On a snowy Sunday in 1905, Eliza Cheney sat down to pen a diary entry:
“It is 28 years today since we moved on this farm…” — April 16, 1905
That simple sentence represented nearly three decades of hope and survival, joy and sorrow, family and neighbors. Eliza must have paused to reflect on her life since coming to McPherson County, Kansas in 1877.
All three boys that grew up in the household of William and Eliza Cheney became doctors.
William and Eliza Cheney had claimed their homestead in McPherson County, Kansas in 1877. By 1880, they had a house and barn, gardens and an orchard.
The family had grown too. In 1880, William Cheney was age 42. Eliza was 40. Their children were Sarah Margaret, age 14, Enos Ralph, age 9, and James William, age 5.
William and Eliza are our 3rd great-grandparents.
Continue readingIn 1877, William Cheney traded a cow for Jack Taylor’s homestead claim for 160 acres of government land in McPherson County, Kansas. That homestead claim gave William the right to occupy the property, and an additional five years to improve it.
By 1870, the Cheney family had established themselves in Christian County, Illinois. Over the previous decade, several of the children had married and started farms of their own, many within a few miles of the original homestead. The family was closely connected—parents, siblings, and in-laws living nearby and working the land.
The 1860s were full of Cheney family events.
The Civil War had ended. The Cheney boys were home.
The Cheneys continued their lives, marked by births, marriages, work and civic life, and loss.
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Family Nibbles 