Illinois Statewide Marriage Index, 1763-1900 (Illinois State Archives and Illinois State Genealogical Society) - four queries read 2026-10-26: all COOPER marriages in Stark County (9 rows; the index's coverage of Stark is 1839-1900); all LEVI COOPER marriages statewide (4 rows); all LUCY DAVISON brides statewide (3 rows); COOPER groom with GOBLE bride statewide (0 rows).

What this document records

Stark county coverage is 1839 to 1900

From the index's own county-span list: "STARK - 1839-1900". Stark County was organised in 1839, so the index spans the county's entire existence down to 1900. THAT IS WHAT MAKES THE ZERO-ROW QUERY WORTH ANYTHING. A null in an unindexed window is worth nothing; a null inside a county indexed from its creation is a real negative. The distinction is the one recorded in [[reference_internet_archive_fulltext_search]] - a coverage gap and a null are different states, and only one of them tells you to look elsewhere.

Query 1 cooper in stark county nine rows

Columns are the index's own: Groom, Bride, Date, Volume, Page, Lic No., County. Blank Lic No. is the index's blank. COOPER, APOLOS S with MCVICKER, LIZZIE J, 1872-08-28, vol 002 p 0047, STARK. COOPER, EDGAR with DUGAN, ALICE, 1869-09-23, vol 002 p 0023, STARK. COOPER, GEORGE with BUNNELL, REBECCA, 1862-09-14, vol 001 p 0153, STARK. COOPER, GEORGE W with PATTERSON, MARY J, 1870-09-22, vol 002 p 0030, STARK. COOPER, HENRY S with MANTER, ELIZABETH, 1840-10-04, vol 001 p 0005, STARK. COOPER, LEVI with DAVISON, LUCY L, 1874-12-24, vol 002 p 0067, lic 00000057, STARK. COOPER, PERRY J with WHITCHER, MAUDIE A, 1895-01-02, vol 3 p 127, lic 1998, STARK. COOPER, WILLIAM D with NICHOLAS, MARY, 1899-06-24, vol 3 p 154, lic 2350, STARK. COOPERTHWAITE, STACY with GODFREY, ELIZABETH, 1882-07-09, vol 003 p 0043, lic 00000903, STARK.

Query 2 levi cooper statewide four rows

COOPER, LEVI with DAVISON, LUCY L, 1874-12-24, vol 002 p 0067, lic 00000057, STARK. COOPER, LEVI A with NEELY, MAUD, 1897-07-30, vol 001 p 0226, lic 00006757, MERCER. COOPER, LEVI M with JAMES, SARAH J, 1867-10-17, vol 00D p 0109, lic 00000288, FULTON. COOPER, LEVIN C with GILLHAM, NANCY, 1840-09-24, vol 006 p 0048, lic 00000913, MADISON.

Query 3 lucy davison brides statewide three rows

CORY, GEORGE N with DAVISON, LUCY ELIZABETH, 1863-05-12, vol 2 p 474, CHAMPAIGN. COOPER, LEVI with DAVISON, LUCY L, 1874-12-24, vol 002 p 0067, lic 00000057, STARK. MOORE, THEODORE F with DAVISON, LUCY M, 1866-02-25, vol 00B, lic 00001449, KANKAKEE.

Query 4 cooper groom with goble bride statewide zero rows

No results; the response carried no results table at all. Levi H. Cooper married Elizabeth Jane "Eliza J." Goble, and the catalog's working reading is that they married in NEW JERSEY about 1860-61 - he was unmarried in his father's Warren Co. household in June 1860 ([D.470]) and had a wife and child by 1864 ([B.108]), and their two eldest children were born in New Jersey. So a zero here is the expected answer and corroborates that reading rather than opening anything. It also means the 1873 divorce ([B.108]'s 1898 family circular: "Jane Goble, divorced 1873 Stark Co. Ill.") was a divorce of a marriage contracted elsewhere, which is what one would expect of a couple who arrived in Illinois in March 1866.

The levi row

WHAT THE INDEX SAYS, AND ONLY THAT: a groom "COOPER, LEVI" married a bride "DAVISON, LUCY L" on 24 December 1874, recorded in Stark County register volume 002 at page 0067, licence file number 00000057. The index gives no age, residence, occupation or parent for either party. WHAT MAKES IT INTERESTING RATHER THAN NOISE. Levi H. Cooper Levi H. Cooper was living in Stark County, Illinois across that date: he removed there from Independence Twp, New Jersey in March 1866 by his own 1870 pension declaration, was still at Toulon in Stark County on 13 September 1875, and had left for Beloit, Mitchell Co., Kansas by 4 September 1877 ([B.108]). His first marriage ended in a DIVORCE IN THAT COUNTY IN 1873 - the year before this licence - so he was both present and free to marry. And in the whole statewide index, 1763-1900, there is exactly ONE groom indexed as a plain "Levi Cooper" (query 2): this one. The other three are Levi A, Levi M and Levin C, in Mercer, Fulton and Madison counties. WHAT STANDS AGAINST IT, AND IT IS NOT SMALL. Levi H. Cooper's pension file [B.108] contains an 1898 family circular in which he himself listed his former wives, and he named TWO: "Jane Goble, divorced 1873 Stark Co. Ill." and "Permelia Lees[?], dead 1882 Asherville". There is no Lucy in it. If this row is him, either the circular omitted a wife, or Lucy L. Davison is the woman the June 1880 Mitchell Co. census calls PERMELIA (29, born Illinois) under a different given name. Neither is established, and the second is a guess of exactly the kind RULE ZERO forbids writing into a field. ONE MORE THING WORTH NOTICING WITHOUT LEANING ON IT. The surname DAVISON recurs in his life: the fourth wife the catalog does hold is Sarah (Gross) DAVIDSON, widow of Levi Davidson, whom he married about 1883 (Sarah (Gross) Cooper, [G.535]), and her Davidson children are in his 1885 Kansas household ([E.12]). A Davison bride in 1874 and a Davidson widow in 1883 may be a coincidence of a common surname, or may mean the two families were already connected. The catalog records the coincidence and draws nothing from it.

What would settle it

The Stark County register page, volume 002 page 0067, and the licence file numbered 00000057. An Illinois county marriage return of 1874 ordinarily gives both parties' ages, residences and birthplaces, and often the parents' names - and a Levi Cooper aged about 43 or 44, resident in Stark County, born New Jersey, would be decisive either way. The same page series holds the Edgar Cooper return at page 0023.