Mark Andrew Henderson

Leila Irene Mason, James Mason’s only daughter, and sister to Nelson Mason was born Thursday, February 15, 1883, at Dalton, Berkshire County, Massachusetts. She attended school in Cleveland, Council Bluffs and Omaha, and was graduated in Nurse’s training in the Nebraska City. She practiced her profession there and in Los Angeles. Following a number of years in California, she returned to Omaha and was married to Raymond Oliver Frederick Henderson. To this union there were born five sons and a daughter:

Paul David, Dec. 4, 1916 (died 2006)
King Elisha, Dec. 22, 1918 (My Father, died 2006)
Mark Andrew, August 24, 1920 (died 2009)
Eleanor Adams, born Dec. 6, 1921
Ralph Lewis, born Feb. 23, 1925 (died 1977)
William Raymond, born February 5, 1927, (Killed in action in 1945, during WWII, at Epinal, France)

Mark Henderson

Mark speaks with much bitterness about his father Raymond, who he described as a “lazy no-good lay-about,” a religious freak who turned his back on his wife and children and mooched off his brother Victor for most of his life. Raymond worked as a night watchman for the Adams & Kelly Lumber Co., a company that Mark says is still there today (2001).

In old age, Raymond Oliver moved to Minnesota to live because they paid the highest state pension. Mark recalls his father’s extraordinary efforts to avoid work. At a time when the standard was a ten-hour, six-day work week, his father decided he was too good to work on Saturdays, and later extended his work limitations to include sundown on Fridays.
He fondly recollects his uncle Nelson, an attorney in Bismarck North Dakota, who would pick up Marks mother Leila and the kids in his Model “T” on weekends and treat them to a day away from father Ray, who Leila’s brother detested. According to Mark, his mother Leila was always writing to her brother Nelson, and Mark perceived them as being very close. Nelson was always trying to convince his sister Leila to quit having more children and was always trying to help relieve their poverty with donations and whatever else he could afford. Eventually, because he had a wife and two children of his own to take care of, and because Leila continued to have more and more children, he became frustrated and unable to continue his charity.
Mark was eight years old in 1928 when he and his brothers King and Paul were put on a train and shipped to Eureka South Dakota. There, because of an advertisement in the flyer of the “7th day church of God,” three separate families of the church, who were referred to as “saints,” offered to take the children in and care for them. Paul went home with the “Schrenk” (a Russian name according to Paul) family, King went with Adam and Rose Straub, and Mark had the misfortune of being selected by Emanual Straub and his wife Albina. Mark tells of a miserable two years with the Straubs, where he was whipped with a rope, locked out in freezing weather, kicked in the stomach while shivering on the floor, and physically thrown around causing him to suffer many cuts and bruises. During this time, he said that he was only able to see his brothers on two occasions. Eventually, one of the seasonal workers on the annual harvest crew noticed Marks injuries and threatened to expose Emanual Straub’s cruelty to the authorities, whereupon the Straubs loaded Mark into an automobile and transported him back to Omaha and dumped him off.
Mark was ten by now and was able to find his way back to his old neighborhood and the house he used to live in near 17th or 18th, and Burt Street. He asked the neighbors if the Hendersons still lived there, and they reported that the father Raymond did. Mark waited until late afternoon for his father to return. When he did return, he said “Mark, is that you.” “Yes it is” replied Mark. “I don’t know what I’m going to do with you” is the comment Mark recalls his dad making.
It was not long before mark was turned over to the Nebraska State Home for Dependent Children in Lincoln Nebraska. He spent the next four years being shuffled between there and the County Masonic Home (even though no members of his family were masons). He speaks of occasional visits to see his Uncle Oscar (scuff) Henderson, a man who Mark remembers with much fondness. Mark describes Uncle Oscar as one of the nicest, most wonderful persons he has ever know. Mark says it was wonderful to get away from the institution for a day or two and live with a real family, and it gave him a feeling of belonging.
By now, it was 1932, the depression was in full swing, the infamous “Dust Bowl” was ravaging much of the Midwest, and Mark was 12 years old. He had only completed the 5th grade in school, which was quite a surprise to the school officials when Mark enrolled. Mark remembers the school principal offering to enroll him in the 7th grade to save him the embarrassment of being “downstairs” with the little kids, but he also let Mark know that it would be his responsibility to exert the extra effort necessary to catch up. Mark was touched by this gesture of not putting him with the little kids. For one of the very few times in his life he realized he was with someone who actually cared about his feelings.
At some point, Mark took a test for graduation to High School, and was told by one of the school matrons that he had done poorly on the exam and that it would be better for him to pursue a vocation rather than to continue is education. She held Mark back and refused to allow him access to further education, until one day, Mark walked the seven miles to the state capitol where he intended to see the governor. Although the governor was not in that day, Mark noticed, by chance, the office of the State Superintendent of Schools, and waited several hours for him to return. While waiting, Mark related his dilemma to a secretary who then related the story to the Superintendent when he arrived. Mark asked the Superintendent to allow him to further his education, whereupon the Superintendent requisitioned Marks school records and found out that he had not only passed the graduation examination, but that he had scored very high. The Superintendent then called the matron who had been lying to Mark about his achievements, and “called her on the carpet” for what she had done. Mark does not relate the final outcome of that meeting, but he was allowed to enter High School, where he excelled at many sports. Because of his Height (over six feet) and years of work on the Straub farm, he was strong and broke the school record for the javelin throw as a freshman. As a freshman, he was rarely beaten in the 12 lb. shot-put event, and he was third best in the State of Nebraska as a Junior. As a Senior in High School, he took second place out of all the High Schools in Nebraska. When Mark was in his senior year in High School, he was taken in by the Havens family, who had heard about his athletic talents.

