Documented Life     Ancestors - Troper and Hochstein Genealogies

Ancestors of Miles Hochstein (Great Great Grandmother)

Marilla (Stevens) Day
(b. 1803?, Mesopotamia, Ohio?,
d. _____? Mesopotamia, Ohio?)

WARNING - The data on this page is speculative, and uncertain because there are a mother and a daughter both named Marilla. If you can help me clear it up, I would love to hear what you know. This is my best synthesis of the data available to me.

Possibly Granddaughter of Charles Clark (b? d.?) and Betsy (Colt) Clark (b.? d.?).

Possibly Daughter of Thomas Stevens and Marilla (Clark) Stevens (b. 1789?, Mespotomia, Ohio, d. September 23, 1861 Mesopotamia, Ohio, but this might be the death date of the daughter. Mother and daughter are both named Marilla.)

Data Note - Two Marillas, Mother and Daughter

There is a Marilla who is described in the Adele Andrews Genealogy of 1940 as "Widow of Thomas Stevens, by whom she had several children, probably Miriam, Marilla, Stoddard G., Thomas, John and Elijah" (Adele Andrews Genealogy, 1940).

These same siblings are listed in the (unverified) International Genealogical Index (LDS site) as follows:
(1) Miriam Stevens (b. 1801 Mesopotamia, Trumbull, Ohio),
(2) Marilla Stevens (b. 1803 Mesopotamia, Trumbull, Ohio) (our subject, or her mother)
(3) Stoddard G. Stevens (b. 1806 Mesopotamia, Trumbull, Ohio),
(4) Thomas Stevens (b. 1808 Mesopotamia, Trumbull, Ohio),
(5) John Stevens (b. 1810 Mesopotamia, Trumbull, Ohio) and
(6) Elijah Stevens (b. 1815 Mesopotamia, Trumbull, Ohio)

The above is confusing because Adele Andrews (1940) appears to confuse the mother and daughter. OUR Marilla for this page is the daughter, Marilla (Stevens) Day born in 1803, I believe, and not the mother Marilla Clark, born in 1789 (?), who marries Thomas Stevens and becomes Marilla (Clark) Stevens.

 

Sister with/of (by the above reasoning, part of the following sibling group)
(1) Miriam Stevens (b. 1801 Mesopotamia, Trumbull, Ohio),
(2) Marilla Stevens (b. 1803 Mesopotamia, Trumbull, Ohio) (HERSELF)
(3) Stoddard G. Stevens (b. 1806 Mesopotamia, Trumbull, Ohio),
(4) Thomas Stevens (b. 1808 Mesopotamia, Trumbull, Ohio),
(5) John Stevens (b. 1810 Mesopotamia, Trumbull, Ohio) and
(6) Elijah Stevens (b. 1815 Mesopotamia, Trumbull, Ohio)

Husband of Willard Day.  The marriage of Marilla (Stevens) Day to Willard Day. occurred on November 3, 1841. She would have been 40 years old. (Adele Andrews Genealogy, 1940)

Mother (with Willard Day) of
(1) Helen M. (b. April 26, 1843),
(2) Laura Maria (b. August 21, 1848)
(3) Emma Kate Day (b November 24, 1850 (or 1842?) ), and
(4) George Willard Day (December 22, 1856, see photo below).

Marilla (Clark) Day's youngest child, the Kansas City lawyer George Willard day, is pictured below. He would have been born when she was 53, which is just barely possible. Data suggesting a 53 year old woman giving birth doesn't prove that these dates are certainly wrong. These things have happened.


George Willard Day, the youngest son of
Marilla (Stevens) Day as a middle aged lawyer in Kansas City.

 

Died in _____

Buried in Mesopotamia, Ohio (?).

 

 

I have so far found nothing about the fates of the six children from Marilla's mother's marriage, but it is possible that one of them or one of their children raised my grandfather G. Day Smith in Eldora Iowa.

Two of Marilla Day's daughters by Willard Day would eventually move to Mitchell, South Dakota. Helen Day (above) married a Civil War veteran named Charles Kibee.

I speculate (without any evidence) that some years later it may have been Helen who introduced her sister Emma Kate Day to a local Mitchell South Dakota real estate dealer, my great grandfather Jacob K. Smith.

Marilla (Clark) Day's only son by Willard Day, was named George Willard Day. George Willard would later play a part in the life of his nephew, my grandfather, G. Day Smith. G. Day Smith left Eldora to stay with his uncle George W. Day in Kansas City while completing high school classes for college admission around 1902-1903. George W. Day would also provide legal services for G. Day Smith and Bertha's purchase of a house around 1922.

Laura Maria Day, the third sister, married William Belden, had three children (Pearl, Henry, Lena), and Henry Belden married Sadie Richards in Gustavus Ohio, June 05, 1893, and had at least one child, Nina Belden, June 18, 1895 in Burg Hill, Ohio. There my records end, for that branch.

Finally, we have the question of just who G. Day Smith's foster parents were. Their names are known from Day's correspondence to have been Marrium (aka Aunt Me) and John. With the death of Emma Kate Day, his mother, it would be natural that he would be given to one of Emma Kate Day's relatives, but lacking descendant information about the above individuals, I can't yet say who. At this time I do not know who reared Emma Kate Day's son G. Day Smith's in Eldora Iowa after her death.

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Additional Information. The Free Dictionary offers the following on the history of Mesopotamia Ohio. I note that among the founders of the Township is a man named Clark. That's the maiden name of Marilla (Clark) Stevens.

 

A History of Mesopotamia Township, Ohio

In 1798 Pierpont Edwards of Connecticut paid $2500.00 for the 25 square miles of wilderness in modern-day Trumbull County Ohio that was later known as Mesopotamia Township. The following spring, John Starke Edwards, just out of college, journeyed alone on foot, carrying an ax and knapsack, across the Pennsylvania frontier into the tangled forest. He cut the first tree that ever felled by an ax upon his father's land. The fragrance which the sunshine drew out of a rich forest floor set him agog with plans to get a settlement started. He offered a hundred acres of free land to the first five families to come and stay five years, and fifty acres to the first five single men. These men were Seth Tracey, Capt. Hezekiah Sperry, Joseph Noyles, Otis Guild, and Dr. Joseph Clark.

http://encyclopedia.thefreedictionary.com/Mesopotamia,+Ohio

Could "Dr. Joseph Clark" be the source of the Clark name above?

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revised March 2006

http://awt.ancestry.com/cgi-bin/igm.cgi?op=DESC&db=llaird&id=I02154