Stories

Having gone down the rabbit hole that is ancestry.com over the last year I have accumulated a mountain of information about those that came before me. This is where all that information will be shared.

  • 4 young women and one older women all dressed in long formal dresses of the 1890s style with air pulled back and pin curls in front

    The Brent Women

    The photo above is of Phoebe Ann Moore Brent and daughters Vesper, Eva, Jessie and Ida circa 1885. Ida Brent Married Emory Starr in 1898 and raised Ernest Starr from the age of 3. Emory is my 2x great grandfather and Ernest is my great grandfather. After Emory was killed by a lightning strike in……

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  • portrait of a young attractive woman with brown pin curls in her hair and a choker necklace

    Almeda Noakes

    Almeda Noakes was born in 1870 in Ellison, Illinois to William and Minerva Wilcox Noakes, the fourth of 8 children William had with Minerva after fathering 6 children with a previous wife. William was a farmer. Almeda married Emory Starr in 1892 at the age of 21. Two years later in Stronghurst Illinois she gave……

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  • adult man with short dark hair and weathered face looks at the camera without smiling

    Killian/Killion

    Martha Jane Killion, our 3rd great grandmother was born in Indiana but moved with her family to Mclean County and at age 21 in 1874 married James Thompson Phillips, a Pennsylvania transplant who worked as a day laborer and later a farmer. Martha had 6 children, including our 2x grandfather, John William Phillips. She died……

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