Born on Friday the 13th of April, 1888, it is no wonder that my grandfather, Jesse James Parker, lived a life of misfortune and mystery.

Just why he was named Jesse James is unknow today. The outlaw, Jesse James, died on April 3, 1882. There is a family legend that the family used to live next to the Jameses but that is not true. I doubt that, six years after the murder, it was a case of hero worship. By then, everyone knew just how bad Jesse James was. There is no indication, from grandpa's siblings names, of hero-naming with any other brother or sister.

Little is known of his childhood. His father was a blacksmith but Jesse became a cabinet maker and carpenter. He learned to play the fiddle and apparently was quite good. He and Francis Ruth Cleveland Harris were married on 25 December, 1907.

We know he received a federal patent for 39.5 acres of Section 1 of Township 16-N, Range 21-W in Newton County Arkansas on 19 May 1913. This was southeast of Gaither and appears to have been good farmland. Which begs the question, why in 1917 was he, grandma, and their three sons in Minnesota?

Grandpa enlisted in the Army late in 1917 or early in 1918. He had a deferment since he had a growing family to feed but he joined up anyway. Grandma accused him of desertion. Many questions and mysteries arise out of this action.

Grandma's father went to Minnesota and got her and the boys (my father, Uncle GB and Uncle Norman). But instead of taking them back to Newton Arkansas, he took them to Witchita, Kansas! There Grandma put the boys in a Catholic boarding school, went to work, and filed for divorce from Grandpa Jesse.

She told Dad, and the rest of her family and anyone else who asked, that Jesse had gone out to buy Dad a pair of shoes and never returned. Alternately, she said Jesse went out to buy a pack of cigarettes and never came back. She never admitted that Jesse had enlisted nor confessed that he was alive.

Finalized on 11 March, 1920, in Wichita, Sedgwick Co., Kansas, she received a divorce and a short time later, married William Curry and lived the rest of her life in Atlanta, Kansas hating Jesse James to the day she died.

On 6 April, 1920, at Superior, Nuckolls County, Neb. Jesse married Lena Pearl York, b. 5 Jan/Feb, 1900, in Jewell Co., Kan. d. 6 July 1953, Corvallis, Oregon. buried Crystal Lake Cem., Corvallis. Oregon. They had two children, Ruth Ilene Parker, b. 23 October 1920 and John Ellis Parker, born 22 December 1921. Where is not known.

A few months after Dad died, John Ellis came to see Mom. We had no idea that he even existed as no one was allowed to talk about Jesse James Parker after the divorce. Mom said John was the spitting image of Dad, so much so she thought for a moment that Dad had returned. Strangely, John died of a similar heart problem as Dad's just a few months later. He was able to tell us that Jesse James Parker had left Texas, where they were living, to take a load of watermelons into Mexico in 1925 or 26. He was never heard of again.

Or was he? Grandma had a sister, Georgia, who loved to torment Grandma with tales of Jesse. Some of these have been preserved.

"In the fall of 1922, Jesse James came back after he left Pearl [no evidence of this] - had an old noisy rattletrap of a car and came in late at night - Green Parker came over to Georgie's and asked if Ruth (Harris Parker) was happily married to Bill Curry [they were until 1970 when Grandpa Bill died] - Jess left that day."

May Small Harris of Wichita KS - a member of the Southern Baptist Church of Wichita, in 1965-66, asked a man if she recognized him and said he didn't think so -- thought he was Jess Parker and he was a great church worker. [Nice thought]

Georgie heard Jess Parker and another woman had a car wreck and he had lost a leg. From Blanche Parker-Tucker: Jess Parker won fiddling contest at the Chicago Worlds Fair (1933)-- she heard him play on radio and Arloo (her sister) recognized him - program was from Hopkinsville, KY. [Soon I am going to check this one out.] We do know that Jesse twice won title of State Fiddler for Arkansas, presumably at the State Fair.

So there we are. A man of mystery whose family is seeking to know the truth. If anyone has any information, contact me at jparker7367@sbcglobal.net.