•   Genealogy Home Page
•   Carey History
•   The Henrys
•   The Steeles
•   The Browns
•   Index  

•   Ancestry.com
•   Family Search
•   Carey Roots
•   Ohio GenWeb

The Steele Family

Mary Elizabeth Steele 1869 – 1950

Mary Elizabeth (Grandma Brown to us) was our grandmother on our mother's side. She is the only grandparent we ever knew. We had always known that she had come down from “up north” in a covered wagon to Oklahoma and that she had married at the age of 14. We also knew that Mary Elizabeth had a brother named Andrew and a sister named Sarah and we have pictures of them. (Family conversations and albums)

We sent for Mary Elizabeth's death certificate and it told us that they came from Iowa and that she was born there. (Death Cert.) It gave her parents names as Levi Steele and Mary Smith. We did a search for Mary Elizabeth Smith. The only information we had from the censuses, was that she was born in Ohio in 1834. We found her in The One World Tree on Ancestry.com and learned that her mother was Elizabeth Ogden and came from a long and distinguished line that went back to England in the 1400s.

We found the family of Levi Steele in the 1860 census in Liberty Township, St Joseph, Indiana and in the 1870 Census in N. Liberty, Penn Township, Johnson County, Iowa. Levi B. Steele and Mary E. (Smith) Steele - he is listed as a laborer, born in Pennsylvania in 1827. Mary is listed as being born in Ohio in 1834. They had the following children - some were in the 1860 census and some were in the 1870 and 1880 census because of age.

Their children were: 1860 Census

Name	Born	State
Abraham	1851	Indiana
Catherine	1853	Indiana
Cornelius	1855	Indiana
Luther	1856	Indiana
1870 Census
William	1858	Iowa
Annie	1861	Iowa
Andrew J.	1863	Iowa
Martin E.	1865	Iowa
Mary Elizabeth	1869	Iowa
Harriet P.	1870	Iowa
1880 Census
Sarah	1874	Missouri

In the 1880 Census they were in Arkansas but Levi was not listed so he may have died between 1873 and 1880. Sarah was born in Missouri in 1874, possibly on the way. Did they leave Iowa and go to Arkansas because of Levi's death? And was Mary pregnant with Sarah at the time? It gets kind of confusing at times as my grandmother and my great grandmother are both named Mary Elizabeth Steele!

Mary Elizabeth married James Eldridge at age 14 (Family conversations) - and had 5 children with him before his death.

1. Andrew     1884
2. Ruth         1886
3. Pearl         1888
4. Albert       1890
5. Rebecca     1892

In the 1900 census, we found Mary Elizabeth married to Charles B. Brown (our grandfather) and living in Pryor Creek, Cherokee Indian Nation. Living with them were the five Eldridge children by her previous marriage and my mother (Ollie Brown) who was just two years old. They had a total of four children pictured at right before he died.

My grandfather, Charles B. Brown, died in 1906 in Pryor Creek, Cherokee Indian Nation (which became the state of Oklahoma in 1907).

In the 1910 census Mary Elizabeth was remarried to Robert L. Smith and living in Tulsa, Oklahoma.

She died July 9th 1950 in Claremore, Rogers Co., Oklahoma and was buried in Fairview Cemetery, Pryor, Mayes Co., Oklahoma