Kerry,
If this is the person I am related to we may have quite a history to tell. I have several e-mail exchanges that happened several years ago between me and Susan Neff, Historian of Dr. James Ford Historic Home, Wabash, Indiana


Hello Jane,

I am Susan Neff, Historian at the Dr. James Ford Historic Home in Wabash, Indiana. I saw your 2002 and 2004 postings on Ancestry message boards about your mother and grandmother.

Your grandmother, Dorothy Leone Kinne, married Robert Holton Bull, a gr-grandson of Dr. James and America Ford. They lived in Charleston WV and according to the 1930 census, their daughter Meredythe was born in 1926 in New York and was listed as "adopted." According to your message board postings, Robert must have married your grandmother near the time your mother was born. Do you have any idea of how Robert and Dorothy Leone could have met?

I have been able to determine that your grandfather graduated Butler University in Indianapolis and later worked as an editor for the Charleston WV Daily Mail - he also wrote an Arts column there. Your grandmother was active in Charleston society at that time (played Bridge and gardening). He later was an editor at the South Bend IN Tribune, and was managing editor for the Hammond IN Times and the Wichita KS Eagle newspapers; he also had a short career with the National Dairy Council in Chicago. Sometime around 1950 he attended Seabury-Western Theological Seminary in Evanston IL and had begun a new career as an Episcopalian minister in Kansas City KS when he died in 1956 at age 54 of lung cancer - I have his obit, but it does not list your mother, Meredythe, as a survivor - it lists his wife's name as "Ruth" and a son Robert Holton Bull III. Had your grandparents possibly divorced and Robert remarried?

So I have a mystery as to who Mrs. "Ruth" Bull was, and what happened to Dorothy Leone and Meredythe Bull. I also am most interested to trace Robert Holton Bull III - is he a natural son of your grandmother and therefore your uncle? Can you help me?

Susan Neff, Historian
The Dr. James Ford Historic Home
177 West Hill Street, Wabash IN 46992
(260) 563-8686
www.jamesfordmuseum.org



It is my hope that the Robert Bull you are referring to was my mother's Meredythe Lee Bull's adopted brother Bobby. I don't know if he is the II or III). I am not sure if my mother was ever formally adopted by him. Anyway, she adored her brother. Let's where this leads. We might be able to help each other.
Jane