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| Birth: | 13 OCT 1868 in New Boston, Linn Co., MO |
| Death: | 18 JUL 1927 in Avard, Beaver Co., OK |
| Sex: | M |
| Father: | |
| Mother: | |
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Burial: JUL 1927 in De Bolt Cem, Arnett, Ellis Co., OK
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| Mary Nuealla Mollie Forrest (Wife) b. 7 JUL 1871 in New Boston, Linn Co., MO |
| Marriage: 2 NOV 1889 in New Boston, Linn Co., MO |
| Children: | |
 Earl Foster Crail b. 31 JAN 1890 in New Boston, Linn Co., MO
- Oscar Jason Crail b. 7 JUL 1892 in New Boston, Linn Co., MO
- Mable Gertrude Crail b. 10 JUL 1894 in Hope, Dickson Co., KS
- Paul Irvin Crail b. 13 SEP 1896 in New Boston, Linn Co., MO
- Hazel Vaughn Crail b. 1 OCT 1898 in New Boston, Linn Co., MO
 Infant Crail b. 6 JAN 1901 in New Boston, Linn Co., MO
- Calvin Lester Crail b. 10 JAN 1902 in New Boston, Linn Co., MO
- Nellie Geneva Crail b. 29 SEP 1904 in New Boston, Linn Co., MO
- John William Crail b. 8 APR 1910 in Arnett, Ellis Co., OK
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Text:
!Family records. Great-grandfather of compiler.
Photo of headstone
Copy of marriage license & certificate.
Ellis County History
1900 Census Baker Twp., Linn Co., MO.
1910 Census Day Twp., Carlton District, Ellis Co., OK.
1920 Census Day Twp., unincorporated area of Arnett, Ellis Co. OK.
Copy of obit notice
Corres with Joann Winters
Copy of death certificate
"Greenstreets" by Opal Abernathey Greenstreet, Pg. 2, 3
From Opal's book, "
John Murry Crail was a carpenter and farmer. While living in New Boston he worked at the carpenter trade during the week and was only home on weekends to farm his eight acres. He had a claim from the
government in Oklahoma so in 1907 he sold his farm to a neighbor Joe Baker and moved his
family to Oklahoma. He filed on his claim but it never did 'prove up' so he bought a claim on one hundred sixty acres in Oklahoma. John continued his carpenter trade and built many homes and barns. The homestead is still in the family today
Since the above was written, John William Crail is now deceased and one of his children is living on the "old home place."
From obit notice: John M. Crail, a prominent pioneer citizen of this section, passed away at the home of his brother-in-law, near Avard, Monday, after an illness of several months. Mr. Crail has been in failing health for the past two years and only recently disposed of his personal property and left his farm
11 miles southeast of here for his health.
John Murray Crail was born in New Boston, Missouri, October 13th, 1868, and died near Avard, Oklahoma, July 18th, 1927, at the age of 58 years, 8 months and 18 days. He was united in marriage to Mary Forrest, in 1889, to this union nine children were born, six sons and three daughters. Seven of whom are living, namely: Earl, Catesby, Oscar, Ottumwa, Iowa; Paul, Oklahoma City; Mrs. Mable Shepherd, Moorewood; Mrs. Hazel Shepherd, Shattuck, Mrs. Nellie Janes and John Crail of Arnett.
Mr. and Mrs. Crail moved to Ellis county with their family in the year 1907 where they settled on a farm near Arnett, where Mr. And Mrs. Crail resided until a few weeks ago. Besides the wife and seven children he leaves a host of other relatives and friends.
Mr. Crail was a good man, a kind and generous father, a loyal neighbor and a true friend, loved and respected by all who knew him and it is with heavy hearts that those who knew him think of his passing on.
Funeral services were conducted by the Christian Church in Arnett, by Rev. A. B. Hemphill, Methodist minister and interment made in the DeBolt Cemetery.
1920 Census: John M. age 51 living with wife, Mary N. age 48 and children Calvin L. 17, Nellie G. 15, John W. 9. Earl and Mina living in next door.