The Havens’ took Mark in for a year, a year that Mark describes as heaven on earth. Apparently, with the Havens’, he was exposed to another side of life, a side of better living standards, better acquaintances, better food and better clothing. The wealthy Havens family had inspired Mark to want better for himself, and based on his academic prowess, Mark earned acceptance into the University of Nebraska. Mark remembers his counselor was S. C. Blood. Marks financial resources did not allow him to remain at the University for long, and he soon borrowed $40 from a friend and headed for California.
Shortly after arriving in California, Mark enlisted in the military and joined his brother King who had just returned from Hawaii and re-enlisted. Brother Paul was still on his first tour of duty in Hawaii at this time, but was soon to join them at McClelland AFB. Mark was in California now and was surprised to learn that the Straub family (Emanual and his wife Albina) who had abused him so many years before, had also relocated to California. He paid a visit to them one night with the intention of doing both of them bodily harm, but was saved that experience by the intervention of his brother King. He wanted them to know what it felt like to be kicked in the stomach and whipped.
Mark was not in the military very long when he was noticed by one of his commanders, who told him that he should apply for Officers Training School (OTS). Mark impressed the selection board with letters of recommendation from the Mayor of Lincoln Nebraska, and one of Nebraska’s State Senators, and with the help of his Uncle Nelson, and Nelson’s son-in-law Al Pilson, he was soon on his way to becoming a Captain in the military. He recalls his time at OTS fondly, and relates that he graduated in the top ten percent of his class.

In the fall of 1940, he was stationed at Stockton, where he met and on Sept. 3, 1941, married Mabel Bateman of Sacramento, a native of Oklahoma.

Mark was stationed for a time at Pendleton, Oregon, and it was at that station that he was chosen for officers training at Camp Lee, near Petersburg, Virginia. Following completion of that course Mark was commissioned a 2nd Lieutenant.
Soon thereafter he was stationed at Rapid City, S. D. and twice was sent with a fleet of trucks to Bismarck to pick up essential equipment stored there by the defunct Worker’s Progress Administration. On the second trip Mabel accompanied him. Soon after being sent to England, he met his brother, King, and later Ralph. Mark was at Omaha Beach the day after D-Day, and had the responsibility for taking care of all those killed in action during that fateful assault. While stationed in France, he was promoted to the rank of 1st Lieutenant, in charge of trucks incidental to aviation. Mark and Mabel’s first child, Mark Andrew, Jr., was born Dec. 2, 1943 in Pittsburg, CA, and their second child William George on the 13th of September, 1946 in Berkely, CA. They made their first home in Concord California.
It was many years before Mark completed his education, but before he was finished he added the University of California at Berkley to his long list of credits. Mark has been a lifelong student and was 44 years old when he completed his formal education, in 1964.

