William S. Diggins

Notes:

William Diggins was a brother to Joseph, Wesley, and Franklin Diggins, who all married daughters of Julius Augustus Owen - "Descendants of John Owen of Windsor, Connecticut" p. 196

William married Lucinda Skinner on 1 Dec 1825 in Waitsfield, Washington Co, Vermont. Lucinda (daughter of Eli Skinner and Lucinda Nims) was born on 5 Aug 1797 in Waitsfield, Washington Co, Vermont; died on 1 Dec 1825 in Waitsfield, Washington Co, Vermont. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Miranda married Ambrose OwenProbably McHenry Co, Illinois. Ambrose (son of Julius Augustus Owen and Rebecca Murray) was born on 31 May 1814 in Milton, Chittenden Co, Vermont; died on 28 Feb 1902 in Knox County, Nebraska; was buried about 1902 in Greenwood Cem, Creighton, Knox Co, Nebraska. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

The Flagler News 17 Jun 1920: Announcing the death of Stella Cooley: "She also leaves...a sister Mrs. Lucy Shaffer who makes her home with Mr. and Mrs. O.A. Groves just south of Flagler."

Family/Spouse: Simon Shaffer. Simon was born about 1836 in Pennsylvania; died on 11 May 1892 in Creighton, Knox Co, Nebraska; was buried about May 1892 in Greenwood Cem, Creighton, Knox Co, Nebraska. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Living. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Stella Alfresine Owen Obituary Mrs. Cooley was one of the really estimable old ladies of Flagler, always quiet and greatly devoted to her home and children. In early childhood she came with her parents to West Union, Fayette County, Iowa, later moving to McGregor, Iowa, where she was married to Robert Reed Cooley on 10 Dec 1874. In 1886 she came with her husband and children to Plainview, Nebraska, where they resided until 1910 when they disposed of their property and came to Flagler, Kit Carson County, Colorado where they lived on a farm just west of town until a short time ago when the deceased and her son, Glenn, moved to town to property he recently purchased. She also leaves a brother, Ernest M. Owen of Flagler, and a sister, Mrs. Lucy Shaffer who makes her home with Mr. and Mrs. O. A. Groves just south of Flagler. She is mentioned in "Descendants of John Owen" as 7th generation. Spelling of name there is E-s-t-e-l-l-a. Source was Helen E. Healy, Mesa AZ, in 1935. - The Flagler News, V 8, No. 22, June 17, 1920 (front page story, also on front page: Harding and Coolidge nominated at the Republican National Convention).

(Medical):I hereby certify that I attended deceased from May 27, 1920 to June 10, 1920, that I last saw her alive on June 9, 1920 and that death occurred on the date stated above. (Signed) E.W. Reis MD, Flagler, Colo.

Stella married Robert Reed Cooley on 10 Dec 1874 in McGregor, Clayton Co, Iowa. Robert (son of Andrew Sutherland Cooley and Salome Warren) was born on 14 May 1847 in Garnavillo Twp, Clayton Co, Iowa; died on 28 Dec 1917 in Flagler, Kit Carson Co, Colorado; was buried on 31 Dec 1917 in Flagler Cemetery, Kit Carson Co, Colorado. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

The Flagler News 17 Jun 1920: Announcing the death of Stella Cooley: "...She also leaves a brother, Ernest M. Owen of Flagler..."

Ernest married Mary Butler on 10 Sep 1913 in Burlington, Kit Carson Co, Colorado. Mary was born about 1875 in Iowa; died about 1955 in Ordway, Crowley Co, Colorado; was buried on ab t 1955 in Valley View Cem, Crowley Co, Colorado. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Name: Bert

Notes:

