Lupher Family and Related Families of Crawford County, PA Old Photographs

The people shown here include most of the seven children of my great great grandparents Henry Lupher 1814-1878 and Lavina Crouch Lupher 1822-1876 of Townville, Crawford County, PA, and some of their spouses, children, and grandchildren.

Other surnames of people shown or mentioned on this page include:

Gilson, Nelson, Frank, Taylor, Osborn, Coburn, VanTrees, Williams, Green, Little, Foust, Baker, Lumbey, Oakes, Larson, Rouche, Phillips

Thanks to my grandaunt Nellie Taylor Nelson, the youngest daughter of Rosetta Lupher and Chandler Price Taylor, I have quite a collection of old pictures of this family, mostly Rosetta's siblings, that is, the children of Henry Lupher and Lovina Crouch Lupher,  and their children.   I admit that in most cases I do not know much about the people pictured, but thanks to Nellie, a rare gem among packrats who always wrote the people's names and sometimes even the year on the backs of pictures, I do know who they are.  I want to provide the pictures for anyone interested, and I have tried to tell what I do know of their stories.   I will show them in birth order of Rosetta's siblings, but first, a bit on her own descendants.

My greatgrandmother was Rosetta Lupher Gilson Taylor Osborn 1851-1929; she had three husbands, and she outlived them all.   I am from her Taylor period and do not know much about her first husband, John Delos Gilson 1843-1874.  Gilson is a Crawford County name but I have not been able to connect John to the other Gilsons, most of whom are buried at a place called Gilson's Ridge.  I do not know whether he is really unrelated, which seems unlikely, or whether the Gilsons lost track of him; he is buried at Townville with most of Rosetta's close relations.  I would love to hear from anyone who can clarify this.

Until  recently (summer 2002) I knew nothing about Rosetta's last husband, Hart Osborn 1844-1925, whom she married in 1904, except his name and dates -- although my father remembered him -- but I know that she had no children with him.  Thanks to my acquisition of yet another segment of Nellie's collection, I now know a great deal more and even have a picture of him, which I have added to Rosetta's own page (link at the bottom of this page).

Anyway, Rosetta and John Gilson had one son, Morris Gilson, born in 1873, and most, though not all, of the people on this photograph are his family.  I think it was taken about 1918.

I have belatedly discovered that I have another one, apparently taken on the same day, with a somewhat different and larger cast of characters, and I was right, this one is dated 1918:

   
 

Back Row, L to R	Leo Gilson, Rosetta's grandson; Frank Oakes, son of Rosetta's sister
	"Phena";Bessie Gray Oakes, wife of Frank Oakes; Leland Frank, Rosetta's
	grandson; Clara Oakes Larson, daughter of "Phena" Lupher Oakes;
	Dorothy Gilson, daughter of Morris Gilson; Antoinette E. Little Lupher,
	wife of William A. Lupher; Jelmer Larson, husband of Clara Oakes;
	Nellie Taylor (later Nelson); Laurence Frank, Rosetta's grandson.
Front Row, L to R:	Ralph Gilson, Rosetta's grandson; Morris Gilson, her son;
	Almira "Mira" Wilson Lupher, wife of Rosetta's brother A.J. Lupher;
	Sophena "Phena" Lupher Oakes, Rosetta's sister;
	Rosetta Lupher Gilson Taylor Osborn, as the caption says;
	Audrey Gilson (child on her lap); Lottie Lupher Williams, daughter of
	A.J. Lupher and Mira; Myrna Conner Gilson, wife of Morris.

I suspect that these pictures above were taken by my grandfather Edwin Frank 1871-1932, since his boys are in them and he is not (their mother, Rosetta's daughter Eva Taylor Frank, had died in 1909).

Rosetta's eldest sibling was her sister Adelia Violetta Lupher, called "Delia" in the family, born in 1838.  She married Thomas Burling Coburn, called "Burl",  who was also from Crawford County, a son of Esick Coburn and his first wife Hannah Jewell.  They moved to Kansas shortly after the Civil War.  Their children were Adalaska Judson Coburn, 1863-1887; Lillie Coburn 1865-1927, who married Frank van Trees; and Kearney Coburn, born in 1880, died very young. The large picture of the Coburns and their children was taken in about 1883 according to Nellie's notes:
 

Delia Lupher Coburn, Burl and children Lillie May, Adalaska Judson, Kearney At Burton, Kansas, about 1883
The small pictures of the children, below, are old tintypes and I had to lighten them quite a bit to make them visible at all.
Adalaska Judson Coburn	Lillie Mae Coburn

A later picture of this couple:


Delia Lupher Coburn and Thomas Burling Coburn,
about 1895

Lottie Lupher Williams, about 1892

Rosetta's second oldest sibling was her brother, Adoniram Judson Lupher 1841-1913, known apparently as "A.J."  His wife was Almira Williams.  I do not have a picture of him except that he is included in the group picture on the Lupher page, but they had a daughter Lottie Lupher, born in 1870, who kept in touch with her aunt Nellie most of her life. Lottie married Fred Williams, and had a daughter Mae Williams who married John Green and continued to correspond with Nellie. Lottie and her mother are both in the second group photo at the top of this page.   This picture of Lottie Lupher was taken, according to Nellie's note, "at Edinboro where she graduated" presumably from what was then the teacher's college there "about 1892 or 1893."

