Laverne Ellis was raised primarily in Goliad TX by his Uncle Charles, but spent a short time with his Aunt Viola at Fort Stockton.  He enlisted in the Army and served in the Pacific during WWII, with a short assignment in Okinawa, Japan.  He received a battlefield commission to 2LT during the war.  He remained in the Army after the war, attending Signal School and becoming a Signal Officer.  He, his wife and first two children were stationed in Italy during the 1940's.  He retired about 1962 and went to work in the Civil Service as the Deputy Chief of Staff for Logistics, 4th U.S. Army at Fort Sam Houston Texas, working in the famous "Quadrangle" where Geronimo had been imprisoned.  He retired from Civil Service in 1972 to a home at Canyon Lake TX where he lived the remainder of his life.

Shirley Strong moved from Chicago IL after 1920 and was recorded in the 1930 census living with her parents in Dallas TX.  She attended Thomas Jefferson High School in San Antonio, TX and was a member of the Lariats Club.  After her marriage to my father, she traveled with him while he was in the military to Italy and Washington D.C. when he was assigned to the Pentagon.  She developed breast cancer here and she and my father were given a compassionate reassignment back to San Antonio where she passed away in 1951, one year and 5 months after my birth.

Frank Strong served in WWI as a second Leiutenant.  After his discharge, he was a salesman, last in the employment of Altofer Brothers of San Antonio, selling washing machines.  He was killed while returning from a business trip when the vehicle he was driving hit a stray horse that was on the roadway.

John Harvey Strong was a "cutter" for a tailoring concern. Most everyone's clothes were made to order in those days.  He lived most of his life in Chicago, Cook, IL.  He died from an injury to his leg - the doctor that had attended to him was revealed as a quack too late to save him.

Helen Olsen had a third grade education but loved to read and was a very intelligent and knowledgeable person. A very fine dressmaker took her as an apprentice when she was very young and would have sent her to Paris to buy materials and note fashions, etc after she had been with her for some time - but she was too interested in enjoying her friends at the time and decided not to go.  She was a very fine dressmaker and made all of the family'ss clothes.  Her parents both immigrated from Norway.

Dudley Smith Strong was an Oil Painter and Violinist.  He enlisted in the Army (Co I 9th ILL Cavalry - Civil War) in 1862 and within months was reported as a deserter.  In his 1881 pension request, he says he abandoned his initial Army career due to medical problems.  He re-enlisted in 1864 in the same unit.  He remained in the Army for many years.   He was at Fort Laramie, Wyoming in 1868, when his son John Harvey was born.  By 1880, he was in Chicago, Cook County, ILL.  He died there in 1910 and is buried in the Forest Home Cemetery. 

Mary Cary was a housekeeper.  According to the census, both of her parents were born in England.  She proceeded Dudley Smith in death and is also buried in the Forest Home Cemetery, Oak Park, Cook, ILL.

Harvey was born 1794 in Connecticut and was in New York by early 1810.  He first married Harriet O'Brien and had 5 children.  Harriet died in 1830 and Harvey was in Belvedere, Boone County, ILL by Nov 1830 where he married Sarah and had another 6 children.

Sarah was born in New York and had evidently moved to Illinois by Nov 1830 when she married Harvey at the age of 23.  I believe her parents to be Mathew Benedict and Rebecca Bush.  They were married in Suffolk County, New York in 1783.

John Jr was the only surviving child of his parents. He was a tanner and spent his life in Windsor, CT. He was a man of prominence in the affairs of that city. His family was not mentioned in the will of Elder John Strong having received, along with his brother Return Strong the Tanneries in Windsor as his inheritance portion. The inventory of the estate of John Strong, was taken Feb 28, 1697/8.

John Strong was a tanner.  He was admitted as a Freeman of Plymouth Colony on 4 Dec 1638.  In 1643, he was a member of the Taunton military company and living on what eventually (in 1948) became Dean Street.  By 1647/48, he was living in Windsor, CT and in 1659, he moved to Northampton [Trumbull's History of Northampton].  In 1663, John Strong and Deacon William Holton were ordained as Ruling Elders of the church.