Stella’s parents were separated when she was 5 years old and officially divorced when she was 6.  The 1880 census shows 8-year-old Stella (mistakenly identified as Stella Hiller) living in St. Louis with her mother and her new stepfather, Rudolph Hiller.  (Meanwhile her three brothers were in Falls City with their father and their Martin grandparents.)  In November 1880, Stella’s father remarried, so she suddenly had a new stepmother and half-a-dozen step-siblings.

In 1885, two state census records, collected 5 months apart, show 12-year-old Stella and her brothers living with their father and stepmother in Cass County, Iowa, in January, and then in Seward County, Nebraska, the following June.

The next record we have of Stella is a newspaper report that shows her participating in a Memorial Day celebration at Peoria, Mahaska County, Iowa, in 1890 (Oskaloosa Herald, 22 May 1890, p. 2).  This is where Stella’s mother and stepfather then resided.  So apparently her parents had agreed that having a steady home on a farm was a better situation for a teenage girl than gallivanting all over the country with her evangelist father.

Stella married Clayton David Hewitt at Peoria on 22 January 1893.  Clayton, commonly known as “Clate,” was born 5 March 1872 in Van Buren County, Iowa, the son of Samuel S. and Susan (Gier) Hewitt.  His family had moved to Peoria while Clate was still a small boy.  Clate’s father was a blacksmith, and that is also the occupation he eventually settled into (after farming for several years).

The Iowa State census of 1895 shows Stella and Clayton Hewitt in Peoria with their son Joseph W. (age 0).  The 1900 Federal census shows them in Richland Township, which includes the community of Peoria.  Once again, it shows just Stella, Clayton, and Joseph (age 5) in the household, but it also shows that Stella was the mother of two children, only one of which was then living.  Hence, obviously, she had lost a child, though I have found no mention of that child in newspapers or official records, nor have a found a grave site for any Hewitt child who died between 1895 and 1900.  Both of these census records list Clayton’s occupation as “Farmer.”

Over the next seven years, Stella gave birth to four more children (including a set of twins), which completed the family.  All told, she had the following children (except for the one who died in infancy):

• Joseph Merrill Hewitt, 1894–1963 (married Lena Jane Bottorff).
• Fanny Zua Hewitt, 1901–1991 (married Lester Thomas Byrne).
• Wray Charles Hewitt, 1903–1960 (married Johanna Cornelia Vander Hoek).
• Freida Irene Hewitt, 1903–1978 (married Fred Anthony Kool).
• Harry Clayton Hewitt, 1907–2000 (married Lois Cordelia Reinier).

All of these were born in Peoria except for Harry.  In April 1907, Clate took on a new job in a blacksmith shop at Pella, Iowa, which is only 7 miles from Peoria but is in Marion County, rather than Mahaska.  Stella and the children moved to Pella in May 1907, and Harry was born there the following November.

In addition to his blacksmithing chores, Clate was appointed to be a deputy marshal in Pella.  According to a report in a local Dutch-language newspaper (Pella Weekblad, 26 November 1909, p. 1), he was on duty one Saturday night when a local drunk, incarcerated for the night, set fire to his bed.  The jail had to be evacuated due to the smoke, and two out-of-town prisoners escaped in the confusion.  (They later returned to Pella, however, and had to pay hefty fines.)

The 1910 census shows Stella and Clate in Pella with all five of their children (although daughter Freida is mistakenly listed as a son).  Clate’s occupation is listed as “Blacksmith.”

In July 1911, Clate bought a blacksmith shop in Rose Hill, Iowa, and moved his business there.  The family moved to a home at 602 North D Street in Oskaloosa (which meant that Clate would have about a 10-mile commute out to Rose Hill).  Thus they had returned to Mahaska County.  One of Clate’s acquisitions at the new shop was a machine for sharpening plow discs.  According to the Oskaloosa Herald (19 Mar. 1914, p. 3), that brought in a lot of business:  “Clate Hewitt is having an easy time sitting on a chair and grinding discs from morning to night.  The machine does the work.”

