This Scrapbook is my reason for joining this group. It was amongst a large lot of old books I bought at an estate auction in West Plains, MO a couple of years ago.
I was able to learn a little through free sources on the internet. When I heard about this group, I thought it would be worth a try to find a relative.
Here is what I learned and deductions I’ve made with some of the information.
The scrapbook was created by one Shelah Stevens Persley. It’s been a while since I researched it so I don’t remember names… but the impression I am under is that Shelah was adopted by a family, surname of Stevens, in the Midwest in the late 1800’s. I deduced this because 1) Shelah is a Jewish name and the names of all the other Stevens’ (mother, father, siblings) are much more common. Back at that time, there were “orphan trains” that brought children from the east coast to the Midwest. So I suspect that is part of her story.
It would appear that Shelah attended and graduated from The Palmer School of Chiropractic in February 1923. She would have married Mr. Persley by this time. The Palmer School of Chiropractic, located in Davenport, Iowa, was the first chiropractic school in the US. I would imagine that Shelah was among the first female graduates.
Per the writing in the front of the book, it would appear that Shelah had a son in October, 1923, whom she named Palmer, presumably after BJ Palmer, developer and president of The Palmer Chiropractic School. Sadly, her son died in April, 1924. The writing indicates that he was born at 4:20am and died at 4:20am, some 6 months later.
If memory serves from my searching public records, I believe Shelah and Mr. Persley divorced at some time.
The scrapbook doesn’t contain any photographs. It’s all various clippings from magazines, drawings (many say “hand drawn”), newspaper clippings, poetry clippings, etc. Most things are dated from 1915-1923, with a few prior to 1915.
There is a clipping of an address label, addressed to Shelah Stevens at Christian Orphans’ Home of St. Louis, MO. If she was in fact an orphan adopted by the Stevens family, I’m not sure why her last name would be Stevens on that label.
The Christian Orphans’ Home of St Louis is defunct and has been for many years; however, their is an authority who has maintained all of the records. I tried contacting them and did receive a reply that basically said they didn’t have the records, try contacting this other place, good luck with my research. I didn’t keep the email and don’t remember anything more specific, but I was able to get that far just through Google searches and free sources so I’m sure anyone else can as well.
I am utterly fascinated with this woman. In the beginning I became quite obsessed with digging for information about her. After only getting so far, I eventually gave up.
So, that’s my story. And here are a few pics from the scrapbook.
~Stephanie Meiler, Family Treasures Found, Facebook
Angel Prairee 