the 2019 event was bigger and better --- and then the pandemic arrived, causing us to cancel in 2020 and not schedule during 2021. We've had to relearn a lot while preparing to bring the event back to life this year, but the investment is paying off.

This year's show will be judged, so $1,000 in prizes will be available thanks to the Arts Council. Many thanks to all who have helped, are helping and will help tomorrow. It should be a great day and we're looking forward to it!

June 1942: Lucas County's World War II Losses Begin

June 1942 arrived in Lucas County as June always does, full of summer's promise --- but this also was the month, 80 years ago, when it started to become clear that World War II would exact a considerable toll,  even in small and remote places like the south of Iowa. Before all was said and done, about 50 of the county's young would die.

The front page of the June 9 Chariton Leader begins to tell that story with three brief items consolidated under one headline, "Andy Knapp is Missing in Action."

Sgt. Knapp (left), a 1938 graduate of Chariton High School, was the first Lucas Countyan to die in that war, a dubious distinction that would not become evident until the war was over. Missing in action, too, the other items reported, were young men with connections to Lucas County but officially resident elsewhere --- Don Donaldson of Des Moines and George E. Morgan of Creston.

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Here's how The Leader reported Andy's status as "missing in action" ---

Andy Knapp, 24, son of Mr. and Mrs. Joe Knapp of Chariton has been reported as "missing in action" by the war department at Washington, D.C. Word was received by his parents last week.

Knapp is in the Army Air Corps and his parents last heard from him last Nov. 6 when he was in Honolulu, Hawaii. He was an Air Corps mechanic.

The message from the war department said that he was serving in the Philippines and that pending the obtaining of a list of prisoners and casualties from the Japanese government that he has been listed as "missing in action."

Knapp enlisted in October, 1940, and received his training at the Army school at Rantoul, Ill.

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I've written here before about Sgt. Knapp --- See "In honor of Sgt. Andy Knapp, 1918-1942" --- and here's an excerpt from that earlier post:

Upon completion of his training as an aircraft mechanic, Andy was assigned to the 21st Pursuit Squadron and deployed to Hamilton Field, California. He left California on Oct. 31/Nov. 1, 1941, with the 21st Squadron, bound for the Philippines, where the squadron had been assigned to the 24th Pursuit Group. His family heard from him the last time in a letter dated Nov. 9, 1941, posted during a stop in Hawaii.

It is almost impossible in the 21st century to comprehend the situation and conditions in the Philippines after the Dec. 7, 1941, attack on Pearl Harbor, as Imperial Japanese forces moved to take the islands.

Headquartered initially at Clark Field, the 24th Pursuit Group was ordered on Dec. 24, 1941, to retreat to the Bataan Peninsula and eventually to Bataan Airfield. During the days and weeks that followed, the 24th and all of its squadrons were destroyed. Survivors, perhaps including Andy, joined infantrymen to fight a deadly, losing battle to defend the peninsula.

On April 9, 1942, the United States surrendered Bataan. Corregidor fell a month later, on May 6. Andy was among an estimated 60,000-80,000 Filipino and American Prisoners of War forced in what now is known as the Bataan Death March to walk up the Bataan peninsula to a railhead at San Fernando, Pampanga, where they were jammed into freight cars and hauled northwest before being forced to walk the final miles to prisoner of war camps. Thousands died.

Andy reached Camp O'Donnell at some point during May of 1942, starving, weak and apparently desperately ill. There was a hospital in the camp and a few surviving medics, but there was no food, no clean water and no medicine. The dying were taken there. Andy most likely was among them. He died on or about June 2, 1942, the U.S. Military eventually determined. Both dysentery and malaria are given as causes in various records. It may have been both. He was buried in the camp cemetery.

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In the aftermath of the war, those buried in the Camp O'Donnell cemetery, including Andy, were disinterred, identified and reinterred at the Manila American Cemetery and Memorial in metro Manila, within the boundaries of the former Fort William McKinley. And there he remains, surrounded by comrades but far from home.

