Early in 1900, Elizabeth Ann suffered what was first called an ulcer in her mouth caused by ill-fitting artificial teeth.  The Stovers lived in Kearney at the home of the Hutchinsons for a time while Elizabeth was receiving treatment.  I have two letters dated in May and June of 1900, written by Elizabeth to Lizzie and Bert at home.  Grand-dad wasn't suffering too much as he was still pursuing his old activities.
   On May 17, 1900, Elizabeth wrote:

    Pa and Clarence Tollefsen have gone a hunting. They went out near Buda yesterday and got 16 prairie pigeons and doves and we had them for Dinner and they was good.  They drove that pony Pa is talking of buying, it is a very gentle little thing and I tell you she can go like a streak.  Clarence drives up here and gets Pa after Dinner and they get back about eight O'clock.

    On June 26, she wrote:

  Pa and Clarence Tolefsen are going a fishing tonite.  I guess they are going to stay all night.  They are going to the lake. Pa says the only thing he doesn't like about it is carrying the fish so far.  I am afraid it won't make him very tired for I am afraid they won't get any.

[Surely A.J.'s sense of humor!]

    Although apparently missing her home, Elizabeth seemed to be in good spirits in May and June of 1900. "The potatoes they get here is not fit to eat.... I would like a good cup of coffee and some short-cake with fixtures and Home-made eggs..."  She also described the  doctor's visits and seemed to be optimistic about her progress. 

    In spite of the apparent progress, however, Elizabeth's condition deteriorated and led to her death on November 2, 1900.  The local news reported the following:

    About eight months ago an ulcer, so called, developed in her mouth, caused, it was said, by ill-fitting artificial teeth.  The ulcer soon took on the formation of a cancer, and despite all that specialists in Lincoln, Omaha, Chicago, and Denver could do the progress was very rapid.... About six weeks ago the progress of the growth seemed to have been checked,... but the advance was soon resumed and continued until her death.

    Bess Wagner recalled her grandmother's funeral, "The services were in the home, burial at Haven's Chapel. They stood around the grave and sang, 'Shall We Gather at the River."'
    Bess shared another observation which I found interesting; a tribute to the industriousness of Elizabeth Ann Lucas Stover. "...her own Chrysanthemums were, as I remember it, the only flowers there."

    A portion of Elizabeth's obituary read as follows:

    There were born to this union five children, three daughters and two sons, four of which with the bereaved husband are now living in this vicinity, Edith J., now Mrs. A. J. Frederick, Doris A., now Mrs. J. J. Wagner, and Lizzie and Bertrand now at home.

    A.J. remarried on April 8, 1902 in Creston, Iowa to divorcee Belle Wilson.  Bess Wagner indicated that not everyone was entirely pleased with the situation:

    His family was "scandalized" - I don't think Edith ever spoke to him again - and Aunt Liz wasn't too pleased.  Our mother Dora Alice was more tolerant and visited him in Kearney, although I can't remember.... the Bride ever coming to our house. She was rather on the pretentious side and I think A.J. soon repented of his deal.  He drove a little mare called Lady and seems like he did come to our house but I can't remember her coming along.   They lived in Kearney for a while and then moved to Oregon -  I believe she had some relatives there, and they settled in Montavilla.

    May Stover commented, "They lived in Kearney for a while then she wanted to move to Oregon - he didn't. The story was that widow's share of the estate was greater in Oregon than in Nebraska."

    In 1904, A.J. and his new wife moved to Oregon in the vicinity of Portland.  Their address was 16 Broad Street, Montavilla.  I attempted to locate that address in Portland in 1974, but could find no such street.

    I have three letters that A.J. wrote while living in Oregon.  He seemed to be pretty sentimental at times, about his family and the old days; but perhaps he was more likely to write when feeling low.  His sense of humor was apparent in each letter.

    A.J. described his home in a letter to Dora Wagner dated August 24, 1905. "I have got a fine garden. Have three lots in five miles of Portland and have all kinds. Pears that weigh over a pound and Prunes so many on a tree that I have to prop the lims up. When I say Portland I mean from the court house."

    He must have had quite a garden. In another letter addressed to Lizzie and dated December 7, 1906, he talks about planting potatoes in January for a Spring crop, then in June for a Winter crop. "When I want a mess I go out and dig them and get a pail full. I wish you could see my garden, it is looking so nice - I have a row of Beets about one hundred feet long, About a hundred Cabbage and three rows of Turnips and lettuce all over the ground and Onions just rite to pull and eat."

    Bert Stover and Earl Clayton traveled some of the Western States in 1905 and got at least as far as St. Johns, Washington, where the Wagners had relocated. Both Bess Wagner and her brother Roy remembered their visit. They even remembered the names of the horses that Bert and Earl rode - Mable and Buck!  Roy remembered a lever-action rifle they carried.  Bert and Earl had come part way by train, then purchased horses for the remainder of the trip. Bess said they arrived dirty, hairy and unkempt.  They told of stopping at a farm somewhere for provisions, where they offered to pay for some vegetables. They were such a sight that the housewife slammed the door on them and told them to take what they needed and leave. 

    Bert and Earl helped the Wagners with their harvest in 1905, then went back to Montana to find work in the mines. One of the horses was killed on the return trip when it fell off the trail into a canyon.  Earl died in a mine near Butte, Montana in July of 1906.  Roy Wagner said that Earl was the only one who didn't survive when the miners encountered gas.... he was the last one to go to safety and was found at the base of the ladder that led the rest of the men out of the mine.