Robert Berton Cooley (Bert) and his twin brother, Herbert Merton (Mert), were born 15 Oct 1875 to Robert Reed Cooley (1840-1917) and Stella Alfresine Owen (1850-1920) in McGregor, Iowa "right on the banks of the Mississippi River" as my Grandpa Bert Cooley told me.
The twins grew up in the McGregor area. Some time before 1894[i] the Robert Reed Cooley family consisting of Dad, Mom, Bert, and Mert came to Pierce County, Nebraska, where they settled in Plainview.
Some time before 1896[ii] Samuel Jasper Miller and his wife Mary Ellen Nickerson and his eight children moved from Iowa to Plainview. Amongst the children was Carrie Louella Miller b. 27 May 1883 in Beaman, Iowa, future wife of Robert Berton Cooley.
Bert and Carrie Louella (Lou) were wed 3 Jan 1903 in Plainview. Later in that same year, their first child, Orville Dale was born. Two other children, Carlyle Berton (b. 1905) and Leo (b. 1907), were born in Plainview but did not survive childhood.
At some point before 1906[iii] Mert acquired the Crofton Journal newspaper at Crofton, Knox County, Nebraska. Meanwhile, Bert and his wife, Carrie Louella Miller, had moved to McLean Nebraska where both taught school.
Ronald Delos Cooley was born to Herbert Merton and Elizabeth Holliday in Crofton 28 Jan 1906 and their second child, Merton Beth Cooley, was born 7 Dec 1907. Unfortunately, their mother, Elizabeth Holliday, died shortly after Beth was born. Because of the tragic loss of their mother, Ronald went to live with his grandparents, RR Cooley and Stella Owen in Plainview, Nebraska, and Beth went to live with his uncle RB Cooley in McLean, Nebraska.
In 1910 the Robert Reed Cooley family consisting of RR, Stella, Glenn, and grandchild Ronald Delos, and the Robert Berton Cooley family consisting of RB, wife CL Miller, first child Dale, and nephew Merton Beth, migrated to Kit Carson County Colorado. The RR Cooleys purchased a relinquishment just at the west edge of Flagler and the RB Cooleys purchased 158 acres about four miles west and five miles north of Flagler.
At the same time, the Samuel Jasper Miller family also migrated to Colorado but they landed in Washington County. All of the Miller children, with the exception of eldest son Odes Bert (Carrie Louella, wife of RB Cooley migrated with the Cooleys) came to Colorado and all filed on homesteads in the Anton area of Washington County.
The RB Cooley family "...was on a homestead nine miles northwest of Flagler and we had three years to prove up the claim," said his nephew, Beth Cooley. Bert began in Colorado as a teacher, earning $40 per month at the Huntley school about seven miles due north of Flagler while Lou taught at the Van Patten school at $35 per month. In the summer of 1910 when school was out he joined his Grandpa SJ Miller's threshing crew to run the engine. Since the crops near Flagler had failed in 1910, Grandpa Miller had decided to head north where the crops fared better that year. One day Bert was working about 30 miles north of Flagler near Otis Colo., when he observed the town didn't have a newspaper. That fall Bert began planning for a newspaper in Otis.
"The big reason [for starting a newspaper] was that almost all of the settlers were homesteading, and the law required that anyone who "proved up" on a homestead had to make a publication in a newspaper in the area. These publications were published for a period of six weeks and the homesteader had to pay a publication fee of $5.[iv]
Bert was fortunate enough to find an empty, one and a half story building on the main street (Washington Avenue). It was located on the east side of the street just south of the yard part of the Akron-Otis Lumber Company. The front part was used as a printing office with a rear part partitioned off as a bedroom. At the back of the building was a sort of lean-to about 15 feet square. This was the kitchen and dining area. In order to get to the two bedrooms upstairs, it was necessary to go outside, climb a flight of steps and then walk on two two-by-eight planks laid across the semi-flat roof of the lean-to to get into the upstairs apartment. [Our biggest] concern was water for domestic use. There was no municipal water system and those who lived in town had cisterns which were kept full by a man named Fred Bowen who owned a wooden tank on a wagon. It had a hand pump on it and he would deliver you a supply of water for 50 cents."
"Dad started in the newspaper business from scratch," remembered his son, Coyne Cooley. "He started the Independent on a $250 loan [from his brother-in-law, Odes Bert Miller of Iowa]...that was in 1911, and I was born the next year. We had quarters above the newspaper office, so that's what you call being born into the business." He bought some used equipment and "hired a bum printer to start the paper in Otis just to print legals", said Beth. The first edition (v1#1) of the Otis Independent was published on 5 Jan 1911.[v]
When the Independent was started there were less than 100 people living in Otis. The newspaper consisted of four pages, the front and back was "home print"; that is, the type was set in the shop and printed there. The two inside pages were called "patent" which were supplied by the Western Newspaper Union (out of business by 1982).
During the early years of the newspaper in Otis, the RB Cooley Flagler property was occupied by Lou, Dale, and Beth during the winter months, putting in the time necessary to prove up. Lou taught school, Dale went with her, and Beth was "farmed out" to a neighbor lady (in today's parlance, sent to childcare). Lou and Dale traveled in an open buggy drawn by a single mare who sometimes engaged in the capricious practice known as "balking". That is, a situation where the horse refuses to move when asked to do so. It is very exasperating."
