Herbert James Kane

Submitted by Ginger Rhodes

   School.jpg (32425 bytes)

Here is the one of the school picture. My grandfather, Herbert James Kane, is on the back row, second from the right. At the bottom, it says High School. On it, it say's "School, daddy Kane" with an arrow pointing to a boy on the back row.  The picture is a group of children with a brick building behind them (the building looks to be in very good condition - not what I thought a school would look like back then.  At the bottom, on the right, it is more or less printed on the picture High School and then over to the far right it says (and the first name is very light and hard to read) either Lila or Ella Lupens, Prin.  There are 11 girls on the front row (one of which is an adult), one boy and 8 girls on the second row (two of which are adults) and 5 boys on the back row. Herbert Kane was born May 5, 1883 in Sturgis, Michigan. So, this is probably around 1898 or 1899, somewhere in that range. I don't know at what age they were in high school then. On the 1900 Iowa Census, Delmar Village, Bloomfield Township, Clinton County, Herbert Kane (listed as age 17) was listed as living in the home of E.B. Parker (Edward B. Parker was Herbert James Kane's mother's, mother's brother) Also living in the home was Mrs. Emma Bratt (she was his mother's, mother's sister). It said Herbert James was "at school". So, this picture could even have been as late as 1900. 

The family story is that Herbert James Kane was an "orphan" raised by an "Aunt Sadie" in Richland, Iowa. But, this story does not hold true. I found Herbert James' mother, Cora Dell (Reynolds) Kane on an Iowa State Census in 1895 in Clinton County, town of Delmar, living in the home of the same E.B. Parker (which would have been her mother's brother). Herbert James was not listed there at that time. It listed Cora as a widow. 

On the probate I found in Clinton County of E.B. Parker in 1904, on the distribution, it lists as not sharing, Frank Kane, husband of Cora Kane, deceased. Frank Kane was the father of Herbert James Kane. Someone did some research for me and found in the county death records: "Mrs. Cora Kane, dressmaker, died Feb. 15, 1897, Widow, born in New York, resident of Iowa for 13 years. Died in Delmar, Ia of brain fever which she had for 2 weeks. Buried Delmar, IA on Feb. 17, 1897. E.S. McCord, Physician." So, if she was a resident of 13 years, she would have moved to Iowa from Albion, Indiana (where she married Frank Kane in 1882) or Sturgis, Michigan (where Herbert James Kane was born in 1883), around 1884. She died in 1897, and she is still listed as a widow, although Frank Kane was alive, according to the probate, in 1904. Very strange and hard to trace. 

Herbert James Kane's mother was Cora Dell Reynolds. Cora Dell's parents were Dudley Reynolds and Harriet Shepard (Parker) Reynolds. Cora and Frank were married in Albion, Indiana. I have found a lot of the Parkers (E.B. Parker, Margaret "Emma" Parker Bratt, etc.) and a lot of their relatives buried in Evergreen Cemetery in Delmar.

Cora must have been buried in an unmarked grave in the plot with E.B., as there is no listing for her. I also found I.G. Parker living around the area (he was one of the Parker brothers), so I think a lot of the Parker family must have migrated from NY (where they were from) to Iowa. E.B. Parker was a banker/attorney supposedly in Maquoketa or Delmar at the People's Bank. I have a list of all 12 of the Parker children, but my research is so boggled down on my direct line. 

I am sending two more pictures separately. They are of Herbert James Kane. He looks to be around the same age as he was in the school picture. 

Hopefully, someone will recognize the school or maybe even some of the children in the school picture. I look forward to seeing it. Hope this will give someone more clues than I have. Thanks - Ginger Rhodes.

 

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