Monday, August 23, 2010

James Bonner and The August 23 Coincidence

Today, as I am writing it is August 23, 2010. I have always said I don't believe in coincidences. I believe things are meant to happen when, where and how they happen. I would like to recall my day for you.

Since starting research on great grandfather Thomas Henry Bonner, I have written to several National Archives to request information pertinent to him. First I requested his Civil War Pension application from the National Archives in Washington, D.C. They searched and said they didn't have it, but that the Veterans Adminstration in D.C. had it and I should write to them. I wrote to them and they responded that they didn't have it but the VA Regional Office in Baltimore had it and they had forwarded my request to Baltimore. That was June 21. July 21, I called the Regional Office and no one knew anything. I obtained the name of the person in charge and called him on August 19, no answer. Today, August 23, I called him again to find out the status of my request. He was very sympathetic and as we talked he emailed the facility with the record and asked that they call me with an update. They haven't called today, yet.

I also wrote to the Provencial Archives of New Brunswick Canada requesting copies of land patents for James Bonner, Thomas Bonner and Robert Bonner. Today, August 23, I looked at my calendar to see how long it had been since my request and it was four weeks. When I went to the mail box, there was a large envelope from the Provencial Archives. Inside the envelope were copies of the five land patents I had requested. All but one were fairly simple and straight forward showing land purchases in the exact location in New Brunswick where the Bonners lived. However, one of the ones for James Bonner was clearly written in a beautiful handwriting and it tells of James, the father of great grandfather Thomas, trying to obtain land from the Province of New Brunswick in 1841. He didn't have any money, but was willing to work the land in hopes of receiving some money when the Province put a road through the property. The most amazing thing about the document is that his request was approved on August 23, 1841.

Here I am today on August 23, 2010 reading about his land purchase on August 23, 1841. Coincidence? I don't think so. I have transcribed the document and will post it with this blog for all to read.



Transcription
1841 Land Patent for James Bonner
St. Mary’s Parish, York, New Brunswick, Canada

To His Excellency Sir William McBean, George Colebrooke KH Lieutenant Governor and Commander in Chief of the Province of New Brunswick

The Petition of James Bonner of the Parish of Saint Mary in the County of York

Humbly Herewith:

That he is a British Subject born in Ireland a married man with six children, who lately emigrated to this Province. Petitioner does not own any land and is desirous of obtaining one hundred acres for immediate settlement and cultivation and he therefore prays for the lot No. 7 on the South Side of the East and West line of Deputy Allan McLean late survey, South East Side of the Nashwaak River. Petitioner begs leave respectfully to State that he does not own any land, and is unable to pay for the lot now applied for at present, and understanding that there is a road to be made through the intended settlement, he humbly prays that a portion of making the same may be given to him at what may be considered a fair valuation to enable him to pay the purchase money for his land. The land now applied for is in its wilderness state no improvements having been made thereon.

And as in duty bound, Petitioner
Will ever pray
James his x mark Bonner

Fredericton
19th August 1841



Information on the back of the document


James Bonner

Land Applic.


No deposit paid


Aug 23, 1841

So, there you go. I don't think I will soon forget August 23.




1910- Wright City, Oklahoma and the Bonner Family

Well, it's been since May that I have written on this blog. Since then I have continued to research great grandfather, Thomas Henry Bonner. I have made some progress and will soon blog some of the information I have gathered. In the process of gathering information, I have realized that the 1910 census in Wilson, Choctaw, Oklahoma was an important one in my collection of information.

On that census, great grandmother Edna Bonner is widowed, working as a laundry woman and has five children. She indicated that the children's father was from Maine. The older of her sons was working at the Choctaw Lumber Company, probably to help support the family. Her other three sons also worked there as seen on their draft registration cards. I have since come to learn of the importance of the Choctaw Lumber Company to the area since 1910 and the importance of lumbering in the Bonner family.

The Choctaw Lumber Company became known as Dierk's Choctaw Lumber Company, named by the Dierk's brothers. They originally established the company in Bismark, OK which was not too far from Wilson, where the Bonner family was living. Bismark had it's first post office in 1910. So, here I am 100 years later trying to learn about the Choctaw Lumber Company and the reasons for Edna to have moved to that area after great grandfather died. Around 1920, the name of the town of Bismark was changed to Wright City. This year Wright City celebrated it's 100th Anniversary and had a celebration with parades, bar-b-ques and rodeos.

While exchanging emails with my friend and cousin, Muriel Sims Manning from Wright City, I began asking her questions about the area and the lumbering business. As she started to tell me about Wright City, I realized I could learn a good bit from her. Although she moved there 30 years after the Bonner's moved to the area, things might not have changed too much.

Muriel wrote several descriptions of the area for me and I would like to share one of them today. She wrote this in July 2010 at age 77. What follows are the words of Muriel Sims Manning and I think they paint a pretty clear picture.



"I moved to Wright City, OK in March of 1944 from Cove, Ark. I was 11 years old on March 31. The hwy.3 & 7 ended at the North Pole store, a short road ran from there to old 98 that ran from Idabel across a low water bridge on the Glover River thru Wright City to Valliant.In Wright City there was a saw mill, a planer, a box & window plant, a reworking plant, dry kilns, power house and a log pond where they unloaded logs into from the Dierks log train that had hauled the logs from the woods & Clebit called (the front). The train came in late evenings unloaded the logs and went back to Clebit that night. The T.O.& E. train hauled logs and ran from Dierks, Ark. to Valliant, Ok. There was a passenger car and a Depot. People rode the train to Valliant, OK and shopped then rode back to Wright City the same day. The Depot had an office and two waiting rooms one for whites and one for coloreds. There was a company office, an ice plant where they froze blocks of ice to sell.The town had an empty bank building, a post-office, a cafe, a barber shop with a dry cleaners in back. There was a doctor’s office on west side of the street and a boarding house and a hotel, an empty apartment building at the back. On the east side there was a movie theater, a big department store with groceries and clothes in the middle, on left side hardware, on the right side a drug store with a drink fountain & ice cream. In the middle, upon a platform, there was a thing where when people charged things. They put the ticket on a t and pulled a string that sent it to the platform. And Mrs.Bush, the store manager’s wife, took the ticket off and sent the carrier back to the department that it came from. If things were paid for with money, there were round paper mills for tax. On pay day there were two check lines, one for whites and Indians and one for coloreds. Another line to go thru to cash the checks and pay for the things charged that week. Some were lucky to have a few dollars left, a few dollars a week for house rent.There was a jail, a rock school for whites & Indians, a grade school for coloreds, they had a colored high school the other side of Valliant. There was an Assembly Of God Church, a Baptist church, a Methodist church, and a Colored church, a cemetery across the rail road tracks and behind the plants. This was our old town. Dierks sold to Weyerhaeuser about 1968/9. The mills closed down in 2009."

By Muriel Sims Manning, age 77 years old
July 8 ,2010