Hello Johnson County Researchers, I am sending this letter that my grandmother wrote to the list in hopes some of you may recognize the people or places and get in touch with me. Her names was Clara McConnell Fritts b. 29 Jan 1892 d. 29 Oct 1959. She married Joseph Lee Fritts. Her parents were Dr. Albert McConnell and Rebecca Cardwell. I have lots of informations on these other families I would love to share. For a number of years the McConnells sent around a Round Robin Letter. Do you know what that is? Well, it would be sent to each family member. That person would write a letter that told what their family was doing at that time. Then it would be sent to the next family. The next time the letter came around the person would take his old letter out and write a new one of all the things that had happened to them since the last time the letter came around. This is a letter to the Round Robin from Grandma Clara but they had ask that each family member tell what they remembered about Dr. Albert McConnell, her father. It is how we got some clues to our family. It is sorta long but I think you might enjoy it. I have kept the spelling and all the same. It was written about 1950. It is called: HISTORY OF OLD DR. A. McCONNELL BY Clara McConnell Fritts He was in the Civil War four years. He ran off at eighteen and joined. They brought him back once, but he ran off again. He lay in Andersonville Prison six months, was abused and starved. A man threw an ear of corn to him and the guard told him that if he touched it, he'd jab a spear in him. He died and was laid out to bury when a colored lady held a mirror to his lips and found he was breathing, said "Law me, folks, that man is not dead." She got coffee and brought him to. He said that if he could find that negro, he would keep her up a life time. He finally came home after the war was over and studied medicine and made a doctor. His father was Samuel McConnell. He was a fine Christian man and would ride miles to attend prayer meeting, was a school teacher, taught one school until they called it the Old McConnell School. Albert's mother was Elizabeth Carlton. She had two borthers, Uncle Dickie and Uncle Ambrose. They had three or four children. I was not very well acquainted with them. His father had one sister, Jincie. She lived with Pa. That's what we called them, Pa and Ma. Pa was going to church one Sunday. He saw a pretty girl looking out of an upstairs window. He said, "That is my wife." It was my mother, Miss Rebecca Cardwell. Pa took her home that day and in a short time, they were married. Her father was a well-to-do farmer. he gave them $50.00 to buy their furniture. It would not buy much now. They had a hard life. Pa was a country doctor. Money was scarce and food not very plentiful. Charlie came sixteen months after they married. Then Lizzie (red-headed), Clara and Alice, twins, Sam, Johnnie, Tom, Ethel and Ida. He moved from one place to another for years. The first thing I remember was two little girls talking. One said, "Let's stay for dinner. They are going to have biscuits." We moved to Missouri in a covered wagon, moved back to Illinois in a year. Pa gave us all an education. Charlie was a teacher, afterward a doctor. Sam was a teacher, afterward a lawyer. He served as city attorney in Hot Springs and in Nashville Ark. He married Mattie Belle Bowen, had four fine children, Jamie, Bowen, Seg and George. Do not know what Bowen does. Jamie was a teacher. Seg is a letter carrier. George is in the army, has a daughter, Jo Ann. Seg has Jimmie, Dickie, Jeanny, Lizzie married young. Married Will Martin, had two children, Suda and Claude. Will died. Lizzie married Ray Listen, had one girl, Olen. They are all dead now. Suda left a daughter, Opal, sons Bill and Cardew. Suda's Husband' name was Walter Edwards. Tom married Prudence Randall, taught school, but quit, said he did not have any job raising people's kids for them. He is a fine laundry man, the best. Ida married. We do not know if she is dead or alive. Clara, that's me, married a mill man. Had a hard life as well as he. Had nine children, lost four, raised five. Lee Fritts, my husband, died when my youngest child was five years old, the oldest sixteen. With Charlie's help raised and educated them. My oldest boy died with appendicitis. The others are all married and have families: Robert, three, Milton, Wilma Lee and Cortez; Cecil two, Clara Maud and Alice Faye; Marie five, Charles, Billy, Cecil Louise, Linda Lee and Jimmie; Gladys, three, Judy, Shirley and Jeraldine. I was in an accident twelve years ago and contracted arthritis. Am crippled up. Eight weeks ago, I fell and fractured my ankle. This incident is rooted so deep in my memory I can not wait to tell it in his history (Pa's). He practiced medicine horseback, would ride ten and fifteen miles on a maternity case and made two more trips for $5.00...........Pa moved to Cross Roads, bought ten acres of land and a log house froma Mr. Taylor who would be our neighbor. He contracted with a mill man, George Huffman, to take and old gray mare and let Charlie, seventeen years old, work for lumber to build a new house. He built it with four rooms and a long front porch. He boxed one end for an office. He was very proud of it with shelves and drawers for this medicine necessities. We felt very proud of our new home and new office with his sign, Dr. A. McConnell, out in front. I was twelve years old. Ethel was born when I was thriteen, Alice, my twin sister, died. It was so sad and left me so lonely. We always sat together and studied in the same books. She was so sweet and good. Everyone love her. I used to wonder why I did not die instead. I had been sick and was spoiled and not so good..........When I was fourteen, Ida was born. I did all the work and the neighbor women would some of them come and sit with Ma in the afternoon while I went to school. The white-sided school was just across the road from us. I got three prizes that year one for getting the most headmarks in spelling, one for good behavior and one for not missing a day. Then, if you went half a day, they gave you credit for a whole day...........The boys, Sam and Tom, planted corn and raised for the pigs Pa bought them. I can hear Sam yet saying, "Pig, pig,pig, roop." instead of "Pig souie" like Pa........Ma raised chickens, geese and turkeys and a nice garden to help out. Geese to make feather beds and pillows as the family increased. Think we had four or five big feather beds and any number of pillows. They thought they would freeze without a feather bed. She sold eggs and chickens and turkeys to buy our clothes. I remember one time Pa had a big basket of eggs, took me and Alice with him and bought us a pair of shoes and a new hat. Mine were No. 13 and Alice's were No. 1's. Ma had two cows and sold butter. When she had company, she just went out and killed a hen or sometimes a rooster and make a big pot of dumplings and cooked potatoes. We were all ver fond of potatoes. We had a hired girl when Ma was sick. She was a regular grouch. She never got enough potatoes. She would cook a putful (Ella Mount)(an old maid)......But sorry to say, Ma had to sell all her chickens, geese, and turkeys and cows. Pa took a notion to move to town, a little railroad town, Simpson. Goodbye to the old white-sided school house where one teacher taught all the grades. They had a big recitation bench and a class would go up there and recite and then return to their seats and another class would go up all day long. We lived at Simpson two years. Ma took pneumonia and died and left Ida,three, and Ethel, five, my responsibility. Lizzie was married. But in a short time, Pa married louise Gregory, Horace's mother. She was a good mother, had three boys, Guy, Ben, and Horace. They move to Oklahoma where her father lived. Learned to love all of them. Grandpa, as we learned to call him. a lean, white-headed man, had Louise, Carrie, John, Jim and Bertha. They had different mothers. Louise raised Bertha and Jim. Grandpa Gregory married an Indian woman and had one baby boy, Lawrence, and then died. They never see Lawrence...........Pa next moved to Springdale, Arkansas. There, I married Lee Fritts, left the McConnnell abode, took up the Fritt's abode......After living in Jessieville and Hot Springs, Pa moved to Douglas Arizona and bought a home. He died there. Louise, Horace's mother, died at Artisia, California, where she bought a home. Horace took her to Whittier to bury her. She was put away with lots of flowers. So that ends the history of old Dr. A. McConnell, my father. ENJOY!!!