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Facts and Events
Samuel Tolliver Harrison was the father of 18 children, 14 by his first wife Mary Jane Francis.
According to the 1880 Census, Samuel Tolliver Harrison was a state representative.
A 1937 article from the local Miller County newspaper interviewed Sam's daughter, Minerva Dooley, age 91. It said this about her parents:
Sam Harrison, came to Miller County from Kentucky as a boy, being one of the eight children of Reuben Harrison, who settled on a hillside between Olean and Mt. Pleasant in a two-room log house. the date of his settlement can not be fixed by document, but would be placed by historical evidence in 1820.
The Harrison homestead was of puncheon logs, and thereby distinguished above some of the other early houses which were built of logs from which the bark was not removed and the chinks were filled with mud. A puncheon log house was made of logs faces and smoothed and the cracks between were filled first with small blocks of wood and then of a mortar made of sand and lime, this latter process being known as "pinting."
It also boasted two doors and a window for each room. The windows of the Harrison house, as of all the early houses, were so small that it was necessary even on winter days to leave a door open if one wanted light enough to work by. the floor was of oak logs fitted together and smoothed with a wood adze.
When Sam Harrison married Mary Jane Francis, daughter of John Francis, who had settled across the river from Tuscumbia, he rented a place on the Saline Creek, now called the Bill Russell place. There Prior Harrison and Minerva Harrison were born, Minerva's birthday having been Feb. 10, 1846.
He then moved to Mt. Pleasant, where John, the third child, was born. Then to what is now the Westermeir place just off Highway 54 east of Eldon, where Cummings and Nancy (Mrs. Bill Etter) were born. From there he went to what is now the Wetzel place in the Flatwoods district and Jane, later Mrs. Al Messersmith, was born.
Then Sam Harrison realized a lifelong ambition; that of migrating to Texas. He sold all of his household furnishings except enough to load in a wagon and went. Arrived in Texas, he took one look and started back to Missouri, being gone in all six weeks. Back in God's country, he decided to make his own home and began cutting timber on what is now known as the W.M. Harrison farm. He built his own home and lived out his days in it. there W.M. Harrison, Bob, Ellen, Tom, Annie (Rusk), victoria (Jones), and Josie (Strand) were born. Of these thirteen children six are now living; Minerva, W.M., Tom, and Annie in Miller County, Bob in Callaway County, and Josie in Washington. (After Mary Jane Harrison's death, Sam Harrison married again and had four children, Lillian, Gertie, Brooks, and Elmer.)Mrs. Dooley couldn't see anything remarkable in the fact her mother raised thirteen children.
References
- Interview with Minerva Dooley, age 91, of Miller county, Missouri. August 12, 1937.
From the local Miller County, Missouri newspaper, August 12, 1937, Page three:
Mrs. Minerva Dooley, 91, Tells Why She is Interested in Miller County After Having Spent a Long Life Here
"Miller County's Centennial, well, why should I celebrate it? -- I helped make it."
Thus might Mrs. Minerva Dooley, 91 years old, speak of the big celebration of August 20 to 22. For she is the oldest living member of one of its first families. One of the families that first began to clear the land of timber and to build its first log houses; that formed its first churches and took part in its first government.
The early days of the county are not history to her; they're memory. And they were not easy days -- when you worked from before sunup to after sundown and your annual vacation was the Fourth of July picnic at Mt. Pleasant. but for all that, the horse-and-buggy days were "the good old days," so she says.
Well, that's a matter over which there has been some little discussion, reaching, of late, even to the U.S. Congress. But, listening to her, your present day Miller Countian, while not exactly envious, is forced to admit there might be something to it.
Mrs. Dooley's father, Sam Harrison, came to Miller County from Kentucky as a boy, being one of the eight children of Reuben Harrison, who settled on a hillside between Olean and Mt. Pleasant in a two-room log house. the date of his settlement can not be fixed by document, but would be placed by historical evidence in 1820.
The Harrison homestead was of puncheon logs, and thereby distinguished above some of the other early houses which were built of logs from which the bark was not removed and the chinks were filled with mud. A puncheon log house was made of logs faces and smoothed and the cracks between were filled first with small blocks of wood and then of a mortar made of sand and lime, this latter process being known as "pinting."
It also boasted two doors and a window for each room. The windows of the Harrison house, as of all the early houses, were so small that it was necessary even on winter days to leave a door open if one wanted light enough to work by. the floor was of oak logs fitted together and smoothed with a wood adze.
When Sam Harrison married Mary Jane Francis, daughter of John Francis, who had settled across the river from Tuscumbia, he rented a place on the Saline Creek, now called the Bill Russell place. There Prior Harrison and Minerva Harrison were born, Minerva's birthday having been Feb. 10, 1846.
He then moved to Mt. Pleasant, where John, the third child, was born. Then to what is now the Westermeir place just off Highway 54 east of Eldon, where Cummings and Nancy (Mrs. Bill Etter) were born. From there he went to what is now the Wetzel place in the Flatwoods district and Jane, later Mrs. Al Messersmith, was born.
