Still Untangling

The Erasmus Miller Owen Family, part 10

For the past two weeks we have been looking into the idea that Erasmus Miller Owen was the acting pastor of a church in Palouse, Oregon in 1916.  Today we are going to take one step further in our efforts to untangle the records of the two Erasmus Owens.

Last week we focused on Erasmus the younger, a.k.a. Uncle Ras, and we talked about my family's story that he was forced to quit preaching as a young man after a head injury left him with a stutter.  If multiple other branches of the (very) extended family had heard the same story, that would explain why nobody has questioned the story that Erasmus Miller Owen was pastoring a church in Washington in his old age.

Well, it seems that I must be more skeptical than most folks out there, because I questioned both stories.  When I thought about Erasmus Miller Owen pastoring a church at age 84, in Washington, and even though he was "feeble," I said to myself, Okay.  We've all been told that Uncle Ras had to give up preaching after his accident, but what if he actually DID take up preaching again some time later?!  

We've looked at what the younger Erasmus was like in his old age, when he was living in Laveen, Arizona and having fits of rage.  Not very pastor-like.  We did see, though, that in the one occasion where we get a glimpse into his own mind, he lectured his niece from the standpoint of sin, something a retired preacher might do.  And then there was the letter from his brother, Reverend Conrad L. Owen; Conrad praised Ras' "knowledge and discernment of the contents of the Bible," and claimed that his brother had helped him gain "a wider and fairer conception of Christian truth."  Hmmmm.  That definitely sounds like a preacher.  Of course, then there were the funeral booklet, obituary, and death certificate - I haven't seen the funeral booklet on the internet (my mother scanned an original copy), but I'm wondering why nobody, myself included, seemed to notice that his death certificate actually listed his 'usual occupation' as Minister, retired.  Huh.  That was right under our noses the whole time!

I guess it's pretty clear then that Uncle Ras was an ordained minister.  But did he preach after his accident?  We have to answer that question if we are going to figure out just who was preaching in Palouse.

Let's look back to what we know about his time in Texas.  It turns out that it's not very much.  Since he didn't marry, it would not be surprising if he had remained at home until his mother died in 1896.  We can't confirm that because there is no 1890 census to check and a search of the newspapers from the Brown County area for that time period don't turn up any hits for the family at all.  We can't find Erasmus - neither one (!) - on the 1900 census, either, which could be an indication that, wherever they were, they were together in the same place. 

Ooh, I just remembered that a few weeks ago I found a deed record for them from December 1898, and it showed that they were both still living in Brown County at that time.  The next time we find them, if you remember my second post on this family, was in Crosby County, which was like 170 miles to the northwest of Brown County, when an Erasmus Owen and an E. M. Owen performed marriages in 1903 and 1904.  But how do we know that the two documents were not referring to the same person?  At that point in my research it was just a hunch, but I have seen enough records from Texas to now know that Erasmus Miller Owen was virtually always recorded as just "E. M."  (I think the only exception to this that I have found so far is the census.)  If the two records are for both father and son, that would mean that Uncle Ras was already ordained in 1903.  Of course, that doesn't really tell us anything about whether or not he was preaching at that time or later.

That was pretty much the last record I had for either one of them in Texas (other than the Confederate pension application or the census records) when I stumbled on the letter from Conrad saying that he had found his father in Oregon in January of 1907.

Now, Conrad's letter didn't mention anything about his brother - just his father and two sisters.  But that doesn't mean that Uncle Ras wasn't there; the letter just said how great it was to see his father, and that he spent two weeks alternating between the homes of his sisters.  I am assuming this meant that his father was living with one of the sisters and her family, and it is possible that Uncle Ras was as well.  Lucky for me, and also for all of you, there are surviving newspapers from the part of Oregon in which they were living - from the time period in which they lived there - that are digitized and online!  

I've spent the better part of the last two weeks searching for, reading, clipping, and saving hundreds of newspaper articles.  I had saved a lot of these to my Newspapers.com account a month or two ago, but I discovered an article last week that mentioned a previous letter by Conrad Owen that had been published the week before - in an addition of a newspaper that didn't pop up in my search results.  It turns out that for a lot of the newspapers on Newspapers.com, they only have certain pages, like pages six through eleven, so there is the potential to miss a lot of references to our ancestors.  This knowledge sent me on another round of searching, and I came up with results from Google Books (newspapers used to be bound into book form and placed in libraries), the Wallowa History Center website, and a site called Historic Oregon Newspapers.  

