Katherine Alice Rooney, 1852–1939?> (aged 87 years)
- Name
- Katherine Alice /Rooney/
- Given names
- Katherine Alice
- Surname
- Rooney
Birth
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Baptism
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Birth of a sister
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Baptism of a sister
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Death of a brother
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Death of a paternal grandfather
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Burial of a paternal grandfather
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Death of a brother
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Death of a mother
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Marriage
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Death of a paternal grandmother
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Birth of a daughter
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Birth of a son
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Birth of a son
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Birth of a son
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Birth of a son
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Death of a father
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Birth of a son
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Birth of a son
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Death of a brother
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Death of a husband
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Death of a sister
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Marriage of a daughter
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Marriage of a son
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Death of a sister
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Death of a brother
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Shared note: Event Description: Moore Cemetery |
Marriage of a son
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Marriage of a son
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Death of a son
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Death of a brother
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Shared note: Event Description: Philbrook Cemetery |
Marriage of a son
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Marriage of a son
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Death of a daughter
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Death of a sister
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Burial of a father
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Death
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father |
1808–1889
Birth: February 2, 1808
26
25
— Ireland Death: April 9, 1889 — Bangor Township, Pope County, Minnesota |
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mother |
1816–1869
Birth: 1816
— Ireland Death: April 25, 1869 — Padua, Stearns County, Minnesota |
Marriage | Marriage — about 1834 — Ireland or Canada |
11 months
elder sister |
1834–
Birth: November 16, 1834
26
18
— Wakefield Township, Outaouais, Quebec, Canada Death: |
18 months
elder sister |
1836–1905
Birth: May 14, 1836
28
20
— Wakefield Township, Outaouais, Quebec, Canada Death: August 26, 1905 — Bangor Township, Pope County, Minnesota |
18 months
elder brother |
1837–1909
Birth: November 1, 1837
29
21
— Wakefield Township, Outaouais, Quebec, Canada Death: May 13, 1909 — Philbrook, Fergus County, Montana |
3 years
elder sister |
1842–1902
Birth: December 21, 1842
34
26
— Wakefield Township, Outaouais, Quebec, Canada Death: November 18, 1902 — Raymond Township, Stearns County, Minnesota |
3 years
elder brother |
1843–1854
Birth: October 18, 1843
35
27
— Wakefield Township, Outaouais, Quebec, Canada Death: August 15, 1854 — Wakefield Township, Outaouais, Quebec, Canada |
22 months
elder brother |
1845–1922
Birth: August 2, 1845
37
29
— Wakefield Township, Outaouais, Quebec, Canada Death: 1922 — Hobson, Judith Basin County, Montana |
2 years
elder brother |
1847–1894
Birth: July 11, 1847
39
31
— Wakefield Township, Outaouais, Quebec, Canada Death: February 1894 — Hobson, Judith Basin County, Montana |
2 years
elder brother |
1849–1868
Birth: July 6, 1849
41
33
— Wakefield Township, Outaouais, Quebec, Canada Death: December 10, 1868 — Padua, Stearns County, Minnesota |
3 years
herself |
1852–1939
Birth: April 2, 1852
44
36
— Wakefield Township, Outaouais, Quebec, Canada Death: May 2, 1939 — Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, California |
2 years
younger sister |
1854–1936
Birth: March 31, 1854
46
38
— Wakefield Township, Outaouais, Quebec, Canada Death: August 30, 1936 — Sauk Centre, Stearns County, Minnesota |
