| Notes |
- (Research):On the 1910 Wetzel Census, she is living with son, William I. Jackson-HH#6, Center Dist.
This is a copy of an article written by Kenneth Boord, for the WETZEL
DEMOCRAT Newspaper, New Martinsville, WV, and was printed in the Thursday,
August 22, 1935 edition.
SMITHFIELD, July 30 (Special) by Kenneth Boord
Far back in the Wetzel County Hills, a little old lady with sparkling eyes and a
witty smile, upon whose shoulders many heavy burdens have been cast, but upon
whom the years have left little trace, on Monday of this week celebrated the one
hundred and first anniversary of her birth.
She is Mrs. Minerva Ann Jackson, who lives with her youngest son, G.
Ellwsorth Jackson, whom she calls, "my baby" at Wheat, on state route 7, about
eleven miles from the town of Hundred.
According to records in her family Bible, Mrs. Jackson was born July 29, 1834,
on the waters of Dunkard Creek, in Greene County, Pennsylvania, a daughter of the
late Huey Crawford Moore and Tabitha Eaton Moore. She was one of seventeen
children. She had ten sisters, three brothers, two half sisters and one half brother.
One sister, Mrs. Mary Morris of Calhoun County; a half brother, Huey Crawford
Moore of Wheat; and one half sister, Mrs. Rhoda Dulaney of Akron, Ohio, are
living.
When she was two years old, she moved with her family to what was then Tyler
county, Virginia, and what is now Wetzel County, West Virginia, where she spent
the last ninety-nine years. She married Leonard Garrison Jackson in August, 1854,
in Greene County, Pennsylvania. Jackson died some thirty-eight years ago. She
remembers that they were married by Magistrate "Squire" J. Hugh Parkison. They
were the parents of five children, four of whom are living. The children are: Mrs.
W. R. (Lucinda) Sapp of Wheat; Mrs. James (Victoria Dunday) Morris, deceased;
W. I. Jackson of Steubenville, Ohio; Mrs. Elizabeth Snyder of Steubenville, Ohio;
and "my baby", G. Ellsworth Jackson of Wheat.
There are five generations in Mrs. Jackson(r)s family. Of thirty-five grandchildren, twenty-six are now living. There are seventy-one great grandchildren and fourteen great great grandchildren.
Asked about her forefathers, she said: ? My father was Irish. No, I don(r)t know
what my mother was but I do remember that she was a big, fat woman and an
awfully good mother. We surely missed her a lot when she was gone.(r)
Mrs. Jackson is the niece of Levi Starkey, of Pricetown, Wetzel County pioneer
settler, who was brutally murdered in 1874 when robbers broke into his log cabin in
search of his gold. Mrs. Jackson well remembers how the atrocious crime was
committed ?by persons who had eaten at his own table, many a time, men whom the
family had known from the time they were born.(r) The aged man was shot while his
wife looked on and pleaded for her husband(r)s life. The murderers left without the
money which is said to have been hidden in a barrel of wheat. Mrs. Jackson said
that she was one of the murderers after he was released from the ?pen(r).
Mrs. Jackson is related to almost all the older families of Wetzel and adjoining
counties, including the families of Anderson, Dulaney, Parks, Efaw, Morris,
Starkey, Jackson, Lancaster, Clark, Sole, Taylor, Sapp, Yoho, Postlethwait,
Cosgray, Garrison, Leap, Long, Snyder, Gallagher and Phillips. On the occasion of
her one hundredth birthday last year there were some 500 persons present to honor her and of this number, there were but a few that were not related either by blood or marriage.
When Mrs. Jackson was a girl, the first town she visited was the town which is
now the county seat of Wetzel County, New Martinsville. There were two stores
there at the time. She was about fifteen years of age and rode horseback over an old trail, a long journey in those days. She went to work there she said. ?And I could do plenty of work for my age, too,(r) she explained with a grin. ?And we had plenty of work to do in those days. The house was large and the woman of the house was sick. I had to help wait on her and do the housework. We had to scout the house inside and out for there was no paint in those days, you know. We milked seven cows and took care of the milk; cooked for twenty men, besides the family of five boys and three girls. It was harvest time, and there was on the of the biggest harvest in years, I remember. In between time, while I was there (seven months) I spun 100 weight wool, I thought nothing of spinning five skeins of yarn in one day in addition to my other tasks.(r)
It was to a log cabin fashioned with his own hands that young Leonard Jackson
brought his bride that summer of 1854. The log cabin was situated but a few feet
from the home in which Mrs. Jackson and her son and his family are now dwelling.
