Frank Kane Lucas & wife Nancy Ann Perkins Lucas: Whispers from the Grave; Klaiber Cemetery, Boyd County, Kentucky

 Compiled by Teresa Martin Klaiber 2023

I wish to thank Dreama Calvo  donated  this picture of Frank Kane and Nancy Perkins Lucas. The picture is thought to be taken on their farm on Long Branch Road, just across the Boyd County line into Carter County, Kentucky.

 

Over the years we had visits with Norman Franklin Lucas and Lottie Marie Jones his wife. Many times we walked among those in Klaiber Cemetery, as Norman and Lottie told us stories.  Norman was one of thirteen children of Frank Kane Lucas and Nancy Ann Perkins, his wife. 

Norman’s father, Frank Kane Lucas was born 4 July 1885 in Boyd County, Kentucky the son of Henry Kane Lucas and Lucinda Sexton Lucas.  They lived on Garner as he was growing up. Farming was the primary source of income, and living off the land.

When Frank was twenty he married Nancy Ann Perkins, the daughter of James “Frank” Perkins and Martha J. Cotton.  Frank was deceased by the time they married and Nancy’s mother Martha J. had remarried to John “Jack” Combs.  Frank and Nancy married 17 January 1906 with the written permission of her mother, Mrs. Martha Combs, because she was only eighteen years and four days old.  Their marriage followed a miserable cold spell for the area, though a bit warmer and damp, everyone wore heavier coats.  Julina Sexton Klaiber, William Vincent Sexton and William’s wife, Elizabeth “Trudi” Enyart Sexton were witness.  They were married by J. W. Hedrick.

Tragedy struck after the birth of Carl Douglas Lucas who was born 10 January 1918 and died the 11^th of September 1918 from gastro intestinal issues. His death certificate is filed for Carter County just across the line on Long Branch.  He was laid to rest in Klaiber Cemetery.

A daughter Martha Edith Lucas was born 23 June 1919 in Boyd County. Julina Sexton Klaiber kept a diary during this time frame and entered her death on 22 October 1923 but did not write down the heartbreaking details.   Little Martha was playing with matches and caught her clothing on fire.  She was buried in Klaiber Cemetery on the 24^th.

 

 

 

Just one year before Martha’s death, Frank had purchased 22 acres on Garner Creek just over the Carter County line from his father and mother, Henry Kane Lucas[i]. Many of the farmers in our area made extra money by signing leases for oil and gas throughout the years and still do. It was an easy way to make some extra money when you owned the mineral rights to your property.  Frank had a lease, in Carter County, with Kentucky Fuel Gas Corporation.  These leases gave the company right of exploration and the possibility of sinking a well.  If the well produced the lease stipulated either royalties or the free use of gas.[ii]

In the late 1930’s Frank invested in 35+ acres along Williams Creek in Carter County[iii]. Williams Creek winds around to Glancy Fork and Denton. Long Branch Road extends, but dead ends, from Boyd County into Carter County. As I have stated many times, there was a horse path across the hill from Long Branch to Denton that was easily accessed. Frank’s World War II draft card, filed in Carter County, describes Frank as five feet ten inches tall, with brown eyes and black hair.  Farming had left him lean at 125 pounds.

Other children of Frank and Nancy that grew to adulthood but are buried in Klaiber Cemetery include Laura Jane born 3 September 1910 in Boyd County and married 20 December 1929 Marion Emerald Jarvis.  She died 31 December 1942 in Columbus, Ohio and was brought back to Klaiber Cemetery for burial. Marion remarried in 1943 Mary Brennan.  When he died 6 March 1968 he was buried in Klaiber Cemetery, as well.

Bessie Juanita Lucas was born 4 June 1926, never married and lived most of her life on Garner.  She moved to Columbus in 1965 and died there 25 November 1966 and was brought back to Garner for burial[iv].

Bessie Juanita’s father Frank Kane Lucas died 23 December 1966 after an extended illness, after farming most of his life. Nancy lived exactly one month and died 23 January 1967 from a heart attack. Both are laid to rest in Klaiber Cemetery.

 

 

Their son Ralph Clifton Lucas born 14 March 1914, married 22 October 1938 Elizabeth Alexander.  He was a member of Coalton Community Church and had worked for Jeffery Manufacturing Company in Columbus, Ohio. Ralph died 16 July 1977, Rush, Kentucky, of a heart attack. He was buried in Klaiber cemetery 18 July 1977.  His widow Elizabeth died 27 November 1989 in Portsmouth, Scioto County, Ohio and was brought back to Klaiber Cemetery for burial on the 30^th.

Frank and Nancy’s daughter Amanda Marie born 28 October 1908, had two marriages. She married Herman Burke who died in 1930 and is buried in Rice Cemetery, Lawrence County, Kentucky.  Amanda married second Thomas J. Maddox.  Thomas was born 13 September 1895 in Elliott County, Kentucky died in 1960 in Columbus, Ohio. He was brought back for burial in Klaiber Cemetery. Amanda died 17 October 1994 and is buried in Klaiber Cemetery.

Other children of Frank and Nancy include Florence Lucas McKnight buried in Columbus, Franklin County, Ohio; Nora (no further info.); Lenora Irene Lucas Smith died Sandusky, OH; Hazel Lucille Lucas Davis died Greenup Co., KY and is buried White Chapel in Barboursville, Cabell, WV: Norman Franklin Lucas buried in Columbus, Franklin County, OH; Ruth Evelyn Lucas Caudill buried Franklin County, OH; Raymond Lucas buried Columbus, OH.

 

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[i] Ky, Carter deed book 39 page 285

[ii] KY, Carter Deed book 49-272 release of lease  4-3-1928

[iii] KY, Carter deed book 58 p 603,

[iv] Daily Independent Nov 1966

Leonard and Mary “Mae” Gallion Enyart. Whispers from the Grave; Klaiber Cemetery, Boyd County, Kentucky

 

Compiled by Teresa Martin Klaiber 2023

Leonard L. Enyart was born 7 July 1888 near the Falls of Blaine in Lawrence County, Kentucky.  He was the son of William Frank Enyart (1855-1935) and Sarah E. Lett Enyart (1859-1917). 

Leonard usually left a smile and had a story to tell to those around him.  Luckily the late local historian, Evelyn S. Jackson, captured some of those stories in her writings.

When Leonard was 21 he married Mary “Mae” Gallion  13 February 1910, in Boyd County, Kentucky[i].  Mary would turn 16, the month after they wed so her father signed consent on the 12^th of February.  They were married in the presence of her father Thomas “Allen” Gallion and, her uncle by marriage, Mont Clay.[ii]  Mary’s mother was Belle Stanley.  Belle and Thomas Allen Gallion had married in 1892 and Mary was one of seven children.  Leonard came from large family of ten.

Sixty years later, when they celebrated their anniversary the Ashland Daily Independent carried the story[iii]. The article stated that at that time they had fifty-nine grandchildren and 76 great grandchildren.  Together, the couple had thirteen children and ten were still living to help them celebrate.

Leonard was a farmer in Boyd County. You don’t retire from farming so at age 80 a picture of Leonard and his “Texas size pumpkin” appeared in the Ashland Daily after a torrential downpour in August[iv].  I smile at the title of the article “Bear Creek Gullywasher Uproots Giant Pumpkins.”  I still hear the locals (including yours truly) using the word gullywasher when our creeks swell and overflow.  One of Leonard’s sixty pound pumpkins was located wedged under a house trailer almost a mile from his garden. 

I think my favorite story was written by Evelyn Jackson in the Press Observer[v]  when Leonard  told  stories “that made his blood run cold…” Among his several encounters is the tale of haunts on the adjoining property that we own where Klaiber Cemetery is located. “I heard this thing coming in behind me when I got up pretty close to the old Mrs. Dowdy place…she lived in the old log house there beside the road…the moon was kind of shining and it come… icicles all over it rattle, rattle, rattling. I looked around at it and seen it plain. It just flipped right by me and took straight up that road…I never did find out what it was.”  Let me assure my readers that the haunts and souls in Klaiber Cemetery are gentle and kind.

Mary Gallion Enyart died 4 November 1973, at the home of their daughter, where they were living.  Her funeral was conducted at Mavity Freewill Baptist Church and she was laid to rest in Klaiber Cemetery.  Leonard died 6 January 1975. His funeral service was conducted at Grassland United Methodist Church and burial was beside his wife, in Klaiber Cemetery.

 

 

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[i] KY Boyd Mbk 31A p 21

[ii] Montville Clay 1861-1943 married Nancy Jane Stanley

[iii] Ashland Daily Independent 22 Feb 1970

[iv] Ashland Daily Independent 25 Aug 1968

[v] Jackson, Evelyn S. Press Observer 30 Oct 1975 Boyd County, Ancestors

Curtis and Douglas Enyart. Whispers from the Grave; Klaiber Cemetery, Boyd County, Kentucky

 

Compiled by Teresa Martin Klaiber 2023

 

One of the saddest things to see in a cemetery is an unmarked grave of our tiniest cherubs.  One of my favorite sayings, which has many versions, is that as long as a person is remembered they live on. I think best said by the quote of George Eliot “Our dead are never dead to us, until we have forgotten them.” And yet so many cemeteries have tiny angels that lay at rest unmarked and undocumented unless someone remembers.  Klaiber Cemetery has our share of babes.

On a sunny, windy day in March 1968 I walked around the cemetery with Ruby Enyart Lawrence. Her grandparents were Leonard and Mary Gallion Enyart.  She stopped, looked down, and said that when she was growing up, her dad Thomas Roscoe Enyart and grandfather had shown her where infants Curtis and Douglas Enyart were buried. 

 

This particular area near Gallion and Sexton markers has several field stones and the possibility of even more graves that need identified.

Ruby said that Douglas was the same age as her aunt Leonard’s daughter,   Dorothy, who is also buried in our cemetery. Dorothy was born 22 January 1924, in Boyd County.  While the cemetery record book already had her birth, I confirmed the same in the Kentucky Birth Index.  Researchers might have a hard time locating it as the transcribed index spells the surname as Eugart!  Ruby’s oral history and memory was correct.  The birth of Douglas is recorded as Douglas Eugart 22 June 1924, mother Mary Gallion.[i] He was the son of Leonard Enyart. This little cherub did leave a tiny paper trail. 

The next step was to locate a death record. It took a little more sleuthing as Douglas Enyart’s death record gives no given name nor surname, ie the entry to the full name was left blank. The death record does give the birth date as June 21 1924.  Was Douglas born before midnight and his twin sister the following day?  Douglas was seven months and fourteen days old when he died of bronchial pneumonia.  Dr. J. A. Prichard of Buchanan was the attending physician.  Douglas died at Mavity, Boyd County on February 6^th and was buried on February 7^th. The informant was C. H. Fannin,  of Catlettsburg[ii]. The place of burial is cited as Sexton Cemetery and should not be confused with Sexton Cemetery on Pigeon Roost in Boyd County.  The property surrounding the cemetery was in the process of going to the heirs of Henry Powell Sexton[iii].

With Douglas honored it was time to review records for the other little Enyart baby, Curtis.   Once again those transcribing the Enyart name at the state level, mis-read the writing.  The Kentucky birth Index states that Curtis Engart was born to Mary Gallion (mother) 9 March 1931.    I was blessed with an earlier donation of the Effie Gullett Midwife Records to share with researchers.  With permission of Michelle Gullett, I extracted the records in a previous blog[iv].   Among the many entries of the midwife is the birth of Curtis stating he is the twelfth child (11 living Douglas having preceded him in death) of Mary and Leonard Enyart.

 

Enyart, Curtis

9 Mar 1931

Born Boyd Co., Princess. Male, legitimate. Father Leonard Enyard, resides Strait Creek, white, 42, born Boyd Co., KY, farmer. Mother Mary Gallion, white, 38, born Boyd Co. 12th child, 11 living.

 

Using various spellings, this compiler, at this writing, has not located a death record for Curtis.  There is no evidence of an obituary in the Ashland Daily newspaper.  However, the death occurred between 1931 and the Federal Census in 1940. Tiny footprints leave tiny imprints.

May you always have an angel by your side.

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[i] KY Birth Index 1911-1999

[ii] KY D Cert Boyd 2852

[iii] Eventually becoming Klaiber property called today by the owners Deliverance Farm

[iv] http://easternkentuckygenealogy.blogspot.com/search?q=gullett