husband |
1846–1899
Birth: 1846
— Ireland Death: June 13, 1899 — Atlan, British Columbia, Canada |
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herself |
1852–1939
Birth: April 2, 1852
44
36
— Wakefield Township, Outaouais, Quebec, Canada Death: May 2, 1939 — Los Angeles, Los Angeles County, California |
Marriage | Marriage — April 9, 1874 — Rooney Settlement, Raymond, Stearns, Minnesota, USA |
13 months
daughter |
1875–1930
Birth: May 13, 1875
29
23
— Grove Lake, Pope County, Minnesota Death: August 10, 1930 — Goldendale, Klickitat County, Washington |
20 months
son |
1876–1918
Birth: 1876
30
23
— Miles City, Custer County, Montana Death: December 20, 1918 — Portland, Multnomah County, Oregon |
4 years
son |
1879–1958
Birth: June 8, 1879
33
27
— Miles City, Custer County, Montana Death: March 16, 1958 — Yakima, Yakima County, Washington |
4 years
son |
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2 years
son |
1884–1940
Birth: May 17, 1884
38
32
— Miles City, Custer County, Montana Death: August 6, 1940 — Goldendale, Klickitat County, Washington |
5 years
son |
1889–1958
Birth: May 21, 1889
43
37
— Douglas, Juneau Borough, Alaska Death: November 24, 1958 — Fairbanks, Fairbanks North Star Borough, Alaska |
3 years
son |
1892–1957
Birth: June 11, 1892
46
40
— Douglas, Juneau Borough, Alaska Death: October 18, 1957 — Medical Lake, Spokane County, Washington |
Birth | |
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Baptism |
Baptism |
Baptismal Sponsors: Michael Killeen and Mary Cahill |
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Shared note
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Katherine Ann Rooney: A Grandma for All "Grandma McKanna: now there was a woman!" Whenever he spoke of her, m y father, Judge Willis, inevitably came around to this glowing phras e of praise. Others who knew her echoed those sentiments: Katherine W illis, named for her; Mickey McKanna, son of Phillip and Kathleen Doyl e McKanna, her grandson; Frances Penglase Barnhill, "Panky," lifelon g friend of Elizabeth McKanna Willis, her daughter. What electrified t hem about this woman? Patrick Rooney and Ellen Tracy gave life to Katherine on April 2, 1852 . Patrick had emigrated from Ireland to Quebec Province, Canada, in 1 835; Ellen had done likewise in time to marry him in 1837 in a small f arming and logging community in Upper Wakefield Township. There Patri ck farmed while Ellen gave birth to, cared for, and raised her ever-gr owing family. Katherine made child number eight; she would in two mor e years welcome her youngest sibling, Elizabeth, the ninth and last ch ild. The family being Catholic, Katherine was baptized at St. Camillu s Catholic Church in Farelltonû a rural town now called La Peche and e xisting to this day alongside the Gatineau River. As always, the goth ic steeple dominates the surrounding landscape. In 1862 the United States Congress passed the Homestead Act. It offere d 160 acres of unused public lands in the Northwest Territories to any one who wished to settle on, and improve their homestead. Much of th e Rooney clanû Patrick and Ellen, and his married brothers and sistersû immigrated to Minnesota to claim its deliciously rich farming soil. Th ey settled in Stearns County in a place they named "Rooney's Settlemen t," eventually renamed Padua in honor of St. Anthony of Padua, its pat ron saint and title of its Catholic parish. Katherine, fifteen at the time of the move, finished her schooling i n her new home. When she evidenced a mature twenty years, the communi ty leaders judged her sufficiently educated to become the first employ ed school teacher of Raymond Township. A small, wooden-shingled, one-r oom schoolhouse where she taught, though no longer in use, still exist s. I treasure a picture of her from that period of her life: <<picture>> I once described this picture thus: "Although of medium height, here s he appears tall, almost statuesque. Dark-brown curly hair encircles he r head and curves gracefully over her forehead toward the outside of h er eyes, setting off her alabaster-smooth face and neck. Deep-set eye s gaze directly at the camera, showing interest and intensity. A sligh t smile indicates kindness and self-possession. She is wearing a pleat ed white blouse with a white collar softly framing her neck. Though th e blouse has long sleeves, they are turned back, exposing her lower ar ms. A black/brown dress with an openwork bodice emphasizes both her wh iteness and maidenly fullness as its falls from her shoulders over he r breasts to her waist. From there it cascades with deep folds in a be ll shape to the floor. She holds her hands clasped behind her in an at titude at once direct and controlled. She