Thornton Cousins: The Wagoners

The Southern Kentucky Thorntons' Wagoner cousins descended through the aunt of Mary Susan Cooper Thornton, wife of Jesse Benton.  Tabitha Josephine "Jocie" Cooper was born November 26, 1859, to Francis "Frank" Marion and Tabitha Sullivan Cooper.  In approximately 1873, she married David E. Wagoner (1842-1901) and had at least ten children.  In the picture above, Jocie Wagoner is in the front row, third from the right.  In the front row, we find her sons, left to right: Robert Lucian (1896-1976); Frank Herbert (1880-1936); Walter Edmond (1875-1956); Will Marshall (1878-1948), and Ervin Samuel (1884-1953).  In the second row, we have Ruthie T. (1899-1942); Laura Bell; Beulah Josephine (1892-1970), and Bessie.  Hershel Tharston Wagoner (1882-1955) is not pictured.  Jocie died December 5, 1943, in Allen County, Kentucky. 

Tabitha Josephine Cooper Wagoner.

Beulah Josephine Wagoner was born July 28, 1892, and died November 28, 1970, in Allen County, Kentucky.  On June 27, 1907, she married Ben Wilson Rippy (1890-1932) in Sumner County, Tennessee, and they had at least eight children: Noah Matthew (1909-2002); Lawrence Albert (1912-1954); Lela Mae (1914-2004); Minnie Bell (1915-1987); Cordell Elizabeth (1918-2005); Nellie; Delbert (1923-1968), and Robert Ray (1927-1995).

Photos from the Rippy family.

Frances Calvert Cline Thornton (1879 - 1950)

Frances Calvert, daughter of Samuel Burge and Martha Dowell Calvert, was born July 15, 1879.  She married James K. Cline in 1901.  After James's death in 1926, in the early 1930s, she married Thomas Benton Thornton, son of Robert Benton and Elizabeth Smith Thornton.  He had returned to Kentucky from Indiana, after the death of his wife Jeannette.  Thomas was born on December 15, 1862, and died on April 8, 1943.  Frances died on November 1, 1950.  Thomas and Fannie lived in New Roe, Allen County, Kentucky.

Fannie is pictured above with her first husband, James.

Death Certificate: Thomas Benton Thornton

Thomas Benton Thornton was born on December 15, 1862, to Robert Benton and Elizabeth Smith Thornton.  Between 1910 and 1920, Thomas departed southern Kentucky for Benton County, Indiana, where he worked on the railroad.  In his later years, he moved to Allen County, KY, where he married his second wife, the widow Fannie Calvert Cline.  His first wife was Jeanetta Watkins.  Thomas died on April 8, 1943, Allen County, Kentucky.  No issue.