John Morrow Marney
b. 5 April 1890, Vincennes, Knox County, Indiana, adopted by Frank and Minnesota (Barrikman) Marney
d. 8 January 1946, Chicago, Cook County, Illinois

m/1. 2 June 1912, Osceola, Mississippi County, Arkansas
Frances Lillian Maude Sturdevant
b. 15 September 1892, Liberty, Osborne County, Kansas
d. 9 June 1974, Pomona, Los Angeles County, California

m/2. 1945
Ada Ashcraft

Children with Frances Lillian Maude Sturdevant:

• William Wayne
• Jesse Earl
• Stelle Mae
• Norma Lee

John lived in Vincennes, Knox County, Indiana; Indianapolis, Marion County, Indiana; and Terre Haute, Vigo County, Indiana.

John Morrow Marney traveled on the Mississippi River by houseboat in 1910–1912 and met a family named Sturdevant who were from Waldo, Kansas. They were floating down the Mississippi on a houseboat that they had built themselves and prospecting for land near the river. John fell in love with their daughter Frances and married her in Osceola, Arkansas, in 1912.

The entire Sturdevant family came down with malaria and nearly died. Frances’s father nursed everyone back to health but died of malaria himself and was buried in Memphis, Tennessee.

John and Frances settled in Indianapolis, Indiana, where they had four children. But John left the family in 1935 or 1936, and he and Frances were divorced. He traveled around and finally settled in Chicago, Illinois, where he married a widow named Ada Ashcraft.

John Morrow Marney always wanted to know who his birth parents were. Although he and his children searched and his grandchildren are searching, so far there are no clues to their identity.

Submitted by:
Barbara J. Olson
Rancho Cucamonga CA