told her granddaughter Kathe rine Willis that as teenagers the Rooney girls created quite a stir am ong the young men thereabouts. If the others looked like her, one nee d not wonder why." The young schoolteacher did spark ardent male attention. One suitor, H ugh McFarland, pursued her assiduously enough to gain a promise of mar riage. When she told her parents her happy news, and produced his ring , she hit a wall of displeasure. The Rooneys professed a strong Iris h Catholicism; the McFarlands did not belong to either of these benigh ted clans. They said no to any unblessed alliance with him. Subsequently Katherine, in tears, handed back the engagement ring. I n exasperation Hugh snatched it and hurled it far out into a grassy f ield. He accompanied it with these words: "Here's to the ring and here 's to the girl who cannot keep a promise." Clearly she had failed him . Yet, how could she simply oppose the traditions that bound her famil y? Years later she related this episode to her granddaughter Katherine. S he held Hugh as her first and probably only true love. She shared thi s, not to complain, but rather to reflect with her on what might hav e been. By the spring of 1874 Hugh and the pain of this rejection faded. Micha el McCanna, a young farmer from adjacent Pope County, courted her. Bot h Irish and Catholic, plus being a hard-working young fellow, satisfie d her parents. The marriage could proceed: <<image>> The couple began their family on Michael's farm in Grove Lake. They co nceived and bore a daughter there, Elizabeth Elinor McCanna (my eventu al grandmother), on May 13, 1875. Katherine became pregnant with thei r second child nine months later. A locust plague devastated the crops of the Upper Midwest in the summe rs of 1875 and 1876. A number of the combined McCanna and Rooney famil ies decided to sell their farms and to head west for more congenial co nditions. Though pregnant and with a two-year-old child, Katherine joi ned her husband on this new adventure. On the way her second-born arri ved, James Adelbert, in Fargo, Dakota Territory, on December 16, 1876. The family settled down in Miles City in the Montana Territory. Ove r the next nine years, Michael labored at construction and hired-out a s a teamster; Katherine, meanwhile, was busy raising her two youngster s and giving birth to three more: Emmett Joseph on June 8, 1879, Joh n on June 7, 1882, and Phillip Francis on May 17, 1884. A studio pictu re taken between 1880-1882 shows the parents with their first three ch ildren: <<picture>> A few incidents give a flavor of their daily affairs in Miles City . I take them from the Yellowstone Journal of 1864, the months lead ing up to the birth of Phillip on May 17th. At that time Katherine ha d four children, ages eight to one. "Mr. McCanna, living on Main Street west of the post office, and the r esidents of the other houses in that block moved out Sunday night an d had barely time to do so before the water backed up by the gorge cam e hurriedly into their houses and covered the lower floor to the depth s of a foot and more." (February 26, 1884) "Mr. McCanna, will shortly grade the street at the corner of the pos t office building, running at right angles to Main." (March 1, 1884) "Quite a lively scrap occurred last night between Contractor McCanna a nd a gentleman who had been under his employ. The latter, it seems ha d a bone to pick with the contractor and led him on an exciting scrimm age, in which Mc took a tumble and was assisted home by one of his num erous friends." (April 10, 1884) "The illness of Lizzie McCanna, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. M. B. McC anna, is greatly regretted by their friends. She is afflicted with St . Vitus dance but there are some hopes of her recovery." (April 16, 1 884) "Furnished rooms to rent at my house corner of Fourth and Main streets . Mrs. McCanna." (April 20, 1884) The Sioux Uprising of 1862 in Minnesota resulted in summary execution s, the breaking of treaties, and the driving of these savages out of M innesota, westward into the Dakota Territory. Mickey McKanna, son o f the Phillip soon to be born to Michael and Katherine, related to m e an incident told him by his father. According to Phillip, just hours before his birth his pregnant mothe r was walking alone on the edge of town. Suddenly, a band of Sioux o n horseback came hurtling down the hills toward her. She darted int o a nearby cattle corral. She ducked down among the steers in order n ot to be seen. The rampaging riders opened the gates for the penned c attle and drove them out. Katherine ran along in their midst and, som ehow, avoided detection. She returned home safely. She delivered Phil lip the next day. I do not know how much truth hides in