52 Ancestors - Week 13 - James Madison Yeakley

Now that I doing the Yeakley side, I am finding that there are errors in the tree. These are not errors others have made, these were created by me when I first started years ago and blindly copied information from other trees. The Rhea side of the family is correct but it took two years to finally get it right although I still find surprises there too.

I do know James Madison Yeakley was my great grandfather. He was born on August 10, 1843 in Washington, Missouri and was one of six children. This is where I had to stop because some of my information didn't add up.

One of the things I chucked at was the names of the boys in his family. There was Jacob but apparently he died as an infant. There were two girls, Caroline and Margaret. Then the came the three remaining children: Martin VanBuren Yeakley, James Madison Yeakley, and George Washington Yeakley. I wish I knew why they named the children after presidents. It is probably an interesting story. 

The back of this photo reads: "J. M. Yeakley father of 1) Marvin Yeakley, 2) Morgan Melendez Yeakley, 3) Mrs. Jenny (Yeakley) Riley, 4) Nolie (Yeakley) King. J.M. Yeakley moved from Denton County, MO to Denton County, TX, spent the night in Bonham, Texas the night Abraham Lincoln was inaugurated president of the United States." 

He moved to Texas on March 4, 1861, according to the writing on the picture posted on Ancestry.com. I'm betting that's right since the person who posted it has contacted me on several occasions and has the original photo. 

Records do indicate that he was born in Missouri. He was a blacksmith by trade and the 1900 Census shows him still working as a blacksmith.

James married Margaret Ann Shearer in 1867. They lived in Texas and had five children. One of them was my grandfather Ernest Marvin Yeakley. She died on August 13, 1893 at the age of 46.

Margaret Ann Shearer

On October 10, 1901 he married again. This time to Minerva Adaline (Briley) McGinnis. As my mother would have said, "She was a widow woman" with five children of her own. 

Both Minerva and James Madison died in 1928. James died at the age of 84 on March 6 and Minerva at the age of 72 on November 25.