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| Catherine Josephine Hobbs Toon, 1939 |
As my paternal great-great-grandmother, Josephine is a focal point of complexity in my family tree. While many of her life events were somewhat common for the time period (including child loss), her life seems to be the most tumultuous and least traditional of many of those around her.
I became interested in researching Josephine because she is an archetype of feminine (and human) determination and power that is underrepresented in historical accounts. She likely did not have much social or financial power as a widowed woman in a farming town at the turn of the 20th century. Despite this, she never remarried, though in theory she was still of age to have more children at the time. Josephine is a complicated character in that respect.
Suffering is isolating. I think this is the core of where I draw inspiration from Josephine. The facts of her life are sparse but they reveal to me an image of an isolated, strong-willed woman. It is my own image. On the other side of my family tree, I see Josephine in them, too. It is the image of my mother, and her mother, the only grandmother I knew. I am their daughter. In this way, I am Josephine.
Who is Josephine
Josephine's parents were both on their second marriage when she was born in 1861. She was the only child of Samuel W. Hobbs and Elizabeth Farmer. Her father died when she was a baby. She had many half-siblings from her parents' other marriages.Who is Josephine
She was perhaps all but abandoned by her mother, who remarried and lived in another town on the other side of the Kentucky-Missouri border. As a child, Josephine somehow ended up living with a family in Fancy Farm, Kentucky with the last name Toon. However, it was apparently not the same Toon family as the one she married into years later.
Josephine married extremely young. Marrying at 15 years old was young even for the 19th century. Most people married in their early 20s at the time. She never remarried or had other children after becoming a widow at age 31. She had been married to William Pius Toon, my great-great-grandfather, for 16 years when he died. She was around 6 months pregnant at the time of his death.
Three of her children died during the 1890s, possibly sometime after the death of William Pius in 1893. The only record of their deaths is within the 1900 census. Overall, half of her children died over the course of her lifetime.
She died in Pueblo, Colorado at the age of 86 and is buried in St. Jerome Cemetery in Fancy Farm, Graves County, Kentucky.
Historical Context
I have no idea about her character or personality. I have no idea what political views she held. For all I know she was a Confederate apologist with deeply held beliefs in support of slavery. She lived in the southernmost outskirts of a border state during the post-Civil War era. Though it was technically a Union state, Kentucky's citizens were deeply divided. Graves County's history of slave ownership was still relatively recent. For certain, she had beliefs.
I can only assume the Klan was active where she lived. I'm sure she was witness to the violent oppression and subjugation of black people during this era in one way or another. I can only hope that she rejected the concept of White supremacy and that her thoughts about the Klan's atrocious activities were on the right side of history.
Josephine's suffering was small and personal relative to the developments of the time period. Her experience during this era is perhaps less important to analyze than white supremacy, civil rights, and terrorism campaigns against black people. Josephine was a white woman who apparently owned property and ran her own farm. This undoubtedly afforded her privileges not available to everyone.
Property and Resources
I know that Charles Kelvy transitioned to head of household sometime around 1920, according to that year's census. Josephine was living with him that year. I assume he inherited the farm from her but I do not have any records to confirm.
Early census records were not uniform. Researchers must piece together clues from multiple census records over time in order to get a full picture. Property value is one example of a data point that lacks uniformity across the census records of 1850-1940. Home values were not recorded in the census records during Josephine's adult life until 1930. Josephine does not appear anywhere in the 1930 census that I could find. Charles Kelvy, however, is recorded that year as the head of household for a farm with an address of "Fancy Farm and Lowes Road." There is a column for home value, but it was left blank.
In the 1940 census, the value of the Charles Kelvy Toon home is listed at $2,500. That is roughly $42,000 in today's dollars. Again, I am assuming he inherited this farm from Josephine. There is no address listed in the 1940 record that I could decipher. Regardless, this does not appear to have been a particularly high value property. It does not indicate that the family had a lot of money and resources. Like all of his neighbors listed on the same page of the 1940 census, Charles Kelvy's income from wages is recorded at $0. It does say he made more than $50 in the last year "from sources other than money, wages or salary."
Josephine is recorded in the 1940 census as head of household for a $1,400 property on Highway Grave Road in Graves County, Kentucky, which is the equivalent of around $24,000 today. It is not marked as a farm. This census record shows she lived in the same house in 1935, and we know she lived with Charles Kelvy in 1920. Since we don't yet know where Josephine lived in 1930, this house must have been purchased sometime between 1920-1935. What became of this property after she died in 1948 is unclear.
I am unsure what happened to the Toon family farm after Charles Kelvy's death in 1968. My own father had memories of that farm. He used to tell me stories about playing in the corn fields with his brother. When I visited Fancy Farm in 2000, my great uncle William Pius (1928-2012) took my sister and I on a tour of the town. He showed us family gravestones in St. Jerome Cemetery and the house where my grandmother, Mary Alma, had lived. My impression at the time was that the farm had long since been sold.
One day I hope to go back.
Blog
With context in mind, the facts and records available about her life suggest Josephine's power, strength, and determination in her personal life. The spaces in between those historic records are pure speculation. She seems to me like an extraordinary woman who lived an usually long life. Outside of her home and her farm, it is hard to say at all what kind of person she was. For me and for this blog, she is both anchor and muse.
To learn more about Josephine, see Josephine - Part 1 and Josephine - Part 2.
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