Wednesday, March 27, 2024

Women's History Month ~ Wars, Working, and Everyday Life

The families of Laney, Paris, Garoutte, Reynolds, Bisel, and James are on my mother’s paternal side. I found a lot of family history records, documents, and photographs on the Laneys and Garouttes, but not much is found about the Paris family line. 

Laney originated in Ireland in its original Gaelic form of O’Dubshlaine and was first recorded in history about 950 A.D. They emigrated to Springfield, Greene County, Missouri. From there, William Dayton Laney, my 2nd great-grandfather, came to Barry County. He married Nancy Ellen Paris in 1878 in Greene County, Missouri. William was a noted preacher of the Gospel and one of Barry County’s early settlers. After he lost his eyesight in 1925, he retired. In 1929, when he turned 71, a dinner was held in his honor, and 51 of his children, grand and great-grandchildren attended. He died in 1938, and Nancy Ellen Paris Laney died in 1947. Here is a photo of them.

Paris is French and English, a variant of Patrice, Patricius, meaning nobleman. Nancy Ellen Paris Laney’s family is hard to trace; little is found about them. I can only go back to Kentucky; from there, they came to Republic, Greene County, Missouri. Nancy had three sisters and two brothers. Nothing recorded yet that I have found in researching them. 

Nancy Angeline Laney (my 2nd great-grandaunt) married Andrew Preston Humble in 1894; their grandson, Edgar Leon Rauch, was a singer with the original Bob Wills and His Texas Playboys. Bob Wills founded Western Swing Music and was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1968. Leon was dubbed the last great vocalist, and another band member kept the music alive until 2018. Some of the Wills band songs are deep in the Heart of Texas and San Antonio Rose. Edgar was my 2nd cousin, 2x removed. 

The Garoutte family name was originally from the Accoules, a part of Marseille, France. They descend from a Garoutte soldier who came with French troops fighting for the independence of America. After the war, he settled in New Jersey, then emigrated west, staying in the Springfield/Billings area in the Ozarks. My 3rd great-grandmother, Sophia Garoutte, married John Laney, and they raised eight boys and five girls. One of Sophia’s daughters, Missouri Laney, married Zachary Biggs and suffered a troubled marriage. Biggs left her, and in the U.S., in the Federal Censuses, in 1900, she was listed as a widow. However, Biggs was very much alive and living in Oklahoma. Missouri was sent at age 57 to the Nevada Hospital #3 Insane Asylum, where she died in 1919 at age 66. They gathered for a Garoutte family reunion in 1900 in Billings, Mo. Here are photos

                 

Jane Reynolds, my 4th great-grandmother, married Samuel J. Garoutte and had a large family. They stayed in the Springfield and Billings areas in Missouri. Thomas Garoutte, my 7th great-grandfather, was a preacher who rode a circuit route for the Methodist Church. Henry Garoutte served in the Revolutionary War and carried supplies to the troops. The women were homemakers and raised large families. Here are photos of the Garouttes

                     
                                  
         

They established a Garoutte Cemetery in Republic, Greene, Missouri, where many of the Garouttes and Laneys are buried. 

I celebrate Women’s History Month with this side of my mother’s family. Not much was recorded about the women, but they assuredly kept the home fires burning when their men were off at war, worked continually about the farm, birthed many children, and withstood it all until they were called home. 

Resources:

MacLysaght, Edward. Irish Families, Irish Academic Press; 4th edition (January 1, 1998).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Antoine_Garoutte

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