Francis Marion Powell and Laura Emaline Church

This is the family of Francis Marion Powell and his wife, who was born Laura Emaline Church, as it existed in 1905 or 1906, when I estimate this photograph was taken. Of the girls that are standing, my maternal grandmother, Grandmother Isenhour, who was born Eula Elvira Powell, is second from the right. I had never seen a picture of her as a girl. She looks remarkably like my first cousin Julie, daughter of my mother's brother, my Uncle Mack. Francis and Laura are my great-grandparents.

Mom called the couple, her grandparents, Mama and Papa Powell. I don't know much else about them other than that Papa Powell operated a country store. Mom has a photo of him standing proudly next to an old gasoline pump, and she said that Mama Powell's father, Squire Allen Church, did not approve of the marriage of his daughter to Francis. It was apparently so bad that Squire would cross the street to avoid the couple, which must have caused his daughter much unhappiness.

Francis was born on July 24, 1869, at Shouns Crossroads in Johnson County, Tennessee, and he died on Valentine's Day 1943 in Abington, Virginia, at the age of 73. His wife, Laura, for whom my sister is named, was born March 28, 1872, in Wilkes County, North Carolina, and she died on April 30, 1947, in Monroe, North Carolina, just after Mom's 9th birthday. Francis and Laura married on September 22, 1889, and they are buried together at the Mountain View Cemetery in Mountain City, Tennessee. Their nine children and the year of each child's birth are as follows:

Luther Conway Powell, 1890 (He died at 8 months old.)
Flora Ethel Powell, 1892
Maude Eunice Powell, 1894
Myrtle Florence Powell, 1897
Eula Elvira Powell, 1899
Mamie Yarborough Powell, 1901
Chester Willard Powell, 1904
Stella Rhea Powell, 1908
Claybourne Forrest Powell, 1910

In the photograph we believe the standing children are, from the viewer's left to right, Ethel, Maude, Myrtle, Eula and Mamie, who was called Mame. The young boy in Francis's lap is Chester, known as Chet. Stella and Clay had not yet been born yet.