I am going to show you the articles in chronological order, with all of the different newspapers mixed together.  That way we can get a more accurate picture of what was really going on.  (I say more accurate because, as you will see, it will still be confusing!)  I will also be showing some articles about Conrad, because it is important to know where he was in order to make sense of the some of the articles that mention an Erasmus or 'E.' Owen, and besides, all three men are going to come together at a critical juncture. (When I first found the articles, I was only looking at two different newspapers so it took me a couple of years' worth of articles and one all-important reference to figure things out.  I have since found additional articles that shed better light on the situation earlier.)

Let's get started then, shall we?  Here is the first article I've found that mentions any of our Owens up in Oregon:

The Daily East Oregonian
15 Jan 1907

This newspaper was published in Pendleton, Oregon, and shows that Conrad had just finished his visit with his father and sisters.  Of course, we probably have no idea where exactly that is, so I am going to have to put up a map!

1901 Map of Oregon

(I found this map on the Oregon Historical Society Digital Collections website.  If you want to open it up with the cities marked so that you can zoom in, you can find it here.)

Way up there at the top right we see Wallowa County.  Conrad's earlier letter to his former church in Texas said that he found his family in the Blue Mountains of Oregon.  This map only shows the highest peaks, but the mountain range actually runs all along the border between Wallowa and Union Counties.  At different points in time, members of our Owen family lived in the towns of Enterprise, Alder, Joseph, and Grouse (not listed on the map, but on the border with Washington near the town of Lost Prairie).  Today we will also see that Conrad lived in western Oregon, in the towns of Astoria and St. John's.

This next article doesn't have anything to do with solving the Erasmus question, but it's super entertaining so I thought I'd share the headline:

The Daily East Oregonian
16 Jan 1907

Apparently, fifty citizens from the town of Adams held up the train and stole a coal car.  The headline says that it was a "Mixed Train," which means that it was also pulling passenger cars.  Conrad Owen was one of those passengers.  And, ironically, according to a different article, he was on his way to that very town to preach at a two-week revival!  Other newspaper articles show that Conrad spent the next four months traveling from town to town in Umatilla and Union Counties preaching revivals.  

Then, at the beginning of May, he headed all the way over to the very northwest corner of the state, to Astoria.  After preaching there for two weeks, the Baptist church called him to be their pastor:

The Morning Astorian
14 May 1907

Conrad remained in Astoria until the middle of 1909.  I found tons and tons of articles about his time there, but I'll have to show those at another time.  I just needed to establish his whereabouts, because it will be mentioned in the other articles .

The earliest article I have been able to find for a Reverend Owen in Oregon not specifically named as Conrad was from September of 1907:

The Enterprise News-Record
7 September 1907

This article names a Rev. Owen as the pastor of the Baptist Church in the town of Enterprise.  We  know that this cannot be Conrad, because he was the pastor of the Baptist Church in Astoria at that time.  Notice how this Rev. Owen was going to preach at the "Union" services at the Christian Church.  I saw this a lot in the Oregon and Washington newspaper articles - all of the different Protestant churches would hold a combined service every so often.

The Enterprise News-Record
14 September 1907

I guess the preaching was splendid.

The Enterprise News-Record
21 September 1907

See? Another combined service.  

The Enterprise News-Record
10 October 1907

And another.  (I actually just discovered after writing this post but before publishing it, that it seems that the Baptist Church in Enterprise did not have an actual building of their own at that time, which explains why they were constantly having services in other locations.)

The Morning Astorian
20 October 1907

Ah.  An actual reference to a Reverend Owen with a first name attached!  Here we see Erasmus Miller Owen - referenced as "E. M." - filling in for his son in Astoria.  This is absolute proof that Erasmus the elder was preaching during his time in the northwestern U. S., but it isn't enough to prove whether he was actually pastoring a church or just preaching here and there. 

The Enterprise News-Record
14 November 1907

Once again we have a Rev. Owen with no first name.  The town of Alder was just to the southwest of Enterprise.  Now, I can't imagine Uncle Ras starting a singing school, so as of now I am going to assume that it was Erasmus the elder - also a bit hard to imagine, actually!  But look at this:

The Morning Astorian
16 November 1907

This is the newspaper from Astoria, where Conrad was the pastor of the Baptist church.  Why does it say that E. M. Owen was the pastor?  And look:

The Morning Astorian
17 November 1907

Here we have a Reverend Mr. Owen performing a wedding in Astoria.  Was this Conrad, or his father?  Well . . . .

