 A piece of interesting memorabilia from the past. Stephen Douglas Crouch sold Will Price some tornado insurance on August 15, 1915. The home, dating from 1912 is still standing, so no claim was ever made. This is roughly one year after the death of Blalock Crouch and two months before Stephen's death. I'm not sure why the transaction took place in Jasper, Missouri. Mary Price did go to high school in Jasper, Mo. with my Aunt Mildred. Children in the area were permitted to go to high school in Mindenmines, Mo., Liberal, Missouri, or Jasper, Missouri. Nashville ran a High School program one time for two years.
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| Will and Lydia Braker
Price Wedding 1912 Mary's parents lived in the Duval, Missouri, area their entire lives. Will's parents had moved to the area in 1872 from Virden, IL. Will and his brother went to school at North Star some 3 and one half miles away. Their teacher was Belle Shapley who was a sister of Harlow Shapley. Although Mr. Price died soon after I was born, Lydia Price was my surrogate grandmother. My mother's mother had died many years earlier and Meredith and Vada had moved to Idaho before my birth. She once got stuck nursing me through a bad case of the measles, which was a very serious disease in those days. The Price farm, still owned by Mary and Howard, is the setting for many of the pictures on this site. |
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This picture is also 1912. It was not an era of candid photography. I'm pretty sure it is post wedding. The engagement was a secret. The story I was told is that the two Price brothers built a large farm house. No one could figure out why the bachelor brother's would build one house. When it was finished, Will married Lydia Braker. The other brother moved to California. When I moved to Hanford, California, I met a neighbor who lived about a block from me - Anna Price Gardner. She was one of the other brother's children. |
| 1919 - Mary Price is born. Eventually she married my Uncle Howard. The news article says they had been sweethearts since their freshman year. Mary and Mildred and Helen went to Biloxi, Miss., where Howard was stationed, for the wedding. Howard was shipped overseas. Mary and my mother moved to Springfield, Missouri, where they were sharing a room when I was born in 1943. Mary's father died not long after, and she had to return to Duval to help run the farm. My mother and I moved to Liberal, Missouri, her hometown, where she got a job as a switchboard operator. |
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 These pictures of myself (Larry Crouch) and Lydia Price are taken in front of the farm house. Those are the steps the Prices share in the picture above from 1912.
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 Lydia and granddaughter Ginny Crouch Stanford - 1951
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 I took this picture of the Price Farmhouse in October of 2005 - Mary and Howard still own it and they've made a deal with their tenants who have really done a fine job of restoration. This is a kit home, not a Sears kit unfortunately. Mary has the catalogue. It is from Gordon - Van Tine of Davenport, Iowa. All lumber and mill work for $1,03.00. This company later supplied all Ward kit homes.
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Mary came up with a picture of the house dating from the year it was built, 1912. The people on the porch are (l) Will Price, Mabel McCune, and Lydia Braker Price. Pat and I had a nice tour of the home this last trip in 2007. It is a treasure. |