Mark was a licensed pilot and loved to fly his own small aircraft. He made his career in the Real Estate and financial markets before he passed away on May 4th, 2009 in Auburn, CA.

Where is James?

The wanderlust afflicted James Mason, and he loved to roam far. A typical globetrotter who covered the English speaking world. Leaving his wife, Martha Ann, and his family he took his profession to the South Seas and spent nine years in Australia, two years in New Zealand and a year in Tasmania, “visiting every city, village and hamlet,” as he said. In the interim he made several trips back to the States, the last through the Indian Ocean and Suez Canal, thus circum-navigating the Globe. He said he had made and lost fortunes, being at one time worth 25,000 pounds Sterling, which he lost through speculation. Upon his home visits, Prof. Mason always wore a silk high hat, and on one occasion a velvet vest, buttoned with $5 gold pieces. In addition to lectures and readings on phrenology, he sold medicines of his own preparation, his best staple seller being Dr. Mason’s Arbor Vitae Oil.

Nelson Mason (1884-1959) and his wife Eva Gorton (1892-1929)

A Narrative about James Mason, by his son Nelson

In the spring of 1902, Father visited us on the farm [two miles south of (Delphos, Iowa?)]. He had returned to the U.S. via England and Canada. In Massachusetts he visited his brother, John, and family. Evidently he did not see his sister by the mother’s second marriage. He invited me to travel with him for a few weeks when school closed. So about the last of June, I took the Great Western [railroad] to Kansas City, transferring to Kearney, Mo. Father met me at the station and we walked to the hotel. A small porter was along and I learned he had once traveled with a midget troupe, but grew too large to be an attraction. A Dr. Gardner was with Father and in the evening we went to a street corner where a large platform was erected. Lectures were given on phrenology and the excellent properties of Dr. Mason’s Arbor Vitae Oil.

This was the home town of the notorious James boys. Frank, the older, was living at the hotel. He and his wife sat at the large boarding house table with us. He was a horse fancier and each summer trained and groomed a trotting horse he would sell in the fall at fancy prices. Then in winter he would take tickets at a St. Louis play house. One day I brought him his mail. He was a tall, wiry individual, then in his sixties. While he never mentioned his former life, he had told others he had put it out of his thoughts, and it was as though it had never been. One evening we [Father and I] walked out to the old James farm, three miles in the country, where an admission charge was made. There was the old log house with rifle holes on the second floor [It was built in 1822. Mr James took it over in 1845. Jesse was born Sept 5th, 1847 and shot by his fellow outlaws April 3, 1882 in (…..illegible side note). Just outside stood a great elm tree beside the grave of Jesse James. Two men could not reach around the gigantic sentinel. Jesse’s daughter [had] married a neighbor boy, named Barr, living close by. The old mother of the boys, Mrs. Samuels, who lived across the street at the other hotel, was said to have been quite put out that “the daughter of Jesse James would marry a Republican.” She had lost an arm and a little 8 year old son when a bomb was thrown into the old house by soldiers searching for the Frank & Jesse. Her second husband, Dr. Samuels, was once hanged, but she cut him down in time after the men had gone. Young Jesse Jr. lived in Kansas City, where he practiced law, and his daughter became an actress. On Wednesday he came in to make arrangements for the removal of his father’s body to the Kearney cemetery. This rite was performed the following Sunday [June 29,] a rainy day, but we had left town on Friday. [Mrs. Frank (Ana Ralston) James lived to the age of 91, dying July 6, 1944 at or near Excelsior Springs, Mo., she left a son, Robert.]