The Athena Press
29 November 1907

This says that the Reverend Owen had been preaching union services in Weston for the past few weeks and that he would be moving on to Adams.  There are actually articles showing that this is referring to Conrad, who had been preaching in Weston since November 4th, and was slated to head to Helix after he was finished there.  The towns of Weston, Adams and Helix were all in Umatilla County.  (They are all marked with one star on the map above.  Weston was right next to Athena.)  Then, in December, we find this:

The Morning Astorian
14 December 1907

See?  Conrad was gone for two whole months.  It looks like his father had been filling in for him during his absence.  That means that it was Rev. E. M. Owen who performed the wedding, but that it was NOT Rev. E. M. Owen who was supposed to be starting a singing school in the middle of November.  Well, that is a surprise!  Here is another article on that topic (slightly out of order):

The Enterprise News-Record
12 December 1907

(As you can see, I had to edit this one; it was cut between the bottom of one column and the top of another.)  It looks like things were going well for Uncle Ras.

The Morning Astorian
15 December 1907

This article confirms what we just figured out - Conrad had been gone from his church for nearly two months, and his father was acting as pastor in his place.  Erasmus the elder would stay a bit longer before returning home to Enterprise:

The Enterprise News-Record
9 January 1908

Although this just says "Rev. Owen," we know for sure that it is referring to Erasmus Miller Owen.  That means that any article mentioning a Rev. Owen in Enterprise from November and December of 1908 is talking about Erasmus the younger.  But here's the thing - only the very first article from Enterprise - the one from September - actually said that Rev. Owen (initials not specified) was the pastor of the Baptist church.  All of the rest just say "of the Baptist Church."  We still don't know which of the two men was the actual pastor.  Maybe Uncle Ras was filling in for his father while his father was filling in for his brother.  That's not confusing at all, is it?

The identity of the Rev. Owen (Owens?  That silly reporter!) in the next four articles is also not entirely clear . . . .

The Enterprise News-Record
27 February 1908

  

The Enterprise News-Record
12 March 1908

The Enterprise News-Record
26 March 1908

The Enterprise News-Record
9 April 1908

But look at the next one:

The La Grande Evening Observer
14 May 1908

I know, this is soooooo long!  But it is also soooooooo important!  This is one of the new articles I found yesterday.  It tells us that the Baptists were having a convention in La Grande, Oregon.  You can find that on the map above, right in the center of Union County, to the southwest of Enterprise.  If you look at the schedule of speakers, you will see that at 2 p.m. of the first day there would be a devotional by the Rev. Erasmus Owen of Enterprise.  Then, at 3 p.m., Rev. E. M. Owen of Enterprise would give a "10 minute talk."  On the following day, Rev. E. M. Owen was slated to speak at 11:40 a.m.  This tells us that both Erasmus Owens, the father and son, were ordained ministers who lived in Enterprise and were active in the Baptist churches.  And, once again, we see Erasmus Miller Owen referred to as "E. M. Owen."

The La Grande Evening Observer
15 May 1908

Erasmus Owen (not E. M. Owen) was elected clerk of the convention.  Or maybe the association, because why would an annual convention need a permanent clerk?  Anyway, Uncle Ras seems to have had a good many years as a capable clergyman.

 La Grande Evening Observer
15 May 1908

The previous article mentioned revival meetings being merged with the convention events, so that is what this article is referring to.  There was a photo in the newspaper showing that the revival meetings were held in an ice skating rink.  This article tells us that Erasmus Owen, which must mean Uncle Ras, was leading the young people's meeting.  I wonder if he was doing this with his stutter, or if he had learned to overcome that disability by then.

The Joseph Herald
12 June 1908

The quality on this one leaves much to be desired.  It came from a tiny, one-page newspaper (more of a newsletter!) printed in the town of Joseph; you can find the town just southeast of Enterprise on the map.  It says that Rev. Owens of Enterprise, who represented the Baptist Missionary Society, was preaching in the Methodist Episcopal church.  This doesn't indicate which one it was, but I am suspecting that it was Erasmus the elder.  I swear I saw in one of the editions of the Baptist Yearbook that he was serving in Oregon as a part of the home missions endeavor.  I couldn't find it again when I looked, but I don't think I dreamed it, so I'll spend some more time looking for it and share it in a later post.

