Frank's Past, My Future

Tonight is special. 96 years ago is special. For me, at least.

On the evening of Monday, April 3, 1916, Frank Waller lay in bed. His breathing was more labored than normal (most likely it was the death rattle). Tillie quickly sent for Miss Kitchen and Miss Tank. At ten minutes past ten (9:10 CDT which didn't exist back then), Frank drew his last breath and exhaled. His chest dropped in the room lit by a small lamp. There, in the presence of Tillie, Ashley, Esther, Annabelle, Elsie Tank and Miss Trumer, Franklin Wilson Waller died at the young age of 36 (my age right now). The entire room cried for some time, then his face was covered by the blanket on the bed.

What does this have to do with me? This was my great-grandfather. My grandmother, Annabelle, told me this story several times. She was four. Imagine losing your father at four. Your husband of 13 years, the father of your three children at the age of 36. It was tuberculosis.

That meant that little Annabelle didn't get to spend much time with her father and her memories were limited. Her most memorable story about her and her father is sad, but cute. While Frank was lying in bed in his room on the second floor. She would stand at the bottom of the staircase and he would call down to her, “Lover.” To which Annabelle would respond. “Wha-at?” And teasingly he would answer, “Nuh-sing.” Then she’d play back, “Lover!” Frank would answer “Wha-at?” and she’d giggle and respond “Nuh-sing!” Frank’s love for his children is very clear in this story. Although he was so sick, he always made time to play with his children, even if he couldn’t be near them.

Life was a struggle for the Wallers. Frank was born on the Fourth of July, 1882. His grandfather was a Freewill Baptist minister who was an abolitionist and had two uncles fight for the Union in the Civil War, losing one in the infamous Andersonville prison. He was the oldest of six children. His parents had a marriage that fell apart on Christmas Day, 1903 when they had too much to drink. In front of their family, to Frank and everyone's horror, his father struck his mother, not once, but twice! Merry Christmas? God bless us everyone? In 1904, the divorce went public and Frank's mother was accused of being a prostitute so she left town.

A few years later, March 31, 1906 to be exact, my great-grandmother Tillie was going through an incredibly difficult birth. The family doctor, J. W. Helz. Dr. Helz exited the room that Tillie was in, looked Frank in the eyes and told him there was no way she’d survive the delivery. Frank was just informed that his wife of three and a half years was about to die. Frank was unwilling to accept this and ran out of the house they lived in at 297 S. Main Street. His destination was the office of the most highly regarded physician in Fond du Lac County, William Edward Minahan. Dr. Minahan had an office located at 88 S. Main. Frank pleaded with Dr. Minahan to deliver his unborn child and safe his wife’s life. Dr. Minahan agreed and the two returned to the house, where at 9:30 AM, Frank and Gertrude’s first daughter was born, Esther Gertrude Waller.

This is relevant right now too. Not only was the 106th anniversary of this miracle, the fate of both Frank and Dr. Minahan would forever be linked to the month of April. As I stated earlier, today is the anniversary of his death. Minahan's would follow just six years and fifteen days later in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. Dr. Minahan’s reported last words were probably spoken after witnessing his sister’s fear, “Be brave.” During the course of the night of April 14/15, both his wife and sister were transferred to collapsable lifeboat D. He drowned that night, his body was recovered on April 30, 1912 by the SS MacKay Bennett. His body was recovered and tagged (bodies were tagged in the order in which they were recovered) with the following paperwork:

 NO. 230. - MALE. - ESTIMATED AGE, 6O. - HAIR, GREY.

            CLOTHING - Black suit and overcoat

             EFFECTS - Pocketbook; papers; gold watch, "Dr. W. E. Minahan"; keys;

            knife; fountain pen; clinical thermometer; memo book; tie pin; diamond

            ring; gold cuff link; nickel watch; comb; check book; American Express;

             $380; 1 collar button £16 10s. in gold; 14 shillings; nail clipper.

             FIRST CLASS PASSENGER.

 NAME - DR. W. E. MINAHAN.

Dr. Minahan was 44 at the time of death, but his estimated age was 60 as shown above, showing how badly the water damaged his body. His body was then moved to Halifax in Canada (where many Titanic fatalities were interred), and then shipped to his brother Victor and finally laid to rest in Green Bay, Wisconsin on May 2. (In 1987, some vandals broke into his tomb and stole his skull! Luckily they were apprehended quickly afterwards and the tomb is under much heaver lock & key).

