July 20

BIRTHDAY of

FRANK W. SMITH 1859-1888

I don't have a photo of Frank Smith, but I have several documents that tell a sad tale of his short life. 

Frank was the husband of Effie Ford Smith. I don't have a photo of her. She was the youngest child of William Ford and Isadore Halsted.

Photo: William Ford

Effie's siblings were Alice, Charles, Nancy, Kate, and Stephen.

Photo: Stephen, Alice, and Nancy Ford.

Nancy Ford married my great-grandfather Charles Thomas.

(So... that would make Frank Smith my great-grand-uncle, by marriage.)

Well anyway, on with the sad story:

Frank's wife Effie died at age 19, of a combination of typhoid fever and 'childbed fever' nine days after her first child was born. Frank Smith died slightly less than a year later. I do not know his cause of death. The obituaries for Effie and Frank are typical of the somewhat 'flowery' style of writing that was fashionable in that time period --

Frank and Effie's child, Ford Smith, apparently was taken in or adopted by someone in Frank Smith's family. He appears in the 1900 census as the 13-year-old 'son' of William and Hattie Smith. (Hattie is 23 years old in that census -- too young to be Ford's natural mother.) 

Records show that Ford married Ruth M. Smith 25 June 1917, and they had a son named Donald and a daughter named Betty. 

Ford Smith died in 1965 at age 78.