Mrs. Carrie J. Dunn
The old pioneer families of Grant County have interesting records, and none of them more so than the Jones family, which will always have a permanent memorial in the little city of Jonesboro. Mrs. Carrie J. Dunn, of Marion, is a daughter of the late Dr. Enoch Pearson and Lydia (Ellis) Jones. Her grandparents were Obediah and Ann (Pearson) Jones. The Jones ancestors came from Wales in 1700, locating first in Virginia and afterward in North Carolina. Obediah Jones was born in the latter State. With other Quakers who were opposed to the institution of slavery the parents of Obediah moved to Montgomery County, Ohio, and there he met the women who became his wife. In 1835 they came with other Montgomery and Miami County families to Indiana, but Obediah Jones had already been in Grant county, where he bought three hundred acres of land, and two years later the town of Jonesboro was founded on a portion of his estate and still bears his name. The house he built is still a landmark of the time. Eight children had been born to Obediah and Ann Jones while they lived in Ohio.
Lydia Ann (Ellis) Jones, the mother of Mrs. Dunn, is a daughter of Robert and Anna Ellis. This was also a family from Ohio who located at Jonesboro. Mrs. Jones, who is still living at Marion, in advanced years, makes her home with her daughter, Mrs. Dunn, and is in many ways one of the most notable of Grant County women. When dr. E. P. Jones began the practice of medicine she was such an able assistant to him that she frequently prescribed for his patients, and the charge for her medical services were added to the account of the doctor's. She was a specialist in diseases of children, many asking her advice from choice in this respect. Dr. Jones and his wife had grown up together at Jonesboro, and while she did not attend the medical college she practiced in his office every day and no comment was ever made about it from a professional point of view. While the Jones family homestead was in town, Dr. Jones built a splendid suburban residence at Jonesboro, where the family combined town and country life, but that home has since been destroyed by fire.
In 1875 dr. Jones and his wife moved to Marion, where the family still live, and Dr. and Mrs. Jones built up a splendid practice. The Jones block and residence on Fourth Street are practical results of their activities, and Mrs. Jones still owns a farm which they paid for out of their joint earnings many years ago. The death of Dr. Jones occurred in 1903, and since then Mrs. Jones and her daughter, Mrs. Dunn, have lived together. Of the seven children born in the family only Mrs. Dunn and Linton E. Jones reached adult age. The son spends the most of his time in travel.
Carrie Jones, the daughter was married October 30, 1883, to Dr. Wesley A. Dunn, who had read medicine in the office of her father and who located in Wabash for the practice of his profession. Dr. Dunn was a son of John and Miranda (Bryant) Dunn, who were pioneer residents of Pleasant Township, Grant county. While he had long aspired to a finished education, dr. Dunn could not complete it until after he had begun medical practice. He continued for ten years in Wabash, and then sought a larger opportunity in Chicago, where he specialized in diseases of the throat, nose and ear, and became recognized as one of the best surgeons in that city. He did a great deal of post graduate work, and twice he went abroad for study and twice for recreation. Mrs. Dunn accompanied him on one of his trips across the ocean. The last voyage was made with a friend, Francis Dunn (no relative) of Chicago, who was with Dr. Dunn when the latter died of typhoid fever in Naples, Italy, March 20, 1897. His friend brought the body to Marion, where he was laid to rest. The body arrived in the home city at the time it had been planned to complete the pleasure trip. Mr. Francis Dunn was a member of the Chicago Board of Trade, and secured transportation for the body of Dr. Dunn without difficulty, although the Italian laws on that subject are stringent.
Mrs. Dunn has three children, and it has been her ambition to give them the education their father had planned for them. The Misses Grace and Edith Dunn left the Marion High School in their junior year and entered Vassar College, where Grace graduated in 1908 and Edith in 1909. While at Vassar Grace Dunn specialized in music, and after teaching piano and violin for two years in the Marion Conservatory of Music took a similar position in Highland Park, Chicago, where for two years she taught the two instruments with success. On the 4th of September, 1913, in Geneva, Switzerland, she was married to John P. Matter, a son of Mr. and Mrs. Philip Matter, a prominent business man of Marion, Indiana. This young couple spent their school days together in Marion, and afterward Mr. Matter attended Princeton University, where he graduated with the class of 1906. Mrs. Matter spent the summer of 1913 abroad, and she was met by Mr. Matter in Geneva, and they were married in that historic old city. Their home is now in Chicago, Illinois.
Miss Edith Dunn taught History and English for two years in the Marion High school, and on March 26, 1913, was married to Berthold M. Nussbaum, who was also a Marion young man, a son of Mr. and Mrs. Leo Nussbaum. After graduating from the Marion High school, he attended Howe School, at Howe, Indiana, to prepare for Harvard, where he graduated in 1908. They began housekeeping in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where Mr. Nussbaum had located in business. It had been a cherished ambition of Dr. Dunn's to give his children the best of educational advantages, and Mrs. Dunn fells that she has carried out his plans for them. While her children are away from her, she and her mother constitute the family circle, and live in Marion where they have business and property investments.
Francis Wesley Dunn, the son of Mrs. Carrie J. Dunn was a member of the class of 1913 of the Marion High school, and in the fall of the same year he entered the University of Chicago, preparatory to entering Harvard, his education being his mother's present ambition.
Centennial History of Grant County Indiana 1812-1912. The Lewis Publishing Co., 1914.