Smith Roten Allison

Per letter to granddaughter Bessie Barnard from Iva Mae Cain on Feb. 20, 1951:

You probably know more about your grandfather, Smith Allison, than I can tell you. I know it was always a great day when Uncle Smith came to visit us, and I knew we would hear great stories of buffalo hunting, running for a claim in the old Oklahoma "strip" and tales of athletic feats in his early manhood. And how I loved to hear him sing! I still remember some of his old osngs, though I have nevr heard anyone else sing them. Tommy Doosnaps, Pompey Show and Pompey Smash, do you remember them?

Your grandfather married Jane McFadin. After a few happy years during which your mother, Etta was born, Jane was stricken with tuberculosis, which was then called "consumption" because the tubercule bacillus had not been discoverd and the disease seemed to consume away the flesh and the strength. Your grandfather told me once that Jane was dying for seven years, and there was nothing he could do about it. Those were heartbreaking years and after it was over your grandfather came west and spent several years trying to forget, in the rough life of a buffalo hunter. I do not know who kept your mother, Etta, during those years nor when she came to Kansas to live with her father. I do remember, once when I was a very little girl, Uncle Smith came to visit us and brought Etta with him. I remember her as a tall girl, (because I was so short, of course,) who wore a white dress and picked many wild pansies or johnny-jump-ups, of which there were milions, I judge, all over our place, and wore a bunch of them constantly for a corsage. She left the white dress at our house and Mollie afterward made it into a dress for me. I think your sister Effie looks more like your mother than either of you other girls, but there is a resemblance to her in each of you.

Uncle Smith used to tell me about your grandmother Jane, what a wonderful person she was, how she could get a dinner for a crowd of men, a threshing crew, for instance, without help, better than most could with help. When asked if he would under any circumstances consider marring again, he always said yes, if he could find another woman just like Jane.