Mary Layton Blackford

BLACKFORD, LAYTON, JACK, READ, FERGUSON

Posted By: Volunteer - Barbara Evans
Date: 10/26/2012 at 15:13:34

Source: Van Buren Co. Genealogical Society Obit Book A-2, page 225, Keosauqua Public Library; Keosauqua, IA

MRS. MARY LAYTON BLACKFORD KILLED
Former Keosauqua Girl Struck by Auto Truck in Los Angeles, California.

Mrs. W.M. Walker, of this place, received a letter from Mrs. Ida Wherry, of Los Angeles, Calif., the first of this week, in which she enclosed a clipping from a Los Angeles paper giving the death of Mrs. Francis Blackford, a former Keosauqua girl, Miss Mary Layton. She was struck by a truck, November 17, and died in a hospital that night. The item says:

“Mrs. Francis Blackford, 72 years of age, of 2241 South Hobart Boulevard, died at the Georgia- street Receiving hospital from skull fracture and other injuries received who she walked into the side of a heavy truck while attempting to reach a street-car safety zone at Adams street and Harvard Boulevard.

According to witnesses the aged woman darted from the curb just as a truck passed. She struck the vehicle and was knocked down.”

Mary Layton was recognized as one of Van Buren county’s best school teachers during the late seventies and eighties. Our readers will recall the Layton-Douglas reunion, which was sponsored by E.F. Pittman, of Des Moines, and held at the Keosauqua fair grounds last August, in which the pupils of Mary Layton and Oscar Douglas participated.

She has lived in Los Angeles for a number of years, also her three sisters, Mrs. Emma Jack, Mrs. Helen Read and Mrs. Aurelia Ferguson, reside there.

Our readers will observe on the sixth page of this week’s Republican the enrollment of the first normal institute held at Keosauqua in 1876, in which the name of Mary Layton appears.