They proved up the [Flagler] claim in March of 1913 and moved to Otis for good.
Tragically, a year later in 1914 Mert was drowned in an automobile accident on the Yankton (SD) pontoon bridge. With the untimely death of his twin brother Bert, sold the OI and he and the family left Otis and moved to Crofton, Nebraska where they continued the operation of Mert's newspaper, the Crofton Journal.
As time went on in that northeast corner of Nebraska near the Missouri River, Bert began to have problems with severe allergies (hay fever). With the climate adversely affecting him he disposed of the Crofton newspaper in 1916 and the family returned to Otis arriving on Election Day, Nov 14, 1916. Bert bought the Independent back and resumed operation of the paper he had founded. Those were the only two years the Cooleys were not involved in a Colorado paper.
"In 1917 we built our new house in Otis and we took the high school principal as a roomer. He was 22 year of age and just out of the University of Denver."[vi] Dale speculates that the principal probably influenced his choice of university as DU from which he graduated.
At some point after their return from Nebraska, the newspaper office was moved "to a make-shift shop adjoining William Whiterhurst's store [on the north]. This had been used as a place to grind and mix feed." At this new location Bert bought a typesetting machine that "was better than doing it by hand, but not much". But a clothing store located in the old grocery store adjoining the Independent office on the south caught fire and was destroyed (no date given). "The Independent was saved by the fact that the north wall of the store [and south wall of the office] was of solid concrete and the fire failed to penetrate."
Not long after that, the chance arose to get a building that had been built out as a drugstore for Justin Hay on the east side of the street across from "the hotel". Shortly, the shop was moved there, the third location for the Otis Independent since RB Cooley started the newspaper.
With the assistance of his wife and sons, he continued to operate the Otis newspaper until 1928 when they traded the paper to J.S. "Stat" Tohill for the Monte Vista Tribune. Tohill came to Otis to operate the Independent but shortly, he sold the newspaper to John W. Graves in 1929. Graves operated it until his death, Feb 22, 1982, and was closely associated with the Cooleys for over 50 years.
Meantime, in Monte Vista, Bert assumed operation of the Tribune but a few months later a better opportunity arose in Akron Colo., county seat of Washington County, whose economy was bustling in the prosperity of the pre-depression years. R.B. sold the Monte Vista Tribune and came to Akron in February of 1929 with his wife Lou, three sons, Dale, Coyne, and Bob, and two nephews, Ronald and Beth.
Akron was a little railroad town and farming community of only a few more than 1200 residents yet it boasted two newspapers, the Akron News and the Akron Reporter. Bert purchased both newspapers which were quickly consolidated resulting in the single newspaper, the Akron News-Reporter the first edition of which was published March 7, 1929. It reported details of a coroner's inquest into death of an Akron man and his son in a train accident, a fire at the Washington County Fairgrounds in Akron, and carried a front page picture of the inauguration of President Calvin Coolidge and Vice President Charles G. Dawes.
Since having five sons working on a small weekly newspaper was overkill, in 1937 Bert purchased the Eastern Colorado Leader in Limon and Dale and Ronald were sent down there to assume operation of the newspaper. Soon they acquired the Genoa Sentinel, the two papers were consolidated, and the Limon Leader was born.
Youngest son, Bob exited the Akron News-Reporter in 1943, went to his wife Eleanor Newcomb's hometown, Mountain Home Idaho, where he started the Mountain Home News. Soon Bob began to feel the ill-effects of arthritis so he moved down to the drier climate of Arizona where he eventually became a Professor of Journalism at Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff in 1976.
R.B. and Lou owned the Akron News-Reporter until 1955 when they retired and turned the operation over to Coyne and Beth who formed a partnership shortly thereafter.
In 1972 the Limon Leader was sold and Dale and Ronald went into retirement. When the Akron News-Reporter was sold in 1979 it marked the end of the Cooley family newspaper dynasty "since none of the children was interested in getting into the business", Coyne said. That was mostly true until Jim, son of Ronald, took over the Oxford (Nebraska) News and is still publishing the newspaper in 2013.
After a brief illness, Robert Berton Cooley died in the Washington County Hospital in Akron, Colo. On 12 Dec 1962. He was buried in the Otis Cemetery.
His wife, Carrie Louella Miller died in the Nursing Wing on the south side of Washington County Hospital 10 Aug 1973 and she also was buried in the Otis Cemetery.
------------------------------------------------------i Their fourth child, Glenn Syren Cooley, was born in Plainview 14 Jul 1894. ii His youngest child, Letta May Miller was born in Plainview 18 Mar 1896. iii Mert's first child, Ronald Delos Cooley was born in Crofton 28 Jan 1906 when Mert had control of the Crofton Journal. iv "Otis, the People, the Places, and the Newspaper" by Dale Cooley, The Otis Independent, vol 70 no 14 v *From some later edition numbers (e.g. vol 30, no 51 dated 18 Dec 1941) I have determined that v1#1 of the OI lay in the range Dec 25, 1910 to Jan 5, 1911. Since most accounts say the OI began publication in 1911 I will summarily establish 5 Jan 1911 (a Thursday) as the date of the first edition, v1#1.
vi Dale

