Monday, October 17, 2011

Mystery Monday - A year in Oklahoma

I'm finishing up the NGS Home Study Course and am getting information together to write an ancestor biography.  I have decided to write it on my gr gr grandfather Zephaniah Webb (1826-1906). 

While I don't have a lot of information on him I probably have more than on most other ancestors I could do this assignment on. 

I had assumed that once he moved to Arkansas with his father around 1858, he stayed there until he died. 

In the 1880 census, he is living with his wife Clementine and four children:
     Elizabell (Elizabeth) age 14
     Huston N. age 13
     Mary A. age 10
     Charley J. age 5

In the 1900 census, he is living with his son Charley J. and his family.  His other son Huston is also living in the household.

According to a letter written by a cousin, Zephaniah moved with Charley J. and his family to "...Oklahoma about 1898...where they made only one crop and then returned to Pope County." 

I have not found any other reference to this move to Oklahoma.  I did search the Reconstructed 1890 census : taken from personal property tax rolls recorded by school district, range and township, Pope County, Arkansas / copied by Genealogical Records Committee, Persis Lovely Chapter, DAR and did not find any CJ or ZT Webb’s listed. 

My next step is to try to find some Oklahoma property records around that time period.  Hopefully they did own the land they farmed otherwise this may be one of those mysteries that remains unsolved.