At Liberty, home of Wm. Jewell College, we stayed a week. We were then alone, so I took a turn at selling medicine in the crowd. At first I moved about so quietly that Father encouraged me by jokingly asking me where I had disappeared to when I finally got back for more of his fine liniment. On the evening of July 4, so much liquor flowed that we remained indoors to avoid the drunken brawls and street rioting. The Negroes hid themselves early, but a hapless Chinaman got his optic badly discolored for loitering too long. There being no one else to combat, the boozers [seemingly] could not resist bending flasks over one another’s craniums.

Then we went to Excelsior Springs, a health resort, continuing our work. The water was salt and sulphur. Having little to do by day, while Father was giving phrenological readings, I worked a couple of weeks at the Hotel Castle Rock, dispensing remedies evenings. Business was good. I longed for the home folks, however, and not being particularly needed there, I went back to the farm. Father, while apparently robust, told me he suffered a great deal from a pain in the back of his neck [lined out-causing the muscles and tendons to become stiff and sore.]. I have wondered if this did not ultimately result in his demise. He was a very dynamic speaker, a trifle shorter than I, but much heavier. With his heavy hair and flowing sandy beard, he was known by everybody right after reaching a town.

Father and I kept in touch with each other. He wrote me many beautiful letters filled with advice and suggestions I have treasured through the years and passed along. In the five weeks we were together, we got to know each other better and the experience was valuable from an educational standpoint. Long a successful salesman, he was very fond of the book “Twenty Years of Hustling,” and presented me with a copy on my nineteenth birthday. He said the writer’s [author] experiences were the closest duplication of his own possible. He had a small star tattooed on one forearm. Asking him about it, he said as a boy at sea he had it done, thinking it was smart, and that now he cautioned against such disfigurements of the person. Among his interesting observations in the South Seas, he once saw a kangaroo leaping along a highway, paralleling their train. The odd creature was keeping up with the engine. Father enunciated a doctrine worthy of emulation. He said: “When considering a purchase, I always ask myself the question, ‘Do I really need it?’” [This I have amplified somewhat to, “Can I do without it?”].

Father was spending some time in San Francisco and making plans to go to Mexico. He contemplated entering the medical profession, being qualified under the laws there to enter that field. On April 18, 1906 [at 5:13 A.M.,] a great earthquake rocked the city. It was a relief when a telegram came saying he was safe. Then he wrote saying that while asleep in his suite of rooms on Market Street he was rudely awakened by a heavy piece of masonry falling on his hip. Being a man of peaceable disposition, as he said, he wondered why the onslaught. He was not kept long in doubt as other pieces began to fall. Dressing hurriedly he left the building a few minutes before it collapsed, and threading his way through panic-stricken crown and between swaying buildings he reached safety. All his equipment, books, instruments and other materials so painstakingly gathered were gone, so he gave up going to Mexico.

Father in 1908 was traveling by team and buggy in Oklahoma and invited me to spend the summer with him. Having made arrangements to go into the furniture store I could not well accept. I wish of course we might have been together more. Father had been keeping in touch with me right along, and I heard from him in October. That was the last word ever had of him. Persistently through the years I wrote to firms and friends he had been associated with, but the trail ended there. A Prof. M Tope had known him in Australia and recalled that Father was an accomplished violinist. None, however, had heard from him since about the time I did. I was forced to believe some sad mishap had befallen him and he was gone.

Martha Scott and James Mason

 The marriage of Martha C. Cooper and William Addison Scott produced three children, of which only two survived beyond infancy, William Hamline Scott, and Martha Ann Scott. The third child, Charles Wesley Scott, did not survive to his first birthday.

Martha Ann (Scott) Mason, (1858-1939)

Much of what is written here is the product of Martha Ann Mason's son, Nelson Mason.  Nelson started these family files in 1935 and the writing is his.  My (Robert Henderson) uncle, Mark Andrew Henderson, ended up with them and passed them on to me about 5 years before he died in 2009.   I have added very little to Nelson's original work except for the information given to me by my uncle Mark in a telephone conversation in 2004.