(Medical):I attended the deceased from November 11, 1962 to December 12, 1962 and last saw him alive on December 12, 1962. Death occurred at 5:25 A.M. on the date stated above. Attendant: Park D. Keller, MD, Akron, Colo. Dec. 13, 1962

Robert married Carrie Louella Miller on 3 Jan 1903 in Plainview, Pierce Co, Nebraska. Carrie (daughter of Samuel Jasper Miller and Mary Ellen Nickerson) was born on 27 May 1883 in Beaman, Grundy Co, Iowa; died on 10 Aug 1973 in Akron, Washington Co, Colorado; was buried on 13 Aug 1973 in Otis Cemetery, Washington Co, Colorado. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Name: Mert
• Occupation: Crofton, Knox Co, Nebraska; newspaperman

Notes:

From Yankton Press and Dakotan, 4 Nov 1914
TRAGEDY AT MISSOURI RIVER
Two Men from Crofton lose lives at river early this morning
THE CAR PLUNGED INTO STREAM
TWO IN CAR ESCAPE AND TELL THRILLING STORY OF ACCIDENT O.W. Cass, a druggist of Crotfton Neb, and H.M. Cooley, editor of the Crofton Journal were drowned in the Missouri River at 2 o'clock this morning when Mr. Cass' auto, a Ford, plunged over the side of the pontoon bridge into 12 to 14 feet of water. O.D. Salley, barber, and L.S. Ross, jeweler, also of Crofton, were members of the party but although both experienced the terrible plunge into the river and hit the sandbar at the bottom, both managed to rise clear of the car and get to shore but hardly able to relate how; Salley especially, who was nearly drowned, is in a state of collapse over the loss of his intimate friend, Mr. Cooley.
[The bodies of Cass and Cooley were never found]

(Medical):Car plunged from the Yankton Pontoon Bridge into the Missouri River, body never recovered.