The Enterprise News-Record
30 July 1908

This is obviously the second part of a longer article.  The first part was way too long to put up here, and didn't even mention any Owens.  It basically said that the Sunday School association of Wallowa County held a convention in which their purpose was to ensure that the Sunday schools were better organized with better-trained teacher who had a better understanding of the Bible.  In this second half we see that Rev. E. Owen was elected as Superintendent of Teacher Training for the following year.  I am guessing that this refers to Uncle Ras, but I could be wrong.

The Enterprise News-Record
30 July 1908

The same edition of the paper also had this article.  It says that the Rev. E. Owen was conducting a Bible course at the Christian (non-denominational?) church.  Once again, I'm thinking Uncle Ras.  But then this also appeared in the same paper:

The Enterprise News-Record
30 July 1908

This just says Rev. Owen.  Could this mean Erasmus the elder?  Somehow, as his photograph comes to my mind, it seems that he would be one to teach a summer school for moral and religious instruction!

The Joseph Herald
31 July 1908

And another beautiful article from the Joseph Herald.  I actually cut the bottom part of this off.  The last paragraph shown here is the important part anyway.  This says that the Rev. E. Owen gave an interesting and helpful address.  (And I had to laugh at the comment "considering the weather and time of year")

This next one is a little different:

The Joseph Herald
10 August 1908

This is an obituary for a resident of the town of Joseph written by "E. Owen." If this sounds familiar, that's because we saw the actual funeral notice way up above in an April news article.  (Notice how the bottom of this one is dated April 5th!)  I am guessing this was Erasmus the younger, since it doesn't say "E. M."

The Enterprise News-Record
13 August 1908

See?  This refers to "Rev. E. M. Owen," and we know that means Erasmus the elder.  This article is from a section reporting news from the town of Sled Springs.  Apparently, Erasmus Miller Owen had been visiting his daughter, who was ill.  I'm 99% sure this refers to his daughter Letitia, because I know for a fact that she was living in the town of Grouse, which isn't on the map I made but is way up north of Enterprise on the Washington state border, and Sled Springs, which is also not on the map above, but is located due north of Enterprise.  I'm not sure what the part about Wallowa means, though, because Wallowa sits to the northwest of Enterprise, so it is hard to imagine him passing through Sleds on his way there.  Oh, and also, I have seen other articles about Letitia's poor health, so yeah - it's got to be talking about her.

The Enterprise News-Record
20 August 1908

Once again, we see that "E. Owen" was the pastor of the Baptist church in Enterprise, and that his church held union services at the Christian church twice a month. 

The Enterprise News-Record
3 September 1908

Okay, now we have another article with a Rev. E. Owen, talking about that summer school for moral and religious instruction.  So maybe this was Uncle Ras, not his father, or maybe the news reporter just didn't realize it mattered whether or not there was a middle initial included.

For the next few months, nearly all of the articles are not entirely clear as to which Erasmus Owen they are referring to:

The Enterprise News-Record
10 September 1908

The Enterprise News-Record
17 September 1908

The Enterprise News-Record
1 October 1908

The Enterprise News-Record
1 October 1908

The Enterprise News-Record
1 October 1908

The one about the Rev. Owen visiting his daughter is obviously Erasmus the elder.  But what about the other ones?  Well, the first two from October are signed Erasmus Owen.  The third, just says "Rev. E. Owen."  But look at the topics of the last two - they are both talking about the Sunday School teacher training, and I think that it was Uncle Ras who was appointed to serve in that capacity.

The Morning Astorian
13 October 1908

I just put this one up because Conrad was going to be preaching in Enterprise, where his father and brother lived.

The Enterprise News-Record
23 November 1908

And another reference to Rev. E. Owen.

The Wallowa Sun
27 November 1908

This newspaper was printed in the town of Wallowa; I only found a few original articles from it on the Historic Oregon Newspapers website.  Most of the ones that mentioned Owens were identical to an article that was also published in the Enterprise newspaper.  

The Enterprise News-Record
26 December 1908

La Grande Evening Observer
8 January 1909

Now, the next article is interesting:

The Enterprise News-Record
23 January 1909

Could it be that the Rev. E. Owen in this article was Uncle Ras, and that he had not lost his stutter but was preaching regardless, and that this John McCormack fellow was heckling him because of his speech impediment?

The Joseph Herald
5 March 1909

The next few articles mention that Rev. Owen was living in Alder Slope.  In case you've forgotten, the town of Alder was to the southwest of Enterprise.  Today the two towns sort of merge together, but I don't know how close they were a hundred years ago.  Had both Erasmus Owens moved from Enterprise, or was only one living in Alder Slope?  

