JAMES ARTHUR DONALD’S EARLY YEARS

Arthur was reportedly born in 1891 a log cabin near Watalula, Arkansas. He lost both parents when young. Oscar Mahlan Donald died Dec. 5, 1899, and Watson Augustus Donald had just died on Nov. 12, 1899. Arthur’s step-mother (Oscar’s second wife) Mary Ellen Morgan Donald did not take him, nor did any other Donald kin. Arthur, and his two sisters Grace and Pearl, were raised by their Milton maternal grandparents.  In the 1900 census of Boston, Franklin County, Arkansas, James Arthur Donald, Pearl Donald, and Lillian Grace Donald were in the household of their grandparents Big Jessie & Nancy Milton.

Front Row: Will Barham, Bonnie Anderson
Back Row: Grace Donald, Belle Anderson, Arthur Donald

In the 1900 census of nearby Watalula Township, Franklin County, lived the household of the widowed Jerucia Ophelia Donald, paternal grandmother of Arthur. Ophelia likely was still living on the original Donald land. Ophelia listed 8 kids alive then.  Oscar Mahlan Donald (Arthur’s father) had already died. Five kids with Jerucia Ophelia in 1900: Rufus H., Vicy E., Alice L., Katy M., George W. Plus Troy F. Donald, age 2, grandson. Troy was the son of Vicy, who married John Andrew “Drew” Primm in 1901. Jerucia’s 3 living kids not residing with her in 1900 would be: Fanny P., Cora C., and Myrtle. Cora C. Donald had by then married William Levi Plymale, Fanny married B.M. James, & Mertie married David Painter.

The original Donald land must have been sold before the 1910 census, when we find Ophelia (age 59) living in Van Buren with her daughter Kate Donald Yeager, Kate’s husband & their daughter. Walker Donald was in the home & worked as a molder in an iron foundry. Vicy’s son Troy was also in this home. I don’t know why, as Vicy was then married to Drew Primm (reported father of Troy prior to the marriage) & they had some other kids by 1910. I had thought that Drew Primm had adopted Troy, but I find a Troy F. Donald in a 1930 census working on an oil rig at Port Arthur, Texas. The age & place data fit. An Ancestry.com tree has this Troy Donald, & everything fits for this to be Vicy’s kid. Troy’s wife Agnes Winstel was from Ft. Smith.

In the May 1910 census, James Arthur Donald was age 18, worked as a hired hand, and lived with the Max Haeger family on Fayetteville Road, White Oak Township, Franklin County. Arthur was at various times a farmer, mill worker, highway grader, pipe layer, gas station owner, and grocery store owner. Prior to their marriage, Arthur Donald and Belle Anderson corresponded from afar (we have a box of their letters to each other).  She was a teacher and he reportedly worked at a mill far south of Ft. Smith. Their marriage was on November 16, 1910.