    A.J. wrote to Bert while he was with the Wagners.  In a letter dated August 9, 1905, he wrote:

    Was glad to hear that you were well and in the Western Country. I think I like it better than I did one year ago.  I seemed as if I was thousands of miles from everybody but am feeling better satisfied now since Doll and family have settled here and now if you make up your mind to stay out West it will make it more interesting.  I would not be surprised if Lizzie would come West and some more of the good people.

    A.J. went on to urge Bert to visit him in Portland and gave him detailed directions for taking the streetcar from downtown Portland.  Did Bert ever make it to Portland?  (Yes, in 1907, per Dorothy Stover Rodehorst)

    I am glad Jake settled in a game country for the Boys will be better satisfied if they can go Fishing and Hunting.  I have not shot my gun since I left Nebraska. In fact, there is nothing here to shoot and the brush and timber is so thick that it is hard to see a rod.

    From the August, 1905 letter to Dora:

    I don't like the idea of you writing for both of them big boys. They are getting out to easy and I won't have it that way so you tell them they have to write just the same.... Bessie, won't you write to your Grampa - I should like to hear from you very much.
    You said you hoped I did not have an Old Cow to keep me at home.  Well, I have, but she is almost dry and it would not hurt her Bag to not milk her for two or three weeks or more.  Well, Doll, I should like very much to see you all for I feel Home sick sometimes... Well, Doll, how do you like the country, do you like it as well as you did Nebraska?  I do not like Oregon very much and would give more to see one Old Jack Rabbit in Nebraska than to look at Mount Hood for a week.

    In the letter of December, 1906 to Lizzie, he says,  "If I were you I would give Bert a good talking to for it - it is not right for him to love somebody else's sister better than his own."  Lizzie Sitz had been married for about 4 years by 1906 - What is "it?"  Was Mary May Clayton entering the picture about now?
 

    In the same letter, A.J. continues with a good dose of sentiment:

    Yes, Lizzie, I do think often of the Old home and wish I was back to it again as it was a few years ago with all of us together. But, Oh, Lizzie, what a change - Dear ma in her grave, Pa away off in Oregon, My Doll in Washington and my Baby Girl and Boy in Nebraska, and Edith, the Pride of our hearts, - Oh, how Proud We use to be of them two, Edith and Doll, away back in Wisconsin.  We dressed them just alike and they did look so pretty.  I must stop this, Lizzie, for it sits me to thinking and I feel bad.  Well, Lizzie, I wish I could do as you say - Greese up my Gun, call Skip and Hunt Quail.  I can greese the Gun all right, But poor Old Skip will never Hunt any more Quail.  I suppose you had a Way Up Thanksgiving and I know you thought of Pa for I thought of you children all day and wished I could be with you. With me it was a lonesome time for me.

    According to Bess Wagner, A.J. never did visit the Wagners, about 400 miles distant in St. Johns, Washington.

    On March 4, 1907, A.J. filed a declaration for pension. The form required him to itemize each place he had lived since the Civil War.  A small blooper he made on this questionnaire was, without doubt, intentional. His home state of 26 years was clearly entered as... "Newbraskey."

    Other samples of A.J.'s handwriting prove that he knew how to spell Nebraska; this sample proves that he was capable of being ornery, and seems to tie together the previous examples of "confusion factors" found in the records.

    On April 29, 1907, Albert J. Stover died at the age of 71 years and 26 days. Cause of death was cirrhosis of the liver with heart disease contributing.

    The characteristic "confusion factors" in the records continued even after his death.  A.J.'s certificate of death is quite clear; it gives his date of birth as April 3, 1836, and his date of death as April 29, 1907.  His age at time of death is given, however, as 72 years and 26 days.  An obituary which appeared in the Ravenna News May 10, 1907, states that A.J. died in his home at Tacoma, Washington on May 1, and that he was buried in Majors Cemetery...when in fact, it was Portland, Oregon on April 29, and he was buried at Haven's Chapel!  I think he would have immensely enjoyed his own obituary!

    According to May Stover, Dora visited A.J. in his last days. "Dora said that A.J. told her that Martha was an adopted child.  Bert didn't believe it - it made him mad. Her son (Verne Hutchinson) lives in Tacoma, Washington. I wrote and asked him and he said he never heard of it.''

   Billy Frederick, after looking at a picture of the Hutchinsons, volunteered, "Aunt Martha, she was a sister to A.J., and they looked a whole lot alike.  I never knew it so much until I just seen that picture.  They both had a square face."
 

    Bess Wagner recalled, "My mother and oldest brother Albert John went to the funeral.  Ted came home with A.J.'s gun and fiddle and a few of his knick-knacks...

    A.J. was brought home to rest beside his wife of 38 years in Haven's Chapel Cemetery.  I can't help but wonder if his grave side services may have also included the hymn "Shall We Gather At The River."  If so, the hymn may have taken on additional meaning to include the Loup as well as the River Jordan???

    At the time of his death, A.J. could count 15 grandchildren by the names of Frederick and Wagner.  Another six Stover grandchildren were born after his death. Enumeration of all of his descendants is an on-going project of immense proportions.

    A.J.'s obituary in the Ravenna News stated, ''Mr. Stover is remembered as a man of strong personality and he was a good neighbor and faithful friend."  As evidenced by the recollections from people who have known him or have heard of him, I'd say that he was indeed remembered... and usually vividly. I'll remember him as a character whom I'm proud to have as a Great Grand-dad.