The Enterprise News-Record
6 March 1909

The Joseph Herald
12 March 1909

The Enterprise News-Record
13 March 1909

The Wallowa County Chieftain
15 April 1909

Okay.  The next article is one that clears things up - a lot!  It is also one of the newer articles that I've found, which just goes to show that if you aren't satisfied with the results or your research, keep looking!

La Grande Evening Observer
27 May 1909

I'm not sure what is up with that headline, but the article is amazing.  This tells us that it was Uncle Ras who was the pastor of the Baptist church in both Enterprise and Alder - not his father, Erasmus Miller Owen!  I believe that means that any article that says "Rev. E. Owen" or just "Erasmus Owen" should be interpreted as being Erasmus the younger.

Another fact presented in this article that has me equally excited is that Uncle Ras was heading to Astoria to visit his brother and "receive medical treatment."  As you will see, other articles just say he is going for the "sea air," but this implies something more.  Was he going to be taking some spa days, or was this the point at which he had the metal plate removed from his head?

The Enterprise News-Record
8 May 1909

Finally, another mention of Erasmus Miller Owen!  I'm not sure what he was giving a "response" to - the mayor's welcome address or the praise service?  Weird.

The Enterprise News-Record
5 June 1909

Okay.  This is getting confusing.  It looks like Rev. E. Owen was re-elected as the Superintendent of teacher's training, even though he was off in Astoria when the convention was held.  He must have done a good job at it during the preceding year.

The Enterprise News-Record
6 June 1909

Ah, see?  Sea air.

The next two articles I found were just repeats of these ones from different newspapers.  The next new one, however, is the one that originally allowed me to finally confirm that Erasmus Miller Owen and his son Erasmus were all mixed together in the news articles:

The Enterprise News-Record
10 June 1909

This article tells us so much information!  If you look at the first paragraph, Uncle Ras was still being listed as the clerk of the Grand Ronde Baptist Association, which indicates that they believed he would be returning to his duties soon.  The second paragraph tells of a letter that Conrad wrote to his father, giving an update on Ras' condition.  (Notice how his father is referred to as "Rev. E. M. Owen".)   Conrad said that his brother was getting stronger but still suffering a great deal.  This article was published just over a week after Uncle Ras left for Astoria, so it is possible that he had his surgery and Conrad was letting their father know how things had gone.  

La Grande Evening Observer
14 July 1909

The Enterprise News-Record
17 July 1909

So, it looks like Uncle Ras was with his brother Conrad for about a month.  Notice how these two articles refer to him as "Rev. Erasmus Owen" and "Rev. E. Owen."  The next two also says "Rev. E. Owen", and we know for sure that all three are talking about Erasmus the younger.

The Enterprise News-Record
8 September 1909

The Enterprise News-Record
11 September 1909

And that was the last article I found for either of our Erasmus Owens in the Enterprise, Oregon area.  Of course, not all editions of those historic newspapers have survived.  It's possible that there was another article saying something that would make it clear they didn't just drop off the face of the earth.

By the end of April 1910, Erasmus Miller Owen had returned to Texas and can be found on the census living with the family of his daughter Minnie in Brown County.  Erasmus the younger can be found on the 1910 census in the household of his brother, Conrad, in the town of St. John's, Oregon.  St. John's is in Multnomah County, just to the northwest of Portland.

So, to recap what we discovered:  

At some time between 1904 and 1906, Erasmus Miller Owen and two of his daughters moved to Wallowa County, Oregon.  In January of 1907, Conrad arrived in Oregon as well.  Whether Uncle Ras moved to Oregon with his father, went there with his brother, or made the trip on his own sometime in between cannot be determined from the newspaper articles that I have been able to find, because Murphy's Law is alive and well and the digitized newspapers for Enterprise, Oregon begin in August of 1907.   The one article stated that in May of 1909, Rev. Erasmus Owen had been the Baptist pastor for two years, which means he was filling that capacity in May of 1907, before the earliest available edition of the newspaper from Enterprise.

What we can also be absolutely certain of is that both Erasmus Owens, father and son, were living and preaching in Oregon during the first decade of the 1900s.  However, at this point it does not appear that the pastor in 1916 Palouse was Erasmus Miller Owen.  He would have had to have travelled back to Texas and then gone back up to Washington several years later in his feeble old age.  It makes sooooo much more sense that it was Uncle Ras instead.  But you know what?  I have a few more documents we can throw at the problem, just to be sure. . . . I'll show them to you next time.

                                                                                                                                                - Therese 

Update:  You can find and download a pdf containing all of the above newspaper articles here.