From Ellis County History: John Murry Crail, son of Jason and Elizabeth (Murry) Crail, was born October 13, 1868, Linn County, Missouri. On November 2, 1889 he married in Linn County, Missouri, Mary "Molly" Nuaella Forrest, daughter of James William and Margaret Elizabeth (Bonnifield) Forrest.
Molly was born in Linn County, Missouri, July 7, 1871. John and Molly had nine children
John Murry Crail, carpenter and farmer, aquired a claim for the Government for one hundred and sixty acres, ten miles southeast of Arnett, Ellis County, Oklahoma. He traveled to Oklahoma, filed on the claim and rented a barn to live in. In February, 1907, John and Molly sold their forty-acre farm in
Linn County, Missouri, and chartered a Santa Fe Railroad car to carry their household goods, team of mules, wagon, and oak fence posts to Oklahoma. The roads were so muddy it took a four-horse team to take their possessions to the train station in Ethel, Missouri. John, Oscar and Paul rode in the
immigrant car with their household goods. Mary and the other five children rode in the passenger car. Each time the train stopped for water, John would get off and buy food for the family and also water the horses.
Gage, Oklahoma was as far at they went by rail. It was twenty-five miles by team and wagon to reach their claim. They unloaded their belongings and took them to a friend's home in Gage. As they were unloading, "the people just about went crazy over the oak fence posts." They wanted to buy them to
stake up grapes. Many had never seen an oak fence post before.
The barn was their home for several months. By late summer, they were fortunate to rent a small house, located on Mr. De Long's claim, near by.
John's claim did not "prove up", so he bought the rights to Mr. White's claim, two miles east. Four years later he bought the De Long claim which now belonged to his brother, William Crail. The location of this three hundred and twenty acres is: Southwest Quarter (SW 1/4) Section 4 and Northeast
Quarter (NE 1/4) of Section 9, Township 18 North, Range 23 West.
In Oklahoma, John continued his carpenter trade as well as farming. His son, Oscar, remembers one barn he helped shingle. It was located on the Wagner place one and a half miles from the Crail's. "The barn was a hundred feet long and eighty feet wide. Two could work all day putting on wood shingles
and it didn't look like you had done anything."
When John William was to be born, there was no doctor to call. This time Oscar was sent for the neighbor woman. John William was delivered by the neighbor with the assistance of his father.
All lumber and coal was brougt in by train to Gage, and fuel seemed to be a problem every winter. One winter there was such a coal shortage that they dug "shinnery" roots to burn and also used cow chips. Another time a coal car was setting on the siding in Gage and someone dumped it on the ground.
People came from miles around to pick up the coal for fuel.
At the death of John (July 18, 1927) and Molly (October 24, 1927), the Crail homestead was left to their seven living children, Earl, Oscar, Mabel, Paul, Hazel, Nellie and Johnny. Until 1972 the land was rented as pasture and the mineral rights leased. Today, John and Molly's son, John William, is
living on the Crail farm. Submitted by Gloria Cramer Crail. Note: Since the above was written, all of the children of John and Molly have passed away. I have a copy of the land platt showing John's
property.
From Joann: John Murry Crail was my grandfather, who I never knew. He was the first and only son of Jason and Elizabeth Murry Stephens Crail. He was born in New Boston, Missouri, 13 October 1868, and was about two years old when his mother died. He lived his childhood and early manhood in New Boston.
John Murry Crail and Mary (Mollie) Nuealla Forrest were married 2 November 1889 in New Boston, Missouri. John and Mollie both attended school and received an 8th grade education in a one-room school located at the junction west of New Boston.
From a "Bit of History - New Boston Then (1882) and now (1970)", written by Ruth Barron Haffee, we see an idea of what school was like in New Boston.
"The first school house in New Boston was built in 1873 and its first teacher was John S. Wilkes. This frame bilding cost $300.00 and it stood at the site of the John Davis home. Miss Fannie James was the teacher in 1882 and taught the six months term for $30.00 per month. She stayed at the 'hotel' of
the grandparents of Ruth Chaffee, Arthur and Catherine Borron. The average daily attendance in 1882 was 33 pupils.