this account. It does offer a dr amatic and startling coda to a momentous spring in frontier Miles City . True or somewhat so, it also underlines how her family saw her. The United States bought the Alaska Territory from Russia in 1867. B y 1882 it began offering homesteads to American pioneers willing to se ttle in that frigid, faraway land. The attraction of free property, pl us the finding of gold deposits that very year around Juneau, drew ma ny hardy folk northward. In 1886 Michael bundled his wife and five young children into a wago n and headed for Seattle. We can only imagine the hardships of that jo urney, including the accidental death of three-year-old John. By Augu st the pioneering family arrived by boat in Juneau. They settled dow n on Douglas Island, across the Gastineau Channel. Michael secured a j ob as a hard rock miner for the Alaska-Treadwell Goldmining Company, b egun in 1881, the largest stamp-mining operation anywhere. Its main a ctivities were located in Treadwell, a half mile down-island from Doug las. The family purchased a house on Second Street in Douglas. There K atherine gave birth to her last two children, Robert John on May 21, 1 889, and Hilary on June 11, 1892. News of gold discoveries in the Yukon began filtering into Juneau an d environs in the fall of 1896. The possible treasures proved irresis tible to the McKannas. The Alaska Searchlight for March 20, 1897 brief ly reports: "M. B. McKanna and son James left on the steamer Rustler o n Tuesday, bound for the Yukon gold fields." Son Emmett would quickl y follow. Katherine stayed home in Douglas, taking care of it and he r three young boys. At this juncture her oldest child, twenty-one-year -old Elizabeth, though living at home had a job outside. She served th e government and her community as postmistress for Douglas. The McKanna men reached Dawson that summer. They staked and worked cla ims for two years until Michael became ill. He came down with "Bright 's Disease," a kidney ailment that is now called acute or chronic neph ritis. In the summer of 1899 with Jim's help he headed back up the Yuk on River, retracing their steps in the hope of reaching home. The sic kness overcame him. He died near Lake Bennett at the top of the infamo usly treacherous Chilkoot Pass. When word reached Douglas, his daught er Elizabeth left straightway by boat to Skagway, and then took a rece ntly completed railway line up the Pass. She met her brother at Lake B ennett. The two buried their father's remains in a small miners' cemet ery nearby. His wife could only grieve at a distance. <<picture>> A family photograph starkly records this tragic event in their lives . Katherine is seated to the right. Next to her and a bit forward, wi th his hand on her right knee, stands her youngest, Hilary. Robert i s standing just off of his little brother's right shoulder. Phillip co mes next, sitting where his father should have been. In back, Elizabet h has placed herself between Phillip and Robert, James talll and erec t between Hilary and his mother. Absent is Emmett, still prospecting f or gold, and Michael, finally at rest. Katherine is dressed in a full -length, long-sleeved black dress buttoned at the neck. She has her ha ir tightly curled and pulled back from her face. Her eyes express a de pth born of pain. Her mouth and jaw appear rounder now, less tense . A quiet dignity adds to her beauty. Soon thereafter the family began a process of dispersal. On November 7 , 1903 Elizabeth married Robert Willis. By July 1907 they will uproo t to Goldendale, Washington. Jim traveled back into the Yukon; he hun ted for gold there until 1904. On returning he earned a living as whar finger and general manager of the Juneau Ferry and Navigation Company' s wharf in Douglas until his marriage to Frances Gaines Morrisette i n 1915. The couple crossed over to Juneau. Tragically, on a future sto pover in Portland, Oregon, Jim would succumb to the flu epidemic of 19 18. Phillip married Alma Gribble on March 25, 1905. They located for a ti me in Rossland, British Columbia, and then retraced a path back to Jun eau. Alma contracted tuberculosis; she died on May 4, 1909; she was t wenty-two years old, and the mother of three small children. Elizabet h and Robert Willis welcomed two-year-old Frances into their family i n Goldendale. Katherine became both mother and grandmother to three-ye ar-old Hugh and one-year-old Phillip. They grew up in the McKanna fami ly home in Douglas until Katherine's youngest son, Hilary, sought ne w fields in Eagle River about fifteen miles northeast of Anchorage. H e farmed; she kept house for him and the boys. She dwelt there between 1915 into the early 1920's. At that time she t ransported the two teenagers to Goldendale. Her