A Loving Biography of Robert John Bonner
Robert John Bonner was a classicist and Professor and Chair of the Classics Department at the University of Chicago for many years. The following biography was written by Gertrude Smith, a former graduate student of R.J.’s, and personal friend and frequent dinner guest of R.J. and Annie Willson’s. Gertrude also became an eminent classicist as […]
Hilda Caroline Oberg
Martin Rheinhold Wallentin Russell
Martin “Pops” Russell was born in Sweden on February 14, 1868, and is the oldest of Nel Russell’s four children. Read about how the family came to have this English last name in How our Swedish Ancestors Came to be Named Russell. Martin was 11 years old when his family immigrated to the U.S. in […]
Agnes Martha Russell
Agnes (Aggie) Martha Russell was born in Chicago on June 13, 1899. Her parents were Swedish. Her father, Martin Reinhold Wallentin Russell (1868-1962), emigrated to the U.S. in 1880, and her mother, Hilda Oberg Russell (1864-1938) in 1885. Martin’s first job was as a lamp lighter in Chicago: this job required no knowledge of English. […]
Ruth Wilson Mullins
Ruth recalls when “a monster came to town, in the form of a red automobile.” The first car in Boonville spooked horses, and caused some furor among farmers who needed to transport goods and themselves by horse-drawn wagons. People had to telephone the owners of the car to see when it would be out on […]
Thomas C. Mullins
Thomas C. Mullins grew up on a farm in Fayetteville, Arkansas, the youngest of 6 siblings. What we know of the farm is that Thomas’s father William Madison Mullins was at one time head of the local fruit growers association, and also kept horses to enter in local races. Thomas received his preparatory education in […]