Sprague, Roy died 1936

SPRAGUE, GRONOW, ADLER

Posted By: Mary Holub, volunteer (email)
Date: 2/5/2009 at 21:24:34

From Le Mars Sentinel, December 29, 1936

Death Strikes on Same Day Miles Apart

Husband Found Dead in Iowa and Wife Killed in California

Formerly Lived Here

Mr. and Mrs. Roy Sprague Meet Tragic Fates

Friends in Le Mars received word Sunday night of the death o Mrs. Roy Sprague, of Cherokee, formerly Lizzie Gronow, a resident of Le Mars nearly all her life.

Mrs. Sprague was killed in an automobile accident at Turlock, Calif. Saturday afternoon [Dec. 26, 1936]. Simultaneously came the news that her husband, Roy Sprague, was found dead in his home in Cherokee the same day.

Mrs. Sprague left Cherokee December 16, for Fresno, Calif., to attend the funeral of her sister, Mrs. Minnie Adler, another well known former resident of Le Mars.

Early Sunday morning Mrs. Sprague’s nephew attempted to call from Fresno, Calif., to report the death. Unable to get an answer at the Sprague home in Cherokee, the operator notified authorities. They investigated and found Mr. Sprague dead of a heart attack.

Details of the California accident were not learned in Le Mars, but Mrs. Sprague was said to have been the only person killed. She died from a skull fracture.

Mrs. Sprague lived in Le Mars since early childhood, her parents being early settlers in Le Mars. For a number of years she was employed in the office of Dr. W. I. Shepard and filled clerical positions with other firms. While living in Le Mars she was married to Roy Sprague. They left Le Mars eight years ago to make their home in Cherokee. Besides her husband she leaves a brother, Will Gronow, of Chicago. Her cousin, Mrs. Chris Adler, lives in Le Mars.

Husband Found Dead

A dispatch from Cherokee says of the death of Mr. Sprague:

When policemen went to the Sprague home early Sunday to tell the husband of his wife’s death, they found his body. Apparently well Friday night, he had succumbed to heart disease.

Mr. Sprague last was seen at 10:30 p.m. Christmas. At that hour a card party broke up at the Albert Burnett home, and Mr. Sprague part of the way home with A. A. McFarlane, … [one word unreadable].

Shortly after 7 p.m. Saturday came the first call from Fresno to inform Mr. Sprague of his wife’s death. The caller was a nephew, Herbert Adler. His brother Reuben was the driver of the death car.

The Spragues had no telephone so the operator rang the telephone of J. E. Griffith. Several times between 7 p.m. and 1 a.m. Sunday he tried at the insistence of the long distance operator, to call Sprague to the telephone.

Officers Don Phipps and George M. Donald went to the house and broke in through a window. On the bathroom floor was Sprague’s body. He apparently had been dead almost twenty four hours.

Is Fully Dressed

Sprague was fully dressed. He apparently became faint while tending the furnace and went to the bathroom for medicine, the officers theorized.

Hold Double Funeral

The body of Mrs. Sprague is on its way from California and a double funeral will be held in Cherokee and interment made in the city cemetery in Le Mars.

Service will be held in the Methodist church in Cherokee Thursday afternoon at 1 o’clock and the interment made in Le Mars.

Tombstone Photo
 

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