Month: September 2005

My distant relation Helen Lowry sent me the following photo yesterday:

Front row, left to right: Johnson Franklin Cunningham, Mary Anne Penelope Anthony Cunningham, possibly Charles Benjamin Cunningham or Alexander Stephen Cunningham.

Back row, left to right: Possibly Johnson Hood Cunningham or Charles Benjamin Cunningham, Mary Elizabeth Cunningham (Mollie — later married name Bragg), Martha Lugena Cunningham (Mattie — later married name also Bragg), and Amos Blakey Cunningham.

I estimate that the photo was taken between 1882 and 1884 based on the appearances of the children. I am not positive about the identities of the tallest boy in the back row or the boy in the front row. Family records have indicated that the youngest Cunningham son, Alexander Stephen Cunningham, died as an infant. The oldest boy on the far left seems to look older than my great-great-grandfather Amos, based on height; however, it should be noted that Amos was noted for his short stature — the family called him Little Grandpa, and his wife Stella mentions in her diary that he weighed 115 pounds as a full-grown man in his twenties. If the tallest boy is indeed Charles, then the young boy must be Alexander, and it would seem that he did not die as an infant as all our genealogical records indicated.

It should come as no surprise to regular readers of this site that I am fascinated with my great-great-grandmother, Stella Bowling Cunningham. I recently received two more pictures of her that wanted to share. These were most likely taken before her marriage in 1894. McKinney, Texas, and Plano, Texas are in the current Dallas-Ft. Worth area.