Martha Ann Scott was born Sept. 10, 1858, at Indianapolis, 14 miles northeast of Oskaloosa, Iowa, where her father was the Methodist pastor. Following in the footsteps of her parents, she became a teacher, and taught in Pottawattamie and Mills counties. While attending Normal (Institute) at Glenwood, she met Frank Fair, penmanship teacher of Oakland. They eloped to adjoining Fremont County and were married. They had one son, Frank Scott Fair, born on the farm midway between Emerson and Henderson, Iowa. Shortly thereafter, Frank Fair, Sr., died in Kansas.

James Mason (1856-?)

Enrolling at the American Institute of Phrenology in New York City, Martha met James Mason, also a teacher. James’ father, John Mason was a carpenter residing in Boston, a man standing nearly six feet in height. His wife was of Irish lineage and very probably was one of those who came to Boston from Ireland in the great Irish migration of 1847, due to the potato famine. To this union there were born two sons: James, born January 23, 1856, in Boston, and John, Jr., two years younger. The father was a protestant; the mother, Catholic. When the boys were respectively eleven and nine years of age, John Mason, while building a house in rainy weather, contracted a cold and pneumonia, and soon his family was left to face life as best they might.

James Mason accepted employment on a farm. Here finding the duties imposed upon him unduly strenuous he wrapped his few belongings in a handkerchief and ran as fast and far as breath would permit. Then he proceeded into the city and, next morning shipped out of Boston harbor as a sailor. Following the sea for several years he returned to Boston finding his mother married again and with a young daughter. His brother John was comfortably settled with an uncle.

Striking out toward the west he stopped overnight at the Bardin farmstead at Dalton, Mass. Then a husky lad of seventeen he was offered work on the farm and accepted. Having had little opportunity for education he took advantage of the rural school facilities. Unable then to divide by long division he nevertheless made such rapid progress that he was the local teacher two years later. Town reports state he taught at the South, the East, and the North schools, and lastly at the Grammar school in the village during the years 1878 – 79 and 80. The reports indicate “he gave excellent satisfaction to all concerned.” In the census of 1880 James Mason is found at Dalton, a school teacher, with birth-place of both parents given as Ireland. This probably was true in the case of the mother, but not of the father. The Bardins doubtless gave this to the census enumerator during James’ absence at school and as their best guess. He was there in 1883, as indicated by Irene’s birth certificate obtained from the town clerk. He united with the Congregational Church of Dalton.

Learning of the science of Phrenology, James went to New York City, enrolling at the American Institute of Phrenology, later known as Fowler & Wells, from which he was graduated November 12, 1880. Here he met Martha Scott Fair, slender brunette of Sandyville Iowa. They met again in Denver, Colo., where on June 1, 1882, they were married at the home of the bride’s maternal uncle and aunt, Isaac and Sarah Cooper. Everybody said it was an ideal match. James was a man of fine bearing, fair, ruddy complexion, blue eyes and aquiline nose, with heavy, straight brown hair and sandy whiskers. It was popular then to wear a beard and his plans to be a world traveler and health lecturer clinched his decision to allow no razor to come upon his face from the age of 19 to 49. He was 5 feet, 8 inches in height, reaching a maximum weight of 220 pounds. He became a dynamic, forceful public speaker.

Upon their marriage James and Martha Mason went to Dalton, Mass., where he resumed teaching. There on February 15, 1883, a daughter, Irene Leila, was born. Determining to enter upon his profession of phrenology, then at its height, Prof. Mason moved with his family to Cleveland, Ohio, traveling out from there. They made their home last at 250 Oregon Street, where an elderly widow, Mrs. McKay, resided. The city Engineer’s office advises that this is now [ca. 1940] 2136 Rockwell Avenue. The Cleveland directory for 1884 shows: “MASON, James, Phrenologist, 376 St. Clair,” and “McKay, Esther, wid. John, r. 250 Oregon.” They resided at this address when the writer [Nelson Mason] joined the family on January 18, 1884.