Occupation:
until his death in 1914

Herbert married Jane Elizabeth Holliday on 26 Apr 1905 in Holliday Farm, Knox Co, Nebraska. Jane (daughter of Hugh Sutton Holliday and Jane Dufton) was born on 20 Mar 1884 in Castle Sowerby, Cumberland, England; died on 1 Jan 1908 in Crofton, Knox Co, Nebraska; was buried about Jan 1908 in Pleasant View Cemetery, Pierce Co, Nebraska. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Herbert married Edith Jones on 29 Jun 1910 in Crofton, Knox Co, Nebraska. Edith (daughter of Richard Thomas Jones, 1 and Josephine Hurley) was born on 15 Aug 1879 in Iowa; died after Aug 1911 in Possibly Colorado. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Note that his mother, Stella, wrote his given names "Alton Verne" but his gravestone is inscribed "Verne A".

Family/Spouse: Unknown. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Other Events and Attributes:

• Name: Syron G Cooley

Notes:

He may have been named after his uncle, Syren Owen b. 1846 to Ambrose Owen and Miranda Diggins.
April 1938 applied for marriage license in Yuma, Yuma County, Arizona under name S. Glenn Cooley to Ivy W. Howe.
He went by the name Glenn S Cooley until he was married to his second wife, Ivy W Howe, when he changed it to Syron G. Cooley. He died still using this name.

(Research):According to the 1920 U.S. census, Colorado, Kit Carson Co, Glenn Syren was a lumber yard laborer; In 1930, California, San Diego Co, he was in real estate

Known public data about Glenn1894, 14 Jul Glenn Syren Cooley was born in Plainview Nebraska 1917, 5 Jun Glenn S Cooley signed a WWI Draft Registration card, address Flagler Colo, occu farmer employed by Robt Cooley, single 1920 Census US, Colo, Kit Carson, Flagler, Glenn S Cooley, age 26, son; Ronald Cooley, age 14, grandson; Stella Cooley, head, age 70 1925 Riverside Calif Directory, Glenn S. Cooley, pntr; Elizabeth Cooley; 317 N Mulberry 1930 Census Calif, San Diego, San Diego, Glen S Cooley, head, age at last birthday, 34; Elizabeth, wife, age 30 1930 San Diego City and County Directory, Glenn S Cooley, slsmn Saml Rose; Eliz Cooley spouse; address 2106 'K' 1940 Census Calif, San Diego, San Diego, Syron G Cooley, head, 35 (error), Monroe St, painter-contractor; Ivy Cooley wife, age 45; Pauline Howe, age 25 1940 San Diego City and County Directory, Syron G. Cooley, carp; Ida W Cooley, 3685 Monroe Ave 1942 San Diego City and County Directory, Syron G. Cooley, pntr; Ivy W Cooley, 3685 Monroe Ave 1959 San Diego City and County Directory, Syren G Cooley, pntr contr; Ivy W Cooley, 3685 Monroe Ave "h do" 1962. 3 Jul Syron G Cooley died ae 67 in San Diego (California Death Index) 1969, 23 Nov Ivy W Cooley died ae 80 in San Diego (California Death Index)
Possibly named after his maternal granduncle Syren Ambrose Owen.

Glenn married Ivy Wood Stebbing-Howe on 24 Apr 1938 in Yuma, Yuma Co, Arizona. Ivy was born on 26 Jul 1889 in South Dakota; died on 23 Nov 1969 in San Diego, San Diego Co, California; was buried in California. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Glenn married Elizabeth (wife of Glenn Syren Cooley) [?] about 1915 in Probably Kit Carson County Colorado. Elizabeth was born about 1890 in Iowa; and died. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Family/Spouse: Grace Carnell Puckett. Grace (daughter of John Wesley Puckett and Lela Ann Robertson) was born on 1 Apr 1914 in Paris, Henry Co, Tennessee; died about 1969 in Nashville, Davidson Co, Tennessee. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]