But for Frank, the suffering continued. His only sister -- his baby sister -- Mable died in 1910 at the age of 17. It was tuberculosis. It is possible that this was the onset of his exposure to this affliction that would eventually kill him. Next, it was his father-in-law in 1913. It was tuberculosis.

By 1915, the disease was bad enough to send him to the Tuberculosis Sanatorium in Wales, Wisconsin. Here, the archaic treatment of letting the men and women live in cottages that were open to the elements, allowing them to have "fresh air" to breathe.

Then his mother-in-law died at the end of summer, 1915. Little Annabelle came out to see her father.

How the family could afford this stay is still not known. This was a house painter. Frank had wonderful talents in singing (boy's choir) and music (he played the violin), but he had trouble keeping other jobs he had, like working as a cabinet maker or on the railroad. He drank. Is it a wonder? Looking into my great-grandpa's life, I can see his weakness. I can see his desire to escape. He was not a mean drunk. He was a very happy drunk. This is best illustrated by a story my grandmother told me years ago. Tillie would have dinner ready, but Frank will be off drinking and she’d send Ashley to get his father. A young Ashley Waller would walk into the tavern and find his father, well immersed in his drink and some conversation. Frank would beam with pride and start boasting about his son in his stupor. Ashley who was around eight or nine, would walk home with his father, trying to keep him upright to get home for the night. This was not an isolated incident.

It wasn't always good at the bar though. He couldn't escape. In the summer of 1912, Frank witnessed an enraged and drunk man stumble into a tavern, accuse the owner of cheating with his wife, then threatened him with a knife. This was in front of everyone there. The owner, Tim Norton, pulled a gun and shot the man that started attacking him. The man would die a few days later of his wounds. The men, Frank included, were summoned to court to testify as witnesses. The bar owner had one last connection to Frank....his daughter Marjorie would later marry Frank's only son Ashley in 1925.

So now Frank is gone. It is a rainy Friday, April 7th and the family travelled to the public cemetery on the edge of town.

It was the complete despair of the situation that was sinking into little Esther and her mother during their ride in the car, as poor Esther cried so hard that she wet her pants. It might have lightened the mood for a moment in Tillie’s eyes, but no doubt nothing could remove from the grief the Waller family felt.

Even though Frank Waller was respected and loved by virtually everyone around him, he was laid to rest without a foot or head-stone in the cemetery. The family couldn't afford one. It wasn't until after Tillie remarried (a short while after, she remarried in September 1916, as she needed someone to be a husband and she needed him right away) to Clarence Thornburg, who took a white stone and etched in the most simple epitat possible: "F. Waller".

So why is all this so important for me? When I was a boy, my grandpa used to take me out to the cemetery to water the flowers at the graves. I didn't understand why my great-grandma was on a stone with a man named Clarence Thornburg, yet we cared about this separate plot next to them with "F. Waller". I asked him who it was. He said that was grandma's father. That he died when she was four and then her mother remarried. So I looked at this lonely gravestone thinking my great-grandfather must have lived a life that was pretty much forgotten. That my grandmother was robbed of many great years with her father (life with her step-father was far from good, as Ashley and Esther could attest).

Then I wanted to know a little more. Who was Frank Waller? Who were these people that died long before I was born? The next thing I knew, I was writing down names, asking stories and collecting photos. Frank Waller's death gave birth to my genealogy passion which I've had since 1987. I was 12. Now, I've pieced together not only the Waller family history (I'm working on completing the book by the end of the year -- it's over 230 pages and I'm only up to 1933) but researched all branches of my family back hundreds of years.

Anyone who knows me, knows that genealogy not only consumes me, but it defines me. I've been able to meet dozens of new relatives and re-establish long-lost ties. I've enjoyed every minute and look forward to teaching my son (the 13th generation Copet) how to appreciate our history. It interlinks with history and things that I learn about every day. It makes me feel right in the world, like I'm where I'm supposed to be.

Thank you grandpa Frank. Your little stone has opened up a book generations later that is shared and understood now. That little stone means so much. I never imagined someone's past would lead my future.