A letter from James E. Bardin of Dalton, dated February 2, 1928, says relative to the life of James Mason:

He worked on the farm, studied, went to night school and picked up education to teach a country school. He taught in three districts here in Dalton. I went school to him. He went to an academy at Wilbraham, Mass. – (this undoubtedly was Wilbraham Academy, an old institution still in a prosperous condition. It is in the nature of a college preparatory school.) He then taught the grammar or high school a few years, boarding at home and riding back and forth on a wooden velocipede. While teaching in this school he would go to a professor in Williams College, in Williamstown, Mass., for special instructions. (This is a nonsectarian men’s school, high in the Berkshires, and operated by a private corporation. Here the Institute of Human Relations held sessions in 1935, 1937 and 1939 [The 1939 session, under the auspices of the National Conference of Christians, and Jews, was the largest group of Protestants, Jews and Roman Catholics ever to assemble in the history of the world.] Then became interested in phrenology and went to school in New York for a year, - went on a lecture tour of the west, headquartering for a time at Bozeman, Montana.

Mr. Mason worked out a butter stamp or mould that would cut and stamp butter from tub or as made. These mould were made in different sizes from individual prints—one-half pound and pound cakes. One was made for cutting pound cakes of lard, which was not successful because lard is so sticky. While in this business his headquarters were at home. The wooden stamp was made in a nearby town, and the other parts were made and nickeled in Waterbury, Conn. (Several moulds are still in the family attic at Dalton.) On his way from the west he married Martha A. Scott of Iowa. They came home and my parents helped them get started in housekeeping in one part of a neighbor’s home. Irene was born there February 15, 1883.

After that Mr. and Mrs. Mason moved to Cleveland, Ohio, which is the last we knew of them for a while. Some years later we received a letter, signed by James Mason from a city in eastern Massachusetts, stating that he had fulfilled his heart’s desire to go around the world, and would call and see us but we never saw him. One other thing, he worked with the Board of Assessors one year with my father, making out the taxes for the town, for Mr. Mason was a good penman. (He had taught penmanship.) I saw the book last summer as I was looking back for records. I am now on the Board of Assessors. His brother, John, lived here a short time when James was away. He was a laborer on the railroad.

Westward Ho!, Coopers and Scotts

On his mother’s side, Marks ancestors can be traced to Peter and Ann (King) Cooper. On their wedding day, or soon thereafter, in 1831, Peter and Ann (King) Cooper left their home in England, setting sail for America. Accompanying them were her mother, two sisters, Charlotte and Sarah; and young brother, John, aged nine.

PETER COOPER (1805-1886)

Peter Cooper, born Sept. 21, 1805, in Preston, Lancashire, was a stonecutter by trade, as was his brother, William, founder of the Cooper Marble works of Buffalo, N.Y.

ANN KING (1811-1858)

Ann King, born March 18, 1811, was the daughter of a drum major in the British Army. The family home is believed to have been either in Leicester, Leicestershire, or at nearby Strafford-on-Avon, home of Wm. Shakespeare.
Landing in New York harbor, after their long voyage by sailing vessel, the Cooper and King families made their home in “The Village.” There it was expected that they would soon be joined by Mr. King, Ann’s father, and the two or perhaps three other brothers, who had fully expected to follow, as the father planned to retire from the British Army. Unfortunately the well laid plans of the King family did not materialize, due to several unforeseen circumstances. Soon after the landing in New York City, the great cholera plague swept the metropolis. Mrs. King, Ann’s mother, was an early victim of its fury and, as required for the protection of the living, was buried immediately. Mr. King was unable to obtain his discharge, and may have died early. With the mother gone, correspondence lagged. It is said that one or two of the boys later came to America, but all were lost track of through the years. John King remained with his sisters, Mrs. Ann Cooper, Mrs. Charlotte Sutton and Mrs. Sarah Peck.
During their residence in New York, Peter and Ann Cooper’s first child, Martha, was born on May 18, 1832. Their eldest son, Theophilus, from census records, also appears to have been born in the Metropolis. The families next removed to Philadelphia, where Peter Cooper continued working at his trade; that of a stone-cutter and stone-mason. There, on October 7, 1836, another son, Peter, Jr., was born.
Following along those paths where his trade led him, we next find the Coopers and Kings at Joliet, Illinois, a few miles southwest of Chicago. Isaac, Lydia, Watson [Richard] and William joined the family circle there. In the midst of a very busy life, Peter Cooper was very active in his work of a lay minister, preaching throughout the region.
John King, then in his late 20’s, went on to California, joining in the gold rush of 1849 to the San Francisco area. Upon making a sizeable “stake” he returned to his sisters and families, interesting them in the gold country of the Pacific. In a short time we find the Cooper, Peck and Sutton families (Ann’s sisters Charlotte and Sarah, had married Mr. Sutton and Mr. Peck respectively) bound for ‘Frisco,’ via prairie schooner. As evidence of the primitive modes of travel of those earlier years by covered wagon, family legend tells of the cows of the caravan being milked, and the morning milk, placed on the shady side of the wagon boxes. From the constant jolting of the wagons lumps of butter would form in the containers before evening.
Thus, in June, 1851, the travel-weary company reached Kanesville (now Council Bluffs), Iowa. Due to illness the Coopers were unable to continue their journey. Other complications ensued, and there being an abundance of work in his trade at “The Bluffs”, Mr. And Mrs. Cooper decided to make their home in the Missouri River “boom town.” Peter Cooper thus preached the first sermon – other than Mormon – in council Bluffs, and their daughter, Martha, taught the first school. There, too, the youngest child Cornelius “Neal” joined the family.

