"Mrs. Oliver Dead" — Stafford County Republican (Stafford, Kansas), Thu 14 Aug 1913, p. 1. Death notice for Mrs. Athalia Oliver, died at Abbyville, Kansas 7 August 1913, buried Stafford cemetery.

Transcription and notes

Data from the document [verbatim]

Mrs. Oliver Dead

Mrs. Athalia Oliver died at the home of her daughter, Mrs. Dr. Walter Evans, at Abbyville, Kansas, Thursday morning, August 7th, after an illness extending over a period of several years. The remains were brought to Stafford Saturday morning and the funeral services were conducted from the Methodist church in this city that morning at 10:30 o'clock. Rev. Hoff and Dr. Akers being in charge of the services and burial was made in the Stafford cemetery.

Mrs. Oliver was a resident of Stafford for a long time until of recent years when she has been residing in Oklahoma. She has been an invalid for a long period of years and some several months ago was taken to the home of her daughter at Abbyville for treatment [sic — no period] A husband, two sons and one daughter, besides a host of friends in Stafford and elsewhere are left to mourn her departure from this life.

What it was pursued for, and did not deliver

[name.539] and [D.588] both set this obituary as the next step, for one stated reason: "It should name her father — which would settle whether [p.1944] James S. is the missing brother."

It names no parent. No maiden name, no birthplace, no birth date, no father, no mother. The survivors are counted, not named — "A husband, two sons and one daughter" — and the only relative identified is her daughter, and that by her husband's name.

Her father was found the same day, by a different route — her Find A Grave memorial ([G.528]) carries an attached 1870 census, and that is [D.589]: Doyle Twp, Clarke Co., Iowa, where a 17-year-old Athalia Cooper is in the household of Joseph Cooper, 59, born New Jersey ([p.1946]). So the obituary is a null on the question, not on the search.

⇒ This document is a documented null on the parentage question — nothing in it supports or weakens any hypothesis. And the James S. hypothesis it was meant to test is now superseded for a different reason: [D.589] supplies a fourth brother the catalog did not have.

What it does establish

1. Death: 7 August 1913, Abbyville, Kansas — at her daughter's home, after a long illness. Not 14 August; that is the issue date, and it is what the Newspapers.com obituary index prints as her death date.
2. Burial: the Stafford cemetery, Stafford, Kansas — funeral from the Methodist church in Stafford, Saturday 9 August, 10:30 a.m.
3. A third child. [D.588]'s 1900 census gives her sons Clay I and Aran C; this notice adds a surviving daughter, married to a Dr. Walter Evans of Abbyville, Kansas. Two sons and one daughter survive her, which matches the two known sons exactly.
4. She left Stafford for Oklahoma in her later years — so the 1910 census should find her in Oklahoma, not Kansas.

The Stafford cemetery, again

This notice puts Athalia's burial in the Stafford cemetery, the same one [J.232] gives for [p.1945] Levi H. Cooper. Her memorial is 94984878, Block C, Lot 17, inscribed "MOTHER" → [G.528].

CORRECTED 2026-09-05 → [G.528]: the defect is FamilySearch's place STANDARDISATION, not the Find A Grave index. Find A Grave itself reads "Stafford Cemetery, Stafford, Stafford County, Kansas", and so does FamilySearch's own Event Place (Original) field; only the standardised Event Place it displays says Camden, Georgia. On any FamilySearch Find A Grave Index hit, read Event Place (Original).

Next

1. Her Find A Grave memorial — fetched 2026-09-05: 94984878, Stafford Cemetery, Block C Lot 17, inscribed "MOTHER", with a family panel → [G.528].
2. Her daughter is named — Laura L. (Oliver) Evans, 1875–1942, Find A Grave 37262316, from the family panel on Athalia's memorial → [G.528].
3. The 1910 census in Oklahoma — where the notice says she was living.
4. Her sons Clay I. and Aran C. Oliver — Clay's Texas death record already gives her maiden name as Cooper ([D.588]); it may also name her father.
5. A Kansas death certificate, Reno Co., August 1913 — Kansas began statewide registration in 1911, so one should exist, and the certificate form asks for the decedent's father's name.