Then Sam Harrison realized a lifelong ambition; that of migrating to Texas. He sold all of his household furnishings except enough to load in a wagon and went. Arrived in Texas, he took one look and started back to Missouri, being gone in all six weeks. Back in God's country, he decided to make his own home and began cutting timber on what is now known as the W.M. Harrison farm. He built his own home and lived out his days in it. there W.M. Harrison, Bob, Ellen, Tom, Annie (Rusk), victoria (Jones), and Josie (Strand) were born. Of these thirteen children six are now living; Minerva, W.M., Tom, and Annie in Miller County, Bob in Callaway County, and Josie in Washington. (After Mary Jane Harrison's death, Sam Harrison married again and had four children, Lillian, Gertie, Brooks, and Elmer.)Mrs. Dooley couldn't see anything remarkable in the fact her mother raised thirteen children.
Being one of the older children brought responsibility early. Mrs. Dooley recalls how her mother would gather up the dishes after dinner and place them on the hearth for her and Prior to wash. They weren't big enough to reach a table. When she was five she began taking care of the other babies.
After she was married, there was no girl old enough to take up the task and her mother's health was not so good, so her father rented a nigger for a year for $50. Before the year was up the Emancipation was proclaimed and the nigger, known as Lucy, celebrated her freedom by electing to remain at the Harrison place. There she stayed until Mary Jane Harrison's death, the she moved on to Nancy (Harrison) Etter's home.
"She watched over the children like a mother," Mrs. Dooley recalls, "and if one of them would be sick, she would not sleep a wink until he was out of bed again."
The children attended school three months in the spring and three months in the winter at what is now known as the Pleasant Hill school. Minerva would get up before dawn to get breakfast while her mother and older brother did the milking. Then the children did the dishes and got water from the spring ready for dinner. Home from school, they would have to hurry to get water up for supper.
For amusement, the young folks visited over the week-end at one of the neighbor's homes, going with them to church on Sundays if there was a preaching. Most of the courting was accomplished on these week-end visits as a "young" swain couldn't get away from his work and ride six or seven miles to see a girl every night of the week.
Then there were protracted meetings in the fall which lasted eight or ten days. There would be two services each day, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, and a basket lunch between sermons which was the occasion for a good visit among the neighbors.
But the big event in the line of amusement was the Fourth of July Picnic held every year at Mt. Pleasant and attended by every able-bodied man, woman, and child from all the counties between Cole and Morgan.
"A woman would plan all year on how to get her spring work done and new dresses made for her girls for the picnic," Mrs. Dooley recalls.
The great day always began with the reading of the Declaration of Independence, followed by speakings. the formal program was concluded at dinner time when everybody ate from lunches spread out under the trees. Then the afternoon was devoted to visiting and the young folks whose parents approved enjoyed the dance pavilion. when dusk began to fall there began a hurried exodus as everyone had to be back home by milking time.
Minerva Harrison married W.J. Dooley in 1863 and went to housekeeping with the second cookstove every brought to Miller County. Mr. Dooley purchased the stove for $12 from his uncle "old Dr. Brockman," who lived in a large frame house, the most pretentious of its time, near what is now the Tolliver Harrison place in Eldon. They rented various farms, then bought the Dooley place east of Eldon where Mrs. Dooley now lives with her daughter, Lucy, and son, Sam.
Mrs. Dooley recalls how, in those days, women made their own soap from a kind of lye obtained from putting ashes in a hopper and catching the "drippings."
Twice a year, the family would load up a wagonful of wheat and corn and take it to the grist millon the Gravois between Versailles and Bagnell. The flour and meal would then be placed in airtight sacks to keep until the next trip to the mills.
Abpout the only thing that was plentiful in the early days, was hard work. "But you didn't hear all the complaining you do now," Mrs. Dooley maintains. "We just took what we had and did the best we could without thinking any more about it. We were too busy to worry about what we didn't have.
"We finished our education when we could read, write, figure, and spell all the words in the blue-backed speller. And if we weren't actually smarter than the youngsters todays, at least we didn't spend a lot of time learning things that didn't do us any good."
"The tell me times are better now. but I don't think so. In those days you had good friends, and you knew they were friends."
Well, it's a matter for contention. In the early days they didn't have electric cookstoves, the automobile, and the movies. but they didn't have nevrous indigestion, sales taxes or the C.I.O. And they didn't give a hang about Russia and Japan.
Anyway, there is something to say for times whhich could produce a woman whose everyday, workable philosophy sustains her and makes her life a useful, happy one at the age of 91 years!
[Note from transcriber: A small error existed in the original where a portion of a sentence was printed out of order. This was corrected in transcription. All remaining errors are in the original text.]
- ↑ Weant, Kenneth. Missouri Newspaper Death Index.
Name: Samuel T. Harrison
Age at Death: Abt 82
Death Date: 23 Apr 1900
Death Place: Cole County
, Missouri
Newspaper: Cole County Democrat
- ↑ Ellsberry, Elizabeth Prather. Miller County, Missouri, 1850 federal census.
Name: Samuel Harrison
Age: 30
Birth Year: abt 1820
Birthplace: Kentucky
Home in 1850: District 13, Miller, Missouri
Gender: Male
Family Number: 83
Household Members: Name Age
Samuel Harrison 30
Mary Harrison 24
James Harrison 6
Minerva Harrison 4
John Harrison 2
- ↑ Edna (Harrison) Powell. Harrison Bible dated 1802.
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