It was at this little shcoolhouse my Dad learned to read, write and cipher. Being a school teacher myself, I was fascinated by the stories he told of the teachers and pupils in that old school. It seemed I too knew the Crail girls who were champion spellers in the area. I sympathized with the teacher
and her unsurmountable problem of teaching a room full of students ranging in age from
five to almost twenty-five years old. I marveled at the fact that when Dad was elderly he could still recite poems and stories from his old school days.
His favorite teacher was Mrs. Larkins. Her husband, who was a doctor, served as a deacon in the New Boston Christain Church. Mrs. Larkins was a faithful member of the church and no doubt often prayed there for the Great Master Teacher to guide her in her profession.
Pupils walked to shcool in those days, some as far as three miles. The poet who wrote, 'The feet that creeping slow to school went storming out to play' could have penned those lines about the old school at New Boston, for when recess came, the echo of heavy boots on the door still could be heard
throughout the town. They carried their lunches, which consisted mainly of cold cornbread or biscuits spread with molasses.
My first rememberance of John and Molly Crail was when, as a child of about 10, my mother and my Aunt Hazel visited their graves. They are buried in the De Bolt Cemetery, Arnett, Oklahoma. As I remember, every few years or as often as they could afford to, my mother and my Aunt Hazel would go
to Arnett for "Decoration Day."
Sometimes other people went with us and we drove Hazel's (?) 1939 Ford down to Arnett to visit the old home place. We got stuck in the sandy road bed and drove through pasture, creek bed, and soft sandy scrub land, in fact, through one families (Wagon's) front yard to get to the old house.
At one visit I remember the house was still in fairly good shape. It was unpainted slat board siding, wooden floors and very weathered. No one was living in the house at that time, but it had been rented to different families off and on through the years. Another visit that I remember was in September
1970. The poor old house was still partially standing and the shifting sand had almost completly covered the floors. It looked as though the house had started as a kitchen and one other room, then later a side room was added on. The windmill sits several hundred yards from the house near another small
out building used as a feed storage barn. Earl and Mina Crail might have lived in this building at one time when they were young married.
The John Murry Crail land has remained in our family for about 80 years and is still owned by some of his descendants. The last tenants were John William Crail and his wife Dorothy Wofford Crail. They lived on the "homeplace", until, due to failing health, they moved to town. John William Crail was
the youngest child of John and Molly. His daughter, Lamona Crail Zelle and her husband Benny Zelle are making plans to retire to this land in the next couple of years. They have made improvements and have placed a mobile home there for their present use.
I know very little about John and Molly's life in New Boston. Oscar and Earl Crail furnished many little stories. My mother Nellie Crail was 3 years old when the family moved to Oklahoma.
John Murry Crail was a carpenter by trade and a good carpenter; but he also had an 80 acre farm in New Boston that was one-forth mile from Jason Crail. While living in New Boston he worked as a carpenter during the week and was home on the weekends. He also worked on a sheep ranch in Kansas and the whole family moved with him there as Mabel Crail was born in Hope, Kansas.
Oscar Crail said the only fuel they bought was kerosene for the lamps. They burned wood for heat and cooking, so one of the never ending jobs was chopping wood. On a cold winter day when Oscar went out to chop wood, he put his tongue to the axe blade to test the sharpness, and in sudden shock dropped
the axe. "It was so cold it took the hide right off my tongue. I went into the house and wanted Mother to wrap up my tongue." He couldn't remember how old he was when this happened.
In the back of the grocery store, next to the Post Office was the photo studio where all the family pictures were taken during their years in New Boston. They had one taken just before they left New Boston.
