Mildred Jane Hughes Mahaney and John Richard Bell were married in Lake County, Indiana on 5 Apr 18501. Prior to her marriage to John R. Bell she had married to Edward Mahony in 18442.
Both John and Edward owed land in Porter County, near the border with Lake County.
In 1870 were still living in Indiana (census data). However, by at least 1873, the Bell family was living in Kansas. (In 1873, John A. Bell wed Amanda Jones.) By 1875 Mildred Bell is living separately from John R. Bell3.
John R. Bell is listed several pages later in there census.
In the 1880s they both owned land about four miles apart.
In the 1885 Kansas Census she states that she is widowed. Shortly after this they packed up and headed west to Comanche County and then Stevens County. John R. Bell is buried in Stevens County, Kansas where the gravestone states that he died in 1889. Mildred Bell remarried and purchased land near her son John A. Bell in Stevens County. She died in 1898.
1. "Indiana Marriages, 1811-2007," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:VNTX-P1Y : accessed 28 July 2015), John R Bell and Mildred Mahany, 05 Apr 1850; citing , Lake, Indiana, county clerk offices, Indiana; FHL microfilm 2,413,488.
2. "Indiana Marriages, 1811-2007," database with images, FamilySearch (https://familysearch.org/ark:/61903/1:1:KDH3-KTQ : accessed 28 July 2015), Edward Mahony and Mildred Jane Hughes, 09 Dec 1844; citing , Porter, Indiana, county clerk offices, Indiana; FHL microfilm 1,686,155.
3. Kansas State Historical Society; Topeka, Kansas; 1875 Kansas Territory Census; Roll: ks1875_10; Line: 55 Ancestry.com. Kansas State Census Collection, 1855-1925 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2009.
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| Clara and Jake Kilbourn |
In 1892 John Andrew Bell homesteaded 160 acres in the southwest quarter of section 15 in Township 33 South range 35 West of the Sixth Prime Meridan of Kansas. This farm was about 12 miles east of Hugoton, Kansas.
In 1894 Jonathan C. Kilbourn, homesteaded 160 acres in the northeast quarter of Section 4 in Township 35 South Range 40 West of the sixth Prime Meridian in Kansas. The Kilbourn homestead was about 20 miles southwest of Hugoton.
Lewis Joseph "Jake" Kilbourn married Clara Bell on 5 Sep 1901. In 1913 they homesteaded 160 acres in the northeast quarter of section 28 in Township 34 South Range 38 West of the Sixth Prime Meridian in Kansas.
All three homestead were within Stevens County. Jonathan Kilbourn probably was not too successful at farming or he wasn't healthy enough to continue farming because in less than six years he was living in Indiana, where he had met and married his wife.
While running the homestead, Jake drilled water wells as a sideline. That eventually became his sole source of income so about 20 years after claiming the homestead he moved the family into Hugoton1.
On aerial images from 1990 there appears to be farm buildings on Jake's property, but there doesn't appear to be any now on Jake's or Jonathan's old homesteads.
By zooming in on this map you can see the land as it appears today.
1. "Jake Kilbourn Passes Following Long Illness." Hugoton Hermes, Nov 7, 1947.
2. "Google Maps Engine Lite." 2012. 23 Aug. 2013 <https://mapsengine.google.com/>
