The Hyphen Family Lineage

Note: The marriages and children of Ralph Weible and his spouses

(I have not determined the full name of Ralph nor of his son, the younger Ralph; as such, I have not designated them Sr. and Jr. in their files, but will refer to them as such in this text to help avoid confusion.)

That I can determine, Ralph Sr. married twice - both times to a woman who'd been previous married and divorced - and himself had two biological children from these unions, though it is possible there are more. Additionally, there are some unresolved questions with regards some of the children in his life, along with the marital history of his second wife, Mable.

Ralph Sr. first married in late 1923 to Vena M. (Kilbourne) Inman, who had previously been married to Samuel Dewey Inman. (Vena married in 1919 as a teenager, and in 1920 was counted in her parents' household with her husband Samuel. Their son, Harold, was born about 1922, with Vena and Samuel presumably divorcing shortly after, as Samuel also remarried in spring 1924. Harold remained with his maternal grandparents, Fred and Maude Kilbourne, until at least 1930.) How long Ralph Sr. and Vena remained married is uncertain, as I have found no further marriage or residence records for her, though the two of them may have rushed into marriage because of the impending arrival of their son - Ralph Jr., born in late June of 1924.

(I suspect Vena remarried at least once more and had at least one more child, as I found an obituary from 2010 for Betty Maxine Linton, born about 1926. This obituary does not name her parents nor give her maiden name, but does name three siblings who preceded her in death - including "Harold Inman and Ralph Weible Jr." along with a sister, Shirley Russell. This strongly indicates that Betty was a daughter of Vena's, and not of the elder Ralph's.)

In the 1930 US Census, Ralph Sr. was counted in his parents' household (giving his marital status as widowed) along with Ralph Jr., though no other children are present in the listing. By the time of the 1940 US Census, both Ralph Sr. and Jr. were counted in a household that included four female family members - Arkansas-born wife Mabel Weible (age thirty), Michigan-born daughters Dorothea J. Weible (age thirteen) and Joyce Mae Weible (age one), and Arkansas-born mother-in-law Nancy Gordon (age sixty-two).

My assumption at this point, prior to further research into the identity of his wife, was that Ralph Sr. had remarried to a woman who had a young daughter (Dorothea) and the two of them had a daughter together (Joyce). I had further assumed that his wife's maiden name was Gordon, and that Dorothea was listed as his daughter (and given the Weible surname) for sake of simplicity or possibly in error.

Further research into Ralph Sr.'s younger brother, Charles Edwin Weible, along with further searching to determine the identity of Ralph Sr.'s second wife, Mabel, turned up some of the following information:

- A US Social Security Death Index record for Mable Weible, b. 15 Aug 1909, d. Aug 1982, with last place of residence given as Genesee, Michigan (the same location as given on the US SSDI record for Ralph Sr.), though I cannot confirm that this record applies to Ralph Sr.'s second wife.

- A 1930 US Census listing for Vernon Cullimore, (indexed as "Vemire Cullmore"), age twenty-two, in Davison, Genesee Cty, Michigan; this listing gives his status as married, and his age at first marriage as twenty. His wife is noted as twenty-year-old Arkansas-born "Mabele" Cullimore, with her first marriage indicated at age fifteen. (This obviously suggests that this is likely his first marriage, and her second.) With them, along with a Missouri-born twenty-one-year old maid named Glendola Hooper, is a three-year-old Michigan-born daughter, "Dorothy Wieble."

- A marriage record for Edwin Weible (with parents named "Wm. Weible" and "Estella Wood") from Flint, Genesee Cty, Michigan on 29 May 1925 to Mable Gordon (with parents named "Jack Gordon" and "Mandy Mclaughlin"). Mable's birth year on this marriage record is reported as 1907, and her birthplace given as Missouri.

These records, in conjunction, have led me to several search avenues that have not yet yielded confirmation, but what I suspect so far comes from the confluence of details - the spelling of Mable's name, the proximity of the reported birthplaces for Mable (Missouri and Arkansas sharing a long stretch of state border), the presence of Dorothy in two of those census records and a mother-in-law with the surname Gordon in one of them, and the possibility of "Nancy" and "Mandy" being transcription or recording errors of similarity. As such:

- I believe Mable was born somewhere in the vicinity of the Arkansas-Missouri state line in the latter half of 1909, and that she was married to Charles Edwin Weible while she was still only fifteen years old. As such, I think the pair misreported her age on their marriage license so that she would appear to be closer in age to her bridegroom.

- Dorothy (or Dorothea - the spelling is not confirmed), daughter of Mable and Charles Edwin, was born about 1927, and the couple likely divorced not long after.

- Mable married Vernon Cullimore about 1928, and she and her daughter Dorothea were counted in the 1930 US Census in his household. Vernon remarried in June of 1931 (to Genevieve Marie Johnson, whom he would later divorce), suggesting that Mable and Vernon divorced sometime in late 1930 or early 1931.

- Sometime between her divorce from Vernon and 1939, Mable married Ralph Sr., and their (presumed) daughter Joyce Mae was born about 1939. Along with their teenaged children from their previous marriages - Ralph Jr. and Dorothy - Mable, Ralph Sr., and Joyce were all counted together in the 1940 US Census in Burton, Genesee Cty, Michigan.

For now, I have not designated Ralph Sr.'s second wife as the same person in my files as his younger brother's first wife, and will need additional research to confirm. I do not have further information on whether Ralph Sr. and Mable remained married for the remainder of their lives, nor whether they had any further children together beyond Joyce. Additionally, I have not found further record for Joyce or Dorothy after 1940, so I do not know whether they married or had children. Ralph Jr. married and had several children, some of whom are believed to survive yet today.