Dorothy Louise Timberlake, 1906-1910

In 2012 I posted about the home of Ida Moran and William G. Timberlake home which is located in Jackson Tennessee and still stands.  I included several pictures of the exterior and interior of the home that were taken in the early 1900's. The pictures were actually negatives that I scanned and then inverted the image.  The results were beautiful but to me had a sad other world feeling to them.  

One image shows a picture of a little girl on the wall.  We thought it was probably Dorothy Louise Timberlake, the only child of Ida and Will, who was just 4 years old when she died.  But we had no way of knowing for sure until now.  Here is the original framed picture that you can see hanging on the wall of the Timberlake home.

Fin de Siecle Club, Jackson TN, 1898

Fin de Siecle: of, relating to, or characteristic of the close of the 19th century and especially its literary and artistic climate of sophistication, world-weariness, and fashionable despair.

Source: Merrian-Webster Online Dictionary. 

Some quick research tells me that several of the people (Mrs. R.H. Cartmell, Mrs O.J. Nance, N.S. White, Miss Callie Mallory, Mrs. J.E. Springbett) on the member list resided in Jackson TN which leads me to think the book came into the family through Ida Moran.  She married William G. Timberlake of Jackson TN and resided there after her marriage.

The Battle of the Strong was serialized in The Atlantic Monthly starting in January 1898.  It came out later that year in book form and was a best seller in the United States ranking number 10 on the best seller list for that year and rising as high as number 2 the following year. Source: Wikipedia

Fin de Siecle Club book guidelines and member list:

This book must be forwarded to the next on the list, on the 1st, & 15th, of each month.  A heavy fine will be imposed for careless handling.  Notify the Sec. Miss Callie Mallory, if not delivered on time, or abused.

Name   Rec'd  Deliv'd Condition

1. Mrs. H. Tomlin 

2. Mrs. J.D. Morgan

3. Mrs. C. Sutton

4. Mrs. R.H. Cartmell

5. Miss Callie Mallory

6. Mrs J.R. Withers

7. Mrs. H.C. Iroy

8. Mrs. W.R. Stout

9. Mrs. Riley Ely

10. Mrs. N.S. White

11. Mrs. Muse

12. Miss Mary Bell

13. Miss Mamie Caldwell

14. Mrs. P.J. Murray

15. Mrs. W. Chandler

16. Mrs. Hamilton

17. Miss F. Mallory

18. Mrs. S. Reid

19. Mrs. R. Balch

20. Mrs. Fulghum

21. Mrs. J. Friddle

22. Mrs. J. Springbett

23. Mrs. P. Bates

24. Miss A. Stephens

25. Mrs. O.J. Nance

26. Mrs. Tom Long

1893 Wedding Wednesday - Walsh & Sullivan Nuptials

Today's featured wedding invitation is to the wedding of Jenny Walsh and Belton O'Neal Sullivan.  They were married on November 28th, 1893 in Jackson Tennessee.  To date I've not found a family connection between the Walsh/Sullivan families to the Moran family so it's possible they were just some of the many friends.  Should a family connection show itself later I'll update this information

The William Kirby Walsh Home, ca 1870's
Jackson TN.  It's on the
National Register of Historic Homes.

Jenny Walsh, the bride, was one of the daughters of William Kirby Walsh of North Carolina and Talitha Jane Anderson of Purdy, Tennessee.  Her mother passed away in 1878 and two years later her father died.  Since neither of her parents were alive to give her away in marriage her sister Annette Walsh McClaran and her brother in law Robert Smith McClaran had the honor.

Belton O'Neal Sullivan, the groom, was the son of Dr. James Madison Sullivan of South Carolina and his second wife, Elizabeth S. Vaughan Sullivan.  The Sullivan's have a long and distinguished lineage and played a prominent role in the history of South Carolina.

Jenny and Belton were blessed with several children: Annette, Belton Jr.,  Marion, Elizabeth (married Frank Caldwell), and William.

Mr. & Mrs. Robert Smith McClaran

request the honour of your presence

at the marriage of their sister

Jenny Walsh,

to

Mr. Belton O'Neal Sullivan,

on Tuesday November the twenty eighth,

eighteen hundred and ninety three,

at high noon.

Cumberland Presbyterian Church.

Jackson Tennessee










 

This is William Kirby Walsh Sullivan, one of Jenny and Belton's children.
He attended Vanderbilt University.  The photo comes from the school annual, The Commodore, for 1930.

