Family History Notes and Photos by Bob Mesenbrink

In genealogy, the female lines are generally more difficult to trace back, because women changed their surname after marriage, and records are generally less prevalent than for men. Salucia Sophronia Clark Squibb (my g.g. grandmother) is no exception. In some ways she should be easier to trace back than most as we have a marriage record for her and know the her maiden name was Clark. The problem is that she just shows up in Clinton county Iowa as a teenager, marries Robert Flemen Squibb, with no sign of relatives around, and few clues to go on. Salucia Squibb ca 1910 Clark is a fairly common name. There were several families by that name in Clinton county, Iowa in the time around November 26, 1857, when she and Robert married. There was a state census taken in 1856, and Salucia Clark doesn't show up there. She could have come after that, but it seems likely that she would have had family around still, and a thorough study of Clinton county biographies and census data has ruled

Robert Turner (b. 1851, d. 1911) was a Scotsman who immigrated to Iowa and lived in Des Moines. He bought the Iowa Boiler Works from his uncle, William Turner, my great great grandfather. The history of Des Moines, published by S. J. Clarke Publishing Company of Chicago in 1911 includes his biography in volume 2, page 1129. The interesting biography states that "He was born at Burnt Island, in Fifeshire, Scotland ... a son of Robert and Margaret (White) Turner." Then it gets very interesting. "The father was the seventh generation bearing that name and was born in 1816 upon the farm in Fifeshire which had been presented to the first Robert Turner by the Duke of Bucclench for valor in the early wars of the Highland." Now I love local history and genealogy and a good mystery so I set out to sort through this and determine how much of this was true. The biography provided a lot of detail with names, places, and dates, that I didn't include here. They provided a ba