Fanny May Nelson

My name is Fanny May. I was born in Mocksville, North Carolina 15 May 1853 to David Porter Nelson and Pauline Rice. My father was a minister, my mother a teacher. We lived for a short while in Cairo, Illinois before moving to Texas. We lived in Guadalupe and Gonzales Counties. My mother taught and strove for better education of Texas children, I worked along beside her after I got old enough.

My marriage to Pleas Ripley is recorded in Wilson County, Texas . We married the 13th of October 1872. We moved to San Antonio where he became an attorney and I continued to teach. We had seven children, 4 died early, but the other three kept me in their lives until their deaths and mine.

Vivia and her daughter Cecile made four generations of teachers starting with my mother. I was active in several fraternal orders and societies and was given several awards for my service to them.

My 87th birthday was a big to do. The Alamo Post No. 2 of the American Legion crowned me Queen mother on Mothers Day. At the time I was the oldest member of the Chapter of American War Mothers and still teaching!

My first child, Vivia died of liver cancer in 1936. It was such a shock. I wrote to her son in California about the quickness of it all (1,2,3,4). My son Roy died of Brights disease in 1922 after serving his county in World War I in France. My daughter Janie is the only one that survived me. I lived until 9 April 1950. I was buried in the Nelson-Ripley cemetery plot of the Confederate Cemetery in San Antonio.

Images with utsa in the file name are from the John M. Steinfeldt Family Papers, 1819-1993, MS 35, Archives and Special Collections, University of Texas at San Antonio Library. Other photos in possession of family members. Other documents obtained from Court Records, digital images on Ancestry.com, FamilySearch.org, and microfilmed records.

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Research and website done by Tresa Tatyrek. This site was last updated 03/28/09