A – An April 1 Wedding for Jeanette

This is my 12th year doing the A to Z April Challenge. For this year’s A to Z Challenge I am posting an event involving someone in my family tree for that date. It may be a birth, a death, a christening, a journal entry, a letter or a newspaper article. If the entry is a news item, it will be transcribed immediately below. Click on photographs to enlarge in another window.

Jeanette McCall
The Emancipator Montgomery, Alabama Sat, April 6, 1918 Page 3

McCALL-McEWEN WEDDING.

Miss Jeanette McCall, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Edward McCall, of this city, and Lieutenant Robert A. McEwen, who is stationed at Camp Dodge, were quietly married Monday morning, April 1st, at Des Moines, Iowa. Lieutenant McEwen is a native of Winnona, Miss., and will probably sail for France at an early date.

________________

Lieutenant Robert A. McEwen did indeed eventually get sent to France after completing his training at Camp Dodge.

I do not know if Jeanette’s husband is in this photo.
Jeanette and Robert Anderson McEwen

I wondered how Jeanette and Robert met when they lived in different states. Then I saw that Robert McEwen graduated from Rust College in Holly Springs, Mississippi. Jeanette’s older sister Otillia was a teacher at Mississippi Industrial College, right across the road from Rust College. Jeanette visited her frequently, giving her the opportunity to meet Robert Anderson McEwen.

The couple lived in Chicago after he left the service. He was a dentist and she did not work outside of the home. They had two sons.

Jeanette McCall was my grandmother Fannie Turner Graham’s first cousin. Their mothers, Mary Allen McCall and Jennie Allen Turner, were sisters. She died in 1931 of influenza on top of tuberculosis. She was 34 years old.

You can read more about Jeanette and her all too short life in these posts:
Jeanette McCall McEwen – Death Certificate 1897 – 1931
Jeanette McCall McEwen
Jeanette McCall McEwen – 1897 – 1931
Cousins on the Running Board

You can find more information about Black soldiers at Camp Dodge at links below
Black World War 1 Soldiers at Camp Dodge
Black Officers at Fort Des Moines Iowa

32 thoughts on “A – An April 1 Wedding for Jeanette

  1. Kristin,
    It is so sad when people die at such a young age especially a woman with children. I wonder how Robert survived after her death.

    1. Jeanette’s sons were 9 and 11 when she died. I imagine it was hard for all of them, but her husband was a dentist and could hire help. Plus there were other relatives in Chicago. Her older sister Otillia was there with her family.

      Robert died in 1938 of a heart attack. He was ill for some time before he died and married his nurse the month before he died. The sons were 18 and 15 by then. Strangely, I can’t find them in a census after 1930, although I can find some other records.

  2. The photos of Jeanette are lovely; the earlier one looks very modern – I would have picked the 1970s with the hat until I read on. Very sad she died so young. Tuberculosis was a dreadful killer.

  3. I love the photos too. Are those in your trove of family photos or did you find them elsewhere. Thank you for including the short video about African Americans in the First World War.

    1. The photos of Jeanette and Robert were in my grandmother Fannie’s collection. And luckily they were labeled! The others were on the sites about Camp Dodge that I mentioned at the end of the post. I had never investigated Robert McEwen’s war experience before I was writing for this post.

  4. My favourite is the last photo, it looks so natural and they look so happy. Finding connections and how people met can be challenging but often the clues are just waiting to be discovered. Who would have thought of looking for connections in Mississippi? job well done.

    1. I knew they had to meet somewhere and when I found that little news item saying he graduated from Rust College, I knew her sister had taught somewhere in Mississippi and I thought maybe it was Rust, but reading more I found the colleges were across from each other. Always something new to find.

    1. Thank you! Now I’m wondering why I can’t find the sons in any census after 1930, I know they were alive. And why I have no photographs of them. No research without more questions.

  5. really enjoyed this post and looking forward to the month ahead! i like that you included that lil video about Black folks in WWI and your own question (and the answers you found) around how the pair met being from different places, i was also curious about that.

    1. So good to see you here Abeo and commenting! If I hadn’t found that little news item saying he was graduating from Rust, I would have never known. Maybe I should look for the sons on newspapers.com

  6. I love reading the history of your family and I’m looking forward to all of your A to Z posts! I actually read one of the other posts you have linked. She died at such a young age.

  7. I’m looking forward to your April A-Z postings. This was a good start, and shows me how your sleuthing of ancestors leads to answers (sometimes!) I too wonder what happened to her sons. My guess would be that they moved away.

    1. I’m not sure that was her wedding outfit. She may have been in summer dress just looking happy at home in Montgomery. But I like it too.

  8. Thank you for this. World War I history is under-remembered today. That goes double (or more) for the black experience in World War I. I’m happy to learn about this war-time wedding more than a hundred years ago.

    1. You’re in luck! You’ll be reading all about various black experiences during this challenge as we follow my family through both alphabet and dates.

  9. It’s amazing how you brought a photograph to life. At that time, there was not much medical aid and people died at a young age. Now, the life span has increased so much that we have an ageing population to take care of.

    1. I visited your arches yesterday and today the bells and books! i hope you can call in too, but no worries, the posts will be here whenever you come.

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