Mentzer

Under Construction

Generation I

Generation II

Generation III

Generation IV

GENERATION V

GENERATION VI
	Benjamin Mentzer
		married - Elizabeth Jane (Jenny) Harmon
			(brother GW Harmon)

GENERATION VII
	George Lawerance Mentzer (1871 - 1955)
		married - Phoebe May Harrah (1886-1913)

GENERATION VIII

	Gordon Harold Menzter (1911 - 2006)
		married (1934) - Katherine McCormick (1911 - 1987)
		children 
			George Mentzer 
			Carolyn Jay Mentzer (1938 - 1990)
			Gordon Terrance Mentzer
	Naomi Mentzer (1905 - 1997)
		Married (18 January 1930) Elmer Lewis Moore (1903-1977)
    		Children
			Phyllis Mae Moore (1931 - 1935)
			Harry Edward Moore (1938 - 2015) 
			Larry Albert Moore (1940 - 1967)


	Dorthy Hazel Mentzer (1907 - 1991)
		Married William Purl Card (1905 - 1973)
		Children
			William Ralph Card (1929 - 2007)
			Lorin Perry Card (1946 - 2019 )

When Naomi Mentzer was born on 18 August 1905, in Florence, Fremont, Colorado, 
United States, her father, George Lawrence Mentzer, was 34 and her mother, 
Phebe May Harrah, was 19. She married Elmer Lewis Moore on 18 January 1930, in 
Lordsburg, Hidalgo, New Mexico, United States. They were the parents of at least 2 sons 
and 1 daughter. She lived in Douglas, Cochise, Arizona, United States in 1930 and 
Supervisorial District 2, Cochise, Arizona, United States in 1940. She died on 4 September 1997, 
in Woodbine, Harrison, Iowa, United States, at the age of 92, and was buried in Oak Shade 
Cemetery, Marion, Linn, Iowa, United States.When Naomi Mentzer was born on 18 August 1905, in 
Florence, Fremont, Colorado, United States, her father, George Lawrence Mentzer, was 34 and 
her mother, Phebe May Harrah, was 19. She married Elmer Lewis Moore on 18 January 1930, in 
Lordsburg, Hidalgo, New Mexico, United States. They were the parents of at least 2 sons and 
1 daughter. She lived in Douglas, Cochise, Arizona, United States in 1930 and Supervisorial 
District 2, Cochise, Arizona, United States in 1940. She died on 4 September 1997, in 
Woodbine, Harrison, Iowa, United States, at the age of 92, and was buried in Oak Shade Cemetery, 
Marion, Linn, Iowa, United States.

Dorothy Hazel Mentzer

When Dorothy Hazel Mentzer was born on 17 November 1907, in Florence, Fremont, 
Colorado, United States, her father, George Lawrence Mentzer, was 36 and her mother, 
Phebe May Harrah, was 21. She had at least 2 sons with William Purl Card. 
She lived in United States in 1949 and Burbank, Los Angeles, California, 
United States in 1950. She died on 13 May 1991, in Hurricane, Washington, 
Utah, United States, at the age of 83.

Gordon Harold Mentzer was born in Arizona, two older sisters, Hazel and Naomi to Lawerance Mentzer
His Mother was said to have left (died?) when his was young (records talked of Colorado and Michigan )
Further reading of letters from Naomi showed they moved between Colorado and Michigan staying with or near relatives 
from both sides of the family.

Grew up on a ranch in AZ the father had moved there to be a printer.
Gordon relayed stories of riding the open ranges of AZ as a child, 
hunting, etc.  one story was of they ran into Indians who demanded their hunt (deer).  
He said the Indians looked very hungry, so they decided it was best to hand it over.