son-in-law Robert Will is had built a house for her and Phillip's children. Their sister Fran ces rejoined her brothers. The three lived with Katherine in these ne w surroundings until Phillip remarried in 1925. Katherine transplante d them again, now to Yakima, just seventy-five miles to the northeast . The family united with Phillip's second wife and their next mother , Kathleen Marguerite Doyle. Phillip and Kathleen headed back north to Juneau by 1929. Katherine r eturned to Robert and Elizabeth Willis in Goldendale. Early in the spr ing of 1930 tragedy struck this family. Elizabeth suffered a stroke wh ich left her paralyzed and unable to speak. Then young James Willis, r ecently graduated from Goldendale High School, drowned on a school out ing on the Columbia River, near Maryhill. He died on July 6th; his mo ther followed him on August 10th. As might be expected, Katherine stay ed on in Goldendale, keeping house for, and helping as she uniquely co uld, her son-in-law Robert, until he too died, of pneumonia, on Febru ary 16, 1935, two months before I was born. I have a number of photographs taken in Washington State of Katherin e as an old woman. My favorite shows her standing with Frances Barnhil l, her daughter's lifelong friend, and my godmother. She is celebratin g her eighty-sixth birthday with her son, Emmett, and family in Yakima . Being not quite three at the time I don't remember her, though we o bviously met. Katherine Ann Rooney McKanna died at her granddaughter Frances's hom e in Los Angeles on May 1, 1939. She is buried in the Willis family pl ot at Holy Trinity Cemetery in Goldendale, Washington, with her daught er, Elizabeth, her son Phillip, her son-in-law Robert, and her grandso n, James Emmett. I began this essay with the desire to draw for myself and for you my p ortrait of a great grandmother I never personally knew. My words stan d as they are. But in the end what finer measure of her exists than th ese lyrical lines of Proverbs. I leave you with an inspired writer's w ords of tribute. He perhaps did not know it, but I think he was speak ing about Grandma McKanna: Who shall find a valiant woman? Far and from the uttermost coasts is t he price of her. The heart of her husband trusts in her, and he shal l have no need of spoils. She will render him good all the days of he r life. Comments Kenneth Vail said, Unfortunately in spring '78 most of the whole town picked up and move d nearly two miles further west to the new town site û this in conjunc tion with the permanent Fort Keogh which was being built, about the sa me distance west from the original Cantonment. rjjwillis said, Michael and Katherine Ann McCanna left Grove Lake, Pope County, Minnes ota, in the fall of 1876. On December 16, 1876 Katherine Ann gave birt h to their second child, James, in Fargo, Dakota Territory. The grou p of McCanna and Rooney families pushed on to Bismarck, wintering ove r there. Michael McCanna leased a hotel in Fargo and rented out rooms. In late spring of 1877 the McCanna family moved on to Miles City. It i s at this time that the family must have received the help of the coun ty commissioner to obtain his log cabin and begin work building a boar ding house. It makes sense that it would have been ready to take in ro omers in January, 1878. In family lore it is mentioned that they had " the first hotel in Miles City." I know that Ft. Keogh was commissioned after Custer's defeat at the Li ttle Big Horn in June 1876. Until you mentioned it in your e-mail, I d id not realize that the initial army cantonment and the beginnings o f Miles City migrated two miles west of the original settlements som e time in 1878. By the 1880 census Michael and family are living in Mi les City, he is working as a teamster, and his wife in taking in board ers. The period of 1878-1880 was significant for the McCanna clan. In the s pring of 1877 Michael's sister, Bridgette, took a side trip to Ft. Buf ord. There she met a young man who worked for an outfit supplying th e Cavalry in what we would now liken to the PX. He had been with the C avalry encampment during the Little Big Horn battle. She married him i n 1880. Another sister, Katherine "Madge," married Charles Johnson , a gambler, in Miles City in 1878 and had two children by him. By 188 0 the couple were separated; in 1883 Katherine married a recently disc harged soldier from Ft. Keogh, Patrick Henry Fox. Michael and Katherin e Ann McCanna added a third child to their family, Emmet Joseph, in Mi les City on June 8, 1879. The McCanna and Rooney families were in Miles City from the spring o f 1877 to the summer of 1886. Mark Lewis Whitman said, rjjwillis said, Mark Lewis Whitman said, rjjwillis said, Pamela Newcomer said, McKanna Descendants said, rjjwillis said, |