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PFC George E. Morgan's connection to Lucas County is remote --- his father, the Rev. George Moore Morgan, had served as rector of St. Andrew's Episcopal Church in Chariton before accepting a call to St. Paul's Church in Bad Axe, Michigan, during March of 1941. But his burial place in the Manilla American Cemetery is near Andy's.

George, trained as a mail clerk, was assigned to the Medical Detachment, 3rd Battalion, 31st Infantry Regiment, U.S. Army, and was serving in the Field Hospital Medical Corps on Bataan when captured by the Japanese during April of 1942. 

George survived the Bataan Death March and captivity at Camp O'Donnell, but died on Oct. 21, 1942, of dysentery at Cabanatuan POW Camp No. 1.

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Don Donaldson, whose parents were R.S. "Jack" and Pansy Donaldson, was living in Des Moines with his mother and her second husband, James Burgett, when he dropped out of Lincoln High School and enlisted at age 17 in the U.S. Navy.

Although reported initially as missing in action, his parents learned as the war progressed that their son had been aboard the U.S.S. Edsall when it went down with all hands on March 1, 1942, during an attack by Japanese forces some 200 miles east of Christmas Island in the Indian Ocean.

Don is commemorated on the Tablets of the Missing at Manila American Cemetery and on his mother's tombstone in the Chariton Cemetery, which serves as his cenotaph. More information about Don and the Edsall is available in this post, entitled "The valor of Don Donaldson and the men of the Edsall."

About that FDR portrait on the museum library wall

I've always admired this nicely framed portrait of Franklin D. Roosevelt in the library at the Lucas County Historical Society Museum, but hadn't thought much about where it came from --- until yesterday, when I happened upon the following brief news item on the front page of The Chariton Herald-Patriot of June 16, 1932, under the headline, "Chariton Woman Gets Picture of Franklin Roosevelt": 

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A large pencil sketch of the Governor of New York adorns the Gittinger Drug Store this week. 

The sketch is the gift of Governor Roosevelt to Miss Mabel Gittinger. The picture is personally endorsed by the Governor as "To Mabel Gittinger, from her friend, Franklin Roosevelt."

Miss Gittinger is a delegate from the fifth congressional district to the national Democratic convention in Chicago, which starts June 27. Governor Roosevelt has been mentioned favorably as the Democratic candidate for the president of the United States.

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The rest, of course is history. Miss Gittinger attended the convention and, presumably, was among the delegates who endorsed the Roosevelt candidacy, one of those pivotal events in U.S. history. 

Mabel, like all of Lucas County's Gittingers, traced her origins to the Greenville neighborhood, southeast of Russell, but a majority of her 103 years were spent in Chariton. Her parents were Jake and Laura (Goltry) Gittinger; her father, variously Lucas County sheriff, clerk of district court, county assessor and state legislator.

The drug store where the portrait was on display during June of 1932 was operated by Miss Gittinger's brother, Burke. Henry Gittinger, longtime editor and publisher of The Chariton Leader, was her uncle.

A career educator and school administrator herself, Miss Gittinger was a lifelong Democratic party activist who also served one term as county auditor after her retirement from teaching. 

She obviously valued the Roosevelt portrait and it accompanied her south during 1971 when she moved to Branson, Missouri, to live near a favorite nephew, Leonard Gittinger. Leonard brought the portrait to the historical society after his aunt's death on June 8, 1994. Her ashes were returned to the Russell Cemetery for burial. 

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If you check out the value of a portrait like this online, you'll discover that FDR courted many "friends" with personalized signed portraits like this during the course of the 1932 campaign --- also that there's stiff competition for political memorabilia these days and the cost of one like this in good condition is considerable.

We value it, however, as an artifact of political life in the 1930s, a memorial to Miss Gittinger --- and as a reminder of another time --- when receipt of a signed image of an aspiring presidential candidate could be front-page news.