John had a claim from the Government in Oklahoma, so he sold his farm to a neighbor; Joe (Joseph) Baker, for the sum of $1,050.00 on the 14th day of January 1907. Mrs. Almond (the lady that gave me the abstract information of Jason Crail's land) is a direct descendant of Joe Baker. John decided to
leave New Boston with his family, to file on the Oklahoma Claim. Some of the Crowder family were already in Oklahoma so this may have been his motive for moving there. They started their trek in February 1907. Earl Foster Crail and Oscar Jason Crail told me stories of how they came to Oklahoma. I've tried to combine both versions:
One person was required to ride in the railroad car with the animals (Immigrant car) but only one person was supposed to be allowed. Oscar and Paul both bedded down in the car with their father to save the price of one fare. The rest of the family rode in the passenger car. Earl rode with his mother, as he was the oldest boy, to help his mother with the smaller children.
They arrived in Oklahoma in early April 1907. They came to homestead 160 acres available at Arnett, Oklahoma. John tried to farm the first farm but it never did "prove up"; just wasn't any good. John's only brother William Robert Crail may have helped him buy the farm. I had an original land tract
patent signed by the Secretary of the Interior for Theodore Roosevelt. The land originally belong to Mr. De Long. I gave this land tract to Carol Jenkins Ratliff as her grandfather Earl Crail had given it to me. John William Crail told me his father later moved the small house to some other land just west of
the present farm.
In Oklahoma John Crail built many houses and barns. Oscar remembers one barn he built for the Wagnon's. The barn was 100 feet long and 80 feet wide. Oscar helped shingle this barn with wood shingles and said "two men could work a whole day and it hardly looked like you had done anything." This barn, full of hay, burned down 5 years later when it was struck by lightning.
In July 1977, while attending the Crail Reunion in Woodward, I removed about six of the siding boards from the house John Crail owned in Oklahoma. It took my husband Royce's full strength prying with a crow-bar to budge some of the large rusted nails. It is not know for certain if John Crail built this
house but it is assumed he might have and did add a room or two.
Shortly after the Crail's moved to Oklahoma, when Calvin was small, he broke his leg while playing in the barn yard. A cousin fell on his leg with her knee and cracked the bone. There was no "team up" so Oscar but him in the bagon and pulled the wagon up to the house with a saddle horse. He carried him
to the house and then went one and a half miles to get a doctor. While thedoctor set Calvin's leg, Johnny Crail held the chloroform. He inhaled too much of the fumes and it made him sick so Oscar had to help finish. Oscar doesn't remember if his mother was at home at the time.
When John William (Johnny) Crail was born, there wasn't any doctor and Oscar recalls going after a neighbor woman and she and his father delivered Johnny. "Molly was never in bed very long after any of her childred were born."
One night in Oklahoma when the family was driving their "big mule team" home from church, it was raining and so dark the reins would light up like "ribbons of fire" in the black night. As they could not see to control the way of the mules, the just let them go ("gave rein to them") and they took them right home.
Earl Crail thought his father probably had a stomach ulcer or cancer and Oscar said "he was always clearing his throat"--but neither John or Molly ever went to a doctor. Molly was never sick while Oscar was living at home.
After John died, Oscar took his mother back to stay with him in Ottumwa, Iowa. She was with him two or three weeks when she had a light stroke. He then took her to Aunt Anna Mae Forrest Carter's home in Missouri. She became worse so Aunt Anna Mae took her home to Oklahoma. She went to Earl's
house at Catesby and died while there. She lived three months and six days after John's
death. "She had been ailing about a year."
Note: death certificate gives cause of death as carcinoma of stomach of 1 year duration. Gives place of death as Woods County, Hopeton Township, Oklahoma. John died age 59 years 9 months 6 days, born in Missouri. Father, Jason Crail born in Kentucky, maiden name of mother Murry. Informant was
E. F. Crail (Earl Foster).
Copy of land plat, mortgage record, homestead and deed for property John purchased. Copy of final decree, showing division of property after John & Mollie passed away. John left 1/3 to Mollie, 2/3 equally divided between Earl, Mabel, Paul, Hazel, Nellie, John and Oscar. (2/21 interest) Mollie's 1/3
divided equally amoung above named children (1/21) after her death.
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Individuals from other files that are believed to be the same person:
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