It was in Council Bluffs, Iowa that the Cooper’s oldest daughter Martha C. met and married her husband, William Addison Scott. William was descended from his father, Dr. Solomon Johnson Scott (1798-1893), and his grandfather John Gilmore Scott (1773-1798), both of Nova Scotia. John Gilmore Scott died at a young age of Yellow Fever. Dr. Solomon Johnson Scott traveled far and wide and was a well respected doctor of his time. His travels eventually landed him in Sherman, Texas, where he passed away at the age of 75.

MEMOIR OF MARTHA C. SCOTT

[By her husband, William A. Scott]

"Martha Cooper Scott was born in New York City, May 18, 1832, and died of complicated puerperal peritonitis, January 18, 1861, near Magnolia, Iowa, in the twenty-ninth year of her age.

The subject of this memoir was blessed with religious parents, her father, Rev. Peter Cooper, having been for years an effectual and useful local preacher in the M E. Church. As a consequence her religious impressions began early, and in her sixteenth year, on New Year's Eve, she joined the M. E. Church, under Rev. W. Palmer in Chicago; where she was attending school. The writer's acquaintance with her began in 1852, at Council Bluffs, Iowa, which resulted in our marriage on April 24, 1853.

About two years after our marriage we entered the itinerancy. Our first work was Magnolia Mission, Iowa Conference, where we traveled a year, and made many warm friends, who proved their devotion by administering to her in her last sickness. Our last work was Indianapolis circuit, Iowa conference, over two hundred miles distant, and in order to go to it, she must leave all her friends and go among strangers. How hard is the lot of the itinerant's wife.

During this year her health began to fail, and was never good to her death. Last spring we journeyed to the Rocky Mountains, which seemed beneficial, but proved delusive. About three weeks before she died her little infant preceded her to the "blessed land." She has left her husband and two little children to mourn her early departure; but we mourn not as those who have no hope. Little Willey, the oldest, who is nearly five years old, says his "ma has gone to help the lord take care of the little baby." The day before her departure, having been to all appearance dead, she suddenly aroused from her lethargy and commenced praising God aloud, and told , while her face beamed with heavenly radiance, of having seen the glories of heaven. She describe its beauties with rapture, and longed to be back again, and said that in a few hours she would b e gone, and exhorted us to meet her in heaven, Shortly after, delirium came on, during which she sang sweetly and pathetically.

Thus a beautiful life was ended, the sad event taking place at Magnolia, Harrison County, Iowa, 35 miles north of Council Bluffs. Some years later her brothers arranged for re-burial beside the sainted mother in the little rural cemetery, a mile east of Hillsdale. Her son, William H. Scott, has erected a red granite memorial to her memory, reading: "Martha C. Scott, May 18, 1832-Jan. 18, 1861"