 

Rosetta's third sibling was her brother William Addison Lupher 1844-1922, who married Antoinette Eliza Little 1850-1936.   She is included in both of the group pictures at the top of this page, and here is a picture of the two of them, taken, according to Nellie's note, in 1901. They were the parents of Sherman Ernest Lupher 1871-1933 and Ilda Lupher Foust 1884-1974 (below).

William Addison Lupher and his wife  Antoinette Eliza Little Lupher

Ilda Lupher Foust, presumably ca 1885

Ilda, who married Barrett Andrews Foust, also of Crawford County, was something of a genealogist herself and a frequent correspondent of Nellie Taylor Nelson's; I have some of their correspondence, which includes genealogical charts and family stories.  She was a school teacher for many years and had the clear handwriting of her calling. I know that one baby picture looks much like another, but since this is the only picture I have so far identified of Ilda, and she is important in the story of Lupher genealogy, I have included it here.

Rosetta's fourth sibling was her brother, James Melvin Lupher 1846 -1924, always called "Melvin" by the family.   He was a physician who practiced for many years in Crawford County.  My only picture of him is on the group photo on the Lupher page.   He married Theresa C. Baker and they had a daughter, Maude Madonna Lupher, born about 1880, who married Frank Lumbey and moved to California. There is a later picture of Maude on the Crawford County Old Photos Site.

Maude Madonna Lupher, about 1890

Rosetta herself was the fifth child of Henry and Lavina, born in 1851, and there are several pictures of her elsewhere on this site, on her own page and on the Taylor page (links at bottom of this page).  She had two younger sisters, both of whom produced families of their own.
  

Sophina Lupher Oakes 1854-1935 probably about 1890

The first of these was Sophena Alsina Lupher 1854 -1939, called "Phena" in the family.   She married Ellison A. Oakes, and they and at least some of their children remained in and around Crawford and Erie Counties all their lives.  Their children, all born in the 1880s and 1890s, were Frank, Ruby, Mabel, and Clara.  I do have some information on some of them, and their descendants, especially their daughter Clara Oakes, born in 1894, who married Jelmer Larson and lived to be ninety, but I do not have useful pictures of them, except that Phena, her son Frank, daughter-in-law Bessie, and her daughter Clara and son-in-law Jelmer are in the second group picture at the top of this page.

Finally, the youngest child of Henry Lupher and Lovina Crouch, Rosetta's youngest sister, was Eva Adina Lupher 1858-1929.  She married Harry J. Rouche 1855-1929 and they lived all their lives in Crawford County.   It appears that Eva Lupher Rouche may have been the beauty of the family.  I assume that it was for her, as well as for her oldest sister "Delia" that Rosetta named her daughter, my grandmother Eva AdeliaTaylor.

Eva Lupher Rouche, probably about 1890

Eva's, branch, the Rouches, was the most prolific with the good old pictures.  The children of Eva Lupher Rouche and Harry J. Rouche (Rouèche originally, he was from Frenchtown in Crawford County) were: Lovina Violetta, born 1877, called "Vina"; Frederick Raymond, born 1880; and Ula Mae, born 1893.  The pictures below are mostly undated; the dates I give are estimated from their known birthdates, apparent ages, and the clothes and trappings.

The first two are clearly a pair:

Vina Rouche and Fred Rouche, probably about 1888

	Three more of Vina Rouche, who never married as far as I know, kept in touch with her aunt Nellie all her life and appears to have sent a picture most years. I think that in the two below she must have been aiming at the "Gibson Girl" look.  These all appear to have been taken about 1895-1905.

Finally, the youngest child of Eva Lupher Rouche, Ula Mae Rouche 1893-1979, who also corresponded with her Aunt Nellie but didn't provide quite so many pictures.  Again, the dates are estimates, but I know when she was born.  She married Wallace Phillips and lived in Ohio.

Ula Mae Rouche, about 1895

Ula Mae Rouche, about 1908

Please note:  I have put only the best of my old photographs from Nellie's collection on this page, most of them studio portraits.   In some cases I have more, not as good; many are just snapshots, but anyone directly descended might like to see them anyway.   If you are in this category, contact me! ______________________________________

 

Lupher Family	Taylor	Crouch	Surnames Index	Home
Rosetta's Page	Lupfer/Lupher/Luper Main Page		Persons Index

Visitors:

_________________________________

This page copyright © 2000-2005 Janice A. Frank. All rights reserved.
This site may be freely linked to but not duplicated in any fashion without my written consent.
Email: janiceaf@ix.netcom.com