Returning to Iowa in 1896, after a failed attempt to pioneer in Nebraska, the Sherd Goff family lived at Stuart, where Leora was a first grader. Her teacher was Elizabeth Myers. (I wonder what Miss Myers thought when the Goff children showed up at school wearing William Jennings Bryan campaign caps.)
Leora moved at least a dozen times as a child, married Clabe Wilson, and moved back to Stuart two dozen years later, with three children of her own.
I was surprised to learn that Leora’s first grade teacher, Elizabeth Myers, also also taught her two oldest sons in first grade!
The Wilsons came down with influenza while they lived in Stuart, and a house they rented caught on fire. They had just settled in a house on Gaines Street when John Myers, the Stuart night watchman, was killed during a bank robbery attempt. He was the father of the Myers sisters, Elizabeth and Minnie, who taught local children through three generations.
Clabe Wilson became Stuart’s next night watchman, and the Wilsons’ first set of twins were born there, plus another son.
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Leora’s Early Years: Guthrie County Roots includes her Stuart stories, and a lot more.
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My sister, Gloria Neal, taught junior high art for thirty-four years, long enough that she also taught children of some of her earlier students.