Lucas County is in south central Iowa. It was founded in 1846 and the county seat is Chariton.
Nebraska was not settled by many European-Americans until 1848. In the 1860s, the government took Native American land and opened it for homesteaders. Nebraska became the 37th state on March 1, 1867,
A prairie is a temperant, level region with grasses, herbs, and shrubs, rather than trees. Most of North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma are prairie.
Bonham Fox was
born on April 30, 1868 in Benton Township, Lucas County, Iowa. He
was the son of John Newton Fox and Sarah Jane Ricketts. His name was pronounced
Bow-mee by the family. It has
been spelled as Bonaparte, Bornie, Bonum, Bowman Boehme, Bomy and Barney
Fox. He was a
farmer.
He married
Eliza Jane White about 1890. Eliza Jane was born on March 5,
1876. She was the daughter of Paris M. White and Mary Elizabeth Breckenridge. She was also Walter White's
sister. Walter White married Grace Smith.
Bomy and Eliza's
oldest nine children were born in Iowa and the youngest two in Nebraska.
Ira Dell Fox was born July 28, 1891. She died at birth.
Iva Belle Fox Foreman was born July 28, 1891. She married Jeremiah E. Foreman.
Mary Dessie Fox Jordan was born
September 10, 1892. She married James Earnest Jordan.
Roy Orville Fox was born February 3, 1894.
Lester
Willard Fox was born July 1895.
Lura May Fox was born September 25,
1897.
Ethel Dean Fox was born January 14 1901. she married Roy Rye Davis.
Lola Irene Fox
was born October 31, 1903.
Luther Irian Fox was born October 31
1903.
Mabel Gertrude Fox was born July 16, 1906.
Greta Marie
Fox Morris was born on September 9, 1908.
The family
had moved to Rogers County, Oklahoma by the time of the 1910
census and remained there during the 1920 and 1930 censuses.
Eliza
died on April 30, 1944 and Bonham died on January 31, 1950 in Rogers County,
Oklahoma. They are buried there together at Woodlawn Cemetery.
The Great Depression was world wide and originated in the U.S. with the stock market crash of October 29, 1929. Income, revenue, profits, prices, and trade plunged.. Unemployment in the U.S. rose to 25%. The negative effects of the Great Depression lasted until the end of World War II.
In the 1830s settlers began arriving in Iowa from Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, Indiana, Kentucky, and Virginia. Iowa became a state in 1846.
Descendants of Absalom Fox and Christian Bonham are Mayflower Descendants.
Greeta [Fox Morris] is the youngest of eleven children, including two sets of twins. Bomy and Jane Fox gathered their ten living children and traveled by covered wagon from McCook, Nebraska, to Bushyhead, Oklahoma. Life was hard and there was little money for material possessions.
Greeta had been to Seminole, Oklahoma, to visit her sister Ethel when she met Robert Earl. It is not certain where they met, but it may have been at a dance, Earl loved to dance. They were married on May 12, 1929, in Seminole, Oklahoma.
During the depression, Greeta and Earl picked pecans on her sister and brother in-law's (Jerry and Iva Foreman) orchard to earn extra money.
Bacon and eggs for breakfast in Freer is just one fond memory that her grandson had of "Mamaw" Greeta. It seems that Greeta was always in the kitchen cooking or doing laundry. Greeta explained that she got the oil out of Papaw's clothes by first washing them in kerosine and then soap. She used an old ringer washer.
One disagreement Mamaw had with her grandson was over eating fried okra. She just couldn't understand why anyone would not want to eat okra.
Greeta and Earl were married for 63 years. Greeta did beautiful crochet work, and all of her family treasure their afghans.
Health concerns, including a detached retina, colon cancer surgery, and carotid artery surgery forced Greeta into a nursing home. She died on December 7, 2004 in Kingsville, Texas, and is buried in Pleasanton City Cemetery.