?When we came here there wasn(r)t a stick amiss for miles around. It was a perfect
wilderness, no neighbors. There were no roads. Only trails like cow paths. The
creek was awfully crooked in front of our place and it would wash out badly. I
worked for weeks to straighten it out.(r) She walked eleven miles through woods to
Littleton to trade.
It was here that Mrs. Jackson toiled long and late beside her husband and where
she continued to labor after his death. ?Why, I cut as many as fifteen trees in one
day, and some of them weren(r)t little ones, either,(r) she reminisced. ?That same year
I raised 500 bushels of corn with the help of my son, who was 7 , and my girl, who
was but 10. We had a pet ?critter(r) that would balk every once in a while. He was
kind of lazy and would jump around in the traces. But when I(r)d give him a good
bustin(r) he wouldn(r)t cut up any more and would work good.(r) She rolled logs to
build fence and her son told the writer that he well remembers how she built more
than 100 panels of rail fence one winter with the snow knee deep. At that time she
was more than 60 years old.
?I only saw one deer that was killed around here,(r) she said. ?Right over on the
hill from the house, they killed it. There were lots of groundhogs, wild cats, foxes
and the like in the woods in those days. And snakes! Good gracious, but they were plentiful!(r)
Mrs. Jackson then related an interesting story about ?Uncle(r) Jack Taylor, who it
seemed was immune to snake bites. ?Why, that man would bring yellow rattlesnakes ___in the bosom of his shirt and say that he was going to throw them on me. I said, ?You do, and I(r)ll kill you.(r)
?One day when they were over on the Long farm picking berries, our dog (which
was a snake hound) holed a big rattler in a root hole and Uncle Jack put his hand in
the hole seven times to ?aggrevate(r) the snake and he was not bit a single time. The
dog would then stick his head in the hole and was bitten each time and had to be
carried home. The dog recovered. You know, I think that Uncle Jack was either
sanctified or the old Nick had cast a spell on him,(r) she added.
Mrs. Jackson was ?baptized in the Mormon Church(r) and believes that the
Mormons ?are good people.(r) She well remembers when the stars fell at the time the
Mormons were driven out of Ohio into Missouri. ?No I didn(r)t see them fall myself,(r)
she said ?but my friends and relatives saw them.(r)
Mrs. Jackson said she has ?gone through three wars, the Civil War, the Cuban
War and the World War.(r) Her husband was a Union soldier, a member of Company
I, the ?Flatfooted Calvary.(r) While he was stationed at the New Creek battleground
near Keyser, Mineral County, she learned that he had had his overcoat stolen. She prepared to take him another. ?I didn(r)t want him to freeze to death, so I got on the train at Burton and started to him. When I got to Grafton I made inquiries to see if any man by his name had been brought in wounded or killed. They told me that he had not been brought in, so I went on to him.(r) Mrs. Jackson made several trips to see her husband at the camps around Petersburg and other fighting grounds, and most of the time she would be the only woman on the trail. ?I guess the other women were afraid to go,(r) she said. ?I remember how I used to stand on the rear of the train all alone and look down on the pine treetops as we crossed the mountains.(r) Her husband was in the army the last nine months of the war. It was in February that she took him his overcoat and the conflict ended in March, she said.
Mrs. Jackson prophesies another great war. ?I(r)ve had some dreams lately in
which I see soldiers as they used to be on dress parade in the sixties. Yes, indeed, I firmly believe that there(r)ll be another war within a few years. Perhaps-who knows-I
may live to see my fourth war.(r)
Mrs. Jackson remembers how, when she was a young girl, women made their
own dresses, ?My sister and I would sit up and make our clothes by the light of a
tallow light. And my father would make our shoes by the same light.(r)
Mrs. Jackson was always fond of traveling. ?No, I never walked a great deal,
but whenever I wanted to go any place I would saddle up old Flora and start out.(r)
She laughingly recalled how she set out from home one evening after ?my geese(r)
which had strayed away and making for the home of their former owner ?over on the
big creek.(r) She got lost in the woods and wandered first up one creek and then
another. When she got home shortly before midnight her husband was ?making a
fagot to come in search of me,(r) she said.
