Laura Eugene Elledge McGrath

When Laura was about six years old the family moved to Manassa, Colorado. It was here she spent the next eighteen years of her life. Laura’s father owned a good farm and a flour mill and was making a little more than a simple living, and her being the youngest child she had an easy, free life until she was about twenty-two years old. At that time, her father (Dillingham Horten Elledge) died and her mother (Elizabeth Nations) had a stroke of paralysis and was in bed for several months. The burden of the work of the home fell upon Laura’s shoulders. By this time all the children had married except her one brother, Israel, and they began to try and find some means of doing something for their mother. Laura first took her to the Hot Springs at Ojo Caliente, New Mexico, where after several months bathing she was able to walk again with the help of a cane. During this time, Laura worked as waitress in the dining room at the hotel where they stayed. They then decided a warmer climate would be better, so they moved in December of 1896 to Franklin, Arizona. For the next eight years they lived on the farm her brother had bought and she kept house for him and her mother. She became an active part of the community, serving as secretary of the Franklin Ward Sunday School, president of the Young Womens’ Mutual Improvement Association, teaching in the Franklin Grade School for one year, and helping in many ways in community affairs.
On the eleventh of September, 1904, she married James F. McGrath, and took the added responsibility of another home, because while they hired a very able lady (Katy Louis) to keep house for her mother and brother, it was still necessary for Laura to devote a great deal of time to the care of her mother.