When the U.S. entered World War I, son Joe (23 years old by then) joined the Army and went off to fight in Europe.  In December 1918, he was listed among the wounded in several Iowa newspapers, though I have not found any further description of his injuries.  He must have recovered, however, as he lived on another 44 years and had a successful career as a hardware merchant and plumbing contractor.

(NOTE:  No Oskaloosa newspaper published after 1918 is available on line as of this writing (April 2023), so the remainder of this narrative relies only on census records, death and burial records, plus a couple of obituaries I’ve obtained from microfilm copies of the Herald.)

By 1920, Stella and Clate had moved to 1023 Eighth Ave. East in Oskaloosa, where they would live for the rest of their lives.  The 1920 census shows them there with all five of their surviving children.  Fanny is listed by her middle name, Zua.  Occupations are listed for Clate (blacksmith), Joseph (plumber), and Zua (bookkeeper in a doctor’s office).  The Iowa State census of 1925 lists all the same family members except for Joseph (and does not identify occupations).

By 1930, Joseph, Wray, and Freida had all married and moved out, leaving only Zua (29) and Harry (22) at home with Stella and Clate.  According to the 1930 census, Zua then was working as a stenographer at an attorney’s office, and Harry was a storeroom clerk at a power and light office.  Clate, of course, continued to work as a blacksmith.

On a Sunday evening, 2 August 1936, Clate had a sudden heart attack and died at home.  The Oskaloosa Daily Herald (3 Aug. 1936, p. 5) printed the following brief obituary:

     HEWITT — Clayton D. Hewitt, former Employee of the Iowa Power & Light company, died at his home, 1023 Eighth avenue east, at 6:20 o’clock Sunday evening, August 2, 1936, at the age of 64 years, as the result of a heart attack.  Surviving are three sons, Joseph of Valley Junction, Ray [sic.] C. of Webster City, and Harry C. of University Park; two daughters, Mrs. Zua Byrne of Des Moines and Mrs. Freda Kill [sic.] of University Park, and one sister, Mrs. Elsie Warn of Montezuma.  Funeral services at 2 o’clock Wednesday afternoon, August 5, at the Forest cemetery.

Clate was laid to rest in the Forest Cemetery in Oskaloosa.  The obituary and Clate’s death certificate both state that he had been employed by the Iowa Power & Light Company.  If so, he must have closed or sold his blacksmithing business sometime between 1930 and 1936.  Well, those early years of the Depression were hard on all sorts of businesses.

The 1940 and 1950 censuses both show Stella, widowed, living by herself in the home on Eighth Avenue East.  The 1950 census, however, lists her son Harry, his wife Lois, and their son Harry Jr. on the same page.  Their address is 809 South 11th St., but a glance at the Oskaloosa map shows that that is less than half a block from Stella’s home.

That 1950 census was dated April 1st.  Five months later, Stella passed away at Mahaska Hospital.  She also received a short obituary in the Oskaloosa Daily Herald (5 Sep. 1950):

     HEWITT—Funeral services were held at 2 o’clock today for Mrs. Stella Eugenia Hewitt, 77, of 1023 Eighth avenue east, who died Saturday, Sept. 2, 1950, about 1:15 p. m., at Mahaska hospital.  Rev. J. K. French of the Free Methodist church was in charge of the services at Powers funeral home, and burial was in Forest cemetery.  Mrs. Hewitt was the widow of Clayton D. Hewitt.  She is survived by her children, Joseph of Baltimore, Md., Harry C. and Mrs. Fred Kool of Oskaloosa, Wray C. of Webster City and Mrs. Zua Byrne of Des Moines; 17 grandchildren; two great-grandchildren, and several brothers and sisters.

Stella also had had a heart attack or, as it was listed on her death certificate, an acute coronary infarction.  She was buried next to Clate at the Forest Cemetery.

If you can suggest any corrections to the information above or provide any further details about the lives of Stella, Clayton, and their descendants, please contact me at the address shown in the image below:

Thanks,      
     —Pete Martin

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