Until seven years ago, she enjoyed excellent health. Asked if she had ever been seriously ill, she replied, ? I reckon I was never very dangerous.(r) Seven years ago she fell and broke her knee and now she must spend her time in a wheelchair.
Nevertheless, she is very jolly and talkative. She has a very brilliant and retentive
memory. She does not look her five score years and one at all, the writer thought.
She sees well. ? I only wear my specs about half the time,(r) she said. ?I don(r)t
care to read the newspapers very much, never did, but I read my Testament most of the time.(r) Her hearing is good, too. She has a good appetite and is especially fond of chicken and squirrel.
Mrs. Jackson still travels. Only a few months ago, she rode in an automobile
from Akron, Ohio, where she had visited relatives. ?But it makes me sick to ride in
a car when they drive too fast,(r) she commented.
Asked if she thought the world is any worse today than it was three-quarters of
a century ago, she said, ?Well, I don(r)t know. Some are good and some are bad, you know. There(r)s still a lot of good people in the world, though,(r) she concluded
optimistically.
A special celebration in her honor was held at the home of her son on Sunday, at which time the chief address was delivered by the Rev. A. Wickham, of
Jacksonburg, well-known evangelist. The event was widely attended by hundreds
of relatives and friends from West Virginia, Pennsylvania and Ohio. A surprise
party was also tendered the centenarian on Saturday evening.
Mrs. Jackson seemed to enjoy both occasion and when asked for her recipe for a long life, she said, ?I always worked hard all the days of my life and took good care of my body. I never was very wicked, you know. About the worst thing I reckon I ever did was to get mad and swear once in a while.(r)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
101 YEAR OLD, WETZEL COUNTY WOMAN HAD FELLED BIG
TREES, BUILT FENCE, DIED LAST MONTH NEAR WILEYVILLE
On March 24 of this year probably the oldest person in this entire vicinity, Mrs. Minerva Jackson, passed away at the home of her son, Ellsworth Jackson, on Little Fishing Creek, near Wileyville, Wetzel County. Her age was 101 years, seven months, twenty five days, she having been born July 29, 1834, on a farm in Greene County, Pa., a daughter of Huey Crawford Moore and Tabitha Eaton Moore.
Moving with her parents to Wetzel County, when a young child, she spent the remainder of her long life in the neighborhood in which she died. In August 1854, she married John L. G. Jackson, and passed eighty one of her more than 101 years at the homestead they established. She outlived two houses, both within 75 feet of the present one. The first was a log cabin, the second a larger house of hewed logs, and the present one, a nice frame house.
The children are Mrs. Lucinda Sapp of Little Fishing Creek, Mrs. Elizabeth Snyder and W.J. Jackson of Steubenville, Ohio, and G.E. Jackson resided with her on the homestead.
Although she was well past her century mark, her mind was still keen and she could relate many of the interesting events of long ago. She had helped her husband clear their farm, fence it well, and build the home. Indian stories and attacks on people by wild animals were vividly related by her, although some of the stories had been handed down from a former generation. Her husband, not being strong physically, Mrs. Jackson would chop down large trees, split them into rails and build fence.
To friends last Fall, she told of an evangelist who came to the neighborhood nearly seventy years ago and drew large crowds. Noon day services were held in the school house when the children were dismissed for lunch, and people would go for many miles to that service and back again to the night service.
She was one of the few survivors of an age that has almost vanished--the age when people sat around the fireside long winter evenings and related from generation to generation heroic stories of both family and neighbors in years that had passed. They lived before the daily newspaper and radio provided other entertainment and before good roads enlarged their world.
One of the stories Mrs. Jackson always related was about a panther, or "painter" as most pioneers called them, that had killed a young married woman of that locality, before Mrs. Jackson was born. The husband shot the animal as his wife expired.
Last July when her 101st birthday was celebrated, Mrs. Jackson greeted her children, many of her thirty-six grandchildren, her seventy-five great-grand children, and her thirty three great-great-grandchildren, and many nieces and nephews to the second and third generation. Her youngest child was then 67 years old.
A member of the Echo Staff called upon Mrs. Jackson last fall at her home near Wileyville on a Sunday afternoon and listened to her relating many incidents of pioneer life.
|
1834 - 1936 (101 years)
[1, 2, 3] 
William Ira Jackson, b. 12 Jun 1865, Center District, Wetzel County, Virginia, United States 