They lost the ranch during the great depression and had to join the migration to CA to work 
farm fields.   That led him to Oregon where he met wife Katherine McCormick.   
They moved to Salinas CA (with brother in-law John (Jack) McCormick and his wife Anna. 
they had opened a tire store, there was also talk of a Smoke/Card room.   
Jack had apparently sold the Salinas store for on in San Jose, as there was a 
Smoke/Card shop associated with it?  That was somewhat code for speak easy in the 1930's (prohibition).   
During the war Gordon and Jack obtained some dump trucks from Nebraska? and the 4 of them 
 by train during the winter.   They were not prepared for the weather 
(they were dressed for CA) and  had to drive these 4 trucks across the Rockies in a snow storm.  
It was a pretty dangerous trip as roads were NOT good in the early 1940's going westward.  
Quite a hair raising drive with old stick shift trucks on dangerous mountain roads.
Also fascinating as if you knew Mickie, she was a slender woman and to imagine her driving a dump truck 
stick shift...

The trucks were used by their business to haul rock for the US GOV during the war.  
He had recieved a draft deferment (he was about 31 years old at the time)
because he had a critical skill/business needed for war effort (the trucks).
A couple of the more notable jobs were hauling rock for 
treasure island and Buchanan field in Concord CA.   Gordon recalled being in 
Benecia CA at a diner when the pier and ships blew up at 
Port Chicago.  He said he was leaving the diner, when there  was bright flash, 
followed by loud explosion and a concussive wave.

Both of their children were born in Salinas CA.   They moved back to Eugene Oregon, 
more specifically an area outside of Junction City.  Worked various jobs, driving log 
truck, etc.   At some point they moved to Coos Bay (I believe either Empire or Barview 
initially) then eventually the Englewood district on Oregon Street in 1954.  
Katherine became an LPN nurse for McCauley Hospital in Coos Bay.  
They purchased 10 acres in the 1963 on Larson Way north of Coos Bay on Larson Inlet.
They had horses and occasionally cattle on the property.
Gordon was a member of the Coos County Sheriffs posse.

They eventually bought a home in North Bend Oregon, when Katherine (Mickey) became too ill.   
Katherine Passed Away in 1987 was interned in Junction City Oregon.
Gordon moved to Hauser Oregon, was later transferred to assisted living in Coos Bay, 
where he passed away in 2006 and was interned in Junction City Oregon

his eldest sister was Naomi
Terry and Gramp said related to Nevada Harrahs, if so it is a distant relation. 
None of Samuel Harrah's brothers left Iowa.  
Gramp lived in Mears, near Hart Michigan until age 7. then moved to Florence Colorado where his grand 
mother Elizabeth Jane (Jenny) Harmon Mentzer lived with her second husband, Civil War 
Veteran Nathanial Parker. In 1920 they moved to San Simon Arizona to sharecrop Onions. They 
lived there until Gramp graduated high school. Approximately 1929-30 moved to LA when a 
glut in the onion market meant could not sell them.  His Grandmother and Hazel lived in LA at that time. 
George was a printer, I am not sure about a newspaper, in an earlier stint of living in 
Florence Co around 1906 and possibly in Michigan. 

Gramp did have a horse at 10-12, they had to sell it, Gramp bought it back a couple of years later 
with his own earnings.  He did follow the crops during the depression. Jay McCormick had moved 
to Salinas where his brother lived... Grammie always said the 1929 stock market crash ended her 
going to the U of O, Suzy said she was recalled to Salinas to break her up from her boyfriend who 
she would meet at Jays hunting cabin at what is now Fern Ridge resevoir...
(I never know what Suzy just made up or is real. )

In 1946 Jack Sr bought out Gramp's share of the tire shop they had for some years in Salinas 
(it had moved once during that time). They moved to "The Ranch" near Cheshire for one year. 
The tire shop folded, Jack moved to the Ranch and Gramp and Grammie lived in JC 1947-1953. 
Gramp and his two buddies Ben McCullugh and Mr. Micklesen (I never knew his first name, but 
worked with his daughter in law at Country Coach) had the 3M logging company, they worked the 
land up Soap Creek nearer to Philomath... Gramp said he almost got killed twice and he was 
not going to risk that third time, so he shut down logging and moved to Coos Bay to work 
at Thortons Tires, located wher the Coney Island Bar is in Coos Bay. 

When they moved to Coos Bay they lived by the Bay in Empire right at where Newmark 
ended and The