Gus and Emeline Essary are the grandparents of Judy (email: jaywhle@aol.com ) and this is where we started getting most of our information on them.

Brenda (email: shorty@sofnet.com) and Donna (email: groupsheet@aol.com ) are also related and have shared so much with us.

Notes for Fred Davis:  (From Brenda - email: shorty@sofnet.com)  Mt. Hope Cemetery caretakers card lists the death date of Fred Davis as 08 Jan 1959 and Ruby, his wife, as next of kin. He is buried in Block 2, lot 131, space 6. His headstone only reads 1906-1959

Following is an articles about Fred's death from the Joplin Globe, Friday 09 Jan 1959

HEART ATTACK AT BLAZE FATAL TO W.C. FIREMAN

"Webb City, MO--City fireman Fred Davis, 52 years old, died at 4 o'clock Thursday afternoon in Jane Chinn Hospital after a heart attack while fighting flames in a tool shed at the M.E. Shipley residence, 600 South Pennsylvania Avenue.

Firemen Lee Hairl and Lonnie Smith who had answered the fire alarm at 3:10 o'clock with Davis, returned him to the fire station at 3:25 o'clock. A Hedge-Lewis ambulance was summoned by Fire Chief C.E. (Bud) Shuey, and oxygen was administered en route to the hospital where Davis died soon after he was admitted. Fire Chief Shuey said that the attending physician stated death was not due to smoke, but to a heart attack.

A veteran fireman, Davis has returned to Webb City fire department last April. He had served the city previously under Fire Chief Bill Atkerson and the late Fire Chief Elmer Covert, and had been a member of the Fort Crowder fire department several years.

A resident of Webb City over 40 years, Fireman Davis came here with his parents, Mr. & Mrs. Gus Davis from Springfield, MO where he was born February 14, 1906. He was a member of the Fourth Ward Democrats Club.

Surviving are his widow, Mrs. Ruby Davis of the home, 3318 South Hall Street; a son, Freddie Mark Davis of the home; a daughter, Mrs. Donna Rumley of Webb City; his mother, Mrs. Nettie Forrest and his stepfather Elza Forrest, of Webb City, and a sister Mrs. Mary Engle of Beatrice, Neb.

Funeral arrangements will be announced by Hedge-Lewis Funeral home.

The fire in the tool shed at the Shipley property apparently was caused by the overturning of a small heating stove by two dogs which had been left in the structure. According to firemen, loss was confined to an electric saw and tools in the building."

Notes for Nettie Richardson: From Brenda (email: shorty@sofnet.com) 

I have found, quite by accident, a 1922 newspaper article that is for Elza Forest and a Miss Nettie Long getting married (the index card read "Lnog") and taking their honeymoon in Springfield... It lists Elza as a barber in W. C...... When we were at Mt. Hope cemetery, the caretakers card for him had written on it "he was a very good barber".

I wonder if Nettie may have remarried between Gus & Elzie.

Have you heard anything about this??

Nettie's obituary, published in the Joplin Globe Friday Dec. 25, 1959 --

"DISTRICT DEATHS"

MRS. NETTIE FORREST

"Webb City, Mo.,-- Mrs. Nettie Forrest, 76 years old, 317 S. Hall street, died at 2 o'clock Thursday afternoon in Jane Chinn hospital where she had been a patient for 19 days. She had resided in Webb City for 35 years, coming here from Springfield Mo.

Mrs. Forrest, until her illness, had operated with her husband, Elzie (Blackie) Forrest, Blackie's cafe on south Main street. She was a member of the Pentecostal church of God and the Fourth Ward Democrats Club. Born Febuary 23 1883 in Christian county Missouri, she was a daughter of Mr. and Mrs. James Richardson.

Surviving, in addition to her husband, is a daughter, Mrs. Joe Engle of Beatrice, Neb; three granddaughters, four grandsons, a daughter-in-law, and several great-grandchildren.

Funeral arrangements will be announced by the Hedge-Lewis funeral home."