Two Suitors from the 1890's

Back in the day if you wanted to ask a girl out you couldn't call her, there were no telephones.  You couldn't drop by her house unannounced, that was considered rude, uncouth, and low class.  What did you do?  You sent a note or perhaps dropped it off yourself but without the expectation of seeing the young lady until she replied to your note, with a note of her own.

W.R. Bobbitt was the druggist in Dresden Tennessee.  In 1905 he became the proprietor of the Smith Hotel (formerly the Hampton Hotel) in Dresden Tennessee.  But on October 13, 1891, he was simply a hopeful young fellow sending a note to a well-bred young lady in the hopes of seeing her.  And he was clever in that he used one of Fannie Moran's own calling cards, which she must've given him, as the invitation for his call.

Miss Fannie Moran
City
10-13-1891
Can I see Miss Moran
This Evening?
W.R. Bobbitt

Another suitor was W.O. Thompson.  I don't know who he was or where he was from because his invitation was sent to Fannie when she was in Jackson, TN attending the Memphis Conference Female Institute and Conservatory of Music and Art.

Miss Fannie Moran
MCFI
2/19/1894

Miss Moran:
If agreeable I would like very much to attend with you the Schubert concert at the Opera House tomorrow evening.

Very truly yours,
W.O. Thompson

We'll never know if Fannie accepted either invitation but we do know that she didn't marry either of these gentlemen.

Class of 1894, Southwestern Baptist University

Southwestern Baptist University was the predecessor of what is now Union University in Jackson Tennessee. Once again the source of this ephemera comes from Fannie Moran as I found this program in with her papers.  Inside the program was a card with the handwritten name S.J. White.  I am assuming that S.J. White was the one graduating with the class of 1894 and this was his invitation to Miss Moran.

 S.W.B.U

'94

The Graduating Class

of Southwestern Baptist University 

request your presence at its

Commencement Exercises.

Thursday, June 7th

at ten o'clock.

1st Baptist Church.

No flowers.

S.J. White

On the telephone at the Timberlake Home

This photo is an inverted image from a negative we have which was taken by William Timberlake of Jackson Tennessee.  I really like it because it shows a woman, possibly Ida Moran Timberlake, using a telephone.  This would've been taken in the early 1900's at the Timberlake home.  For more pictures of the exterior and interior of their home check out my earlier blog post.

Ida Morehead Timberlake in her wedding dress

Ida Morehead Moran, known as Teatot, married William Gilmer Timberlake on November 26, 1902, in Dresden Tennessee.  They made their home in Jackson Tennessee where Will was a successful Attorney.

Teatot and Will were blessed with a daughter, Dorothy Louise Timberlake, born in 1906 but she died at the age of four on July 15, 1910.

Of the three Moran girls Ida was the best musician.  She played piano at many functions and probably got her musical talent from her mother, Sophia Riley Gunn, who was Dresden's music teacher and first organist at the Methodist Church.

Ida died June 25, 1936, from lobar pneumonia.

The Timberlake Home at 399 Highland

Ida Morehead Moran and William Gilmer Timberlake were married November 26, 1902, in Dresden Tennessee.  Probably at the home of her father John Williamson Moran.  They had one daughter, Dorothy Louise Timberlake, who was born in 1906 but died in 1910.  As an aside and just for kicks Justin Timberlake is a distant relative of ours.  He is the second cousin, four times removed of the grand aunt of my husband.  If you see this Justin I'd like to discuss the condition of the Timberlake cemetery with you and how you can help get its sexy back!

At one time they had a huge Victorian home similar to the one in Dresden that Ida's father built but they also had a smaller, more modest but still very elegant home "in town" in Jackson, Tennessee.  That home was located at 399 Highland and still stands today though it has been modified somewhat.

Exterior views, early 1900's.

Interior views of the home.

Ida Moran Timberlake's bedroom.

Ida Moran Timberlake's bedroom.

Another Bedroom.

Possibly William Gilmer Timberlake's bedroom.  The door on the right is to the bathroom.

Dining room.

Dining room.

Living room.  Notice the ornate grand piano on the left.  Ida Moran Timberlake
was an accomplished pianist.

Entrance hall perhaps.

Possibly a sunroom.

New Year's Greetings 1926

New Year's Greetings
Announcing the Dates West Tennessee District Fair
Jackson, Tennessee
September 13-14-15-16-17-18, 1926
Bigger and Better
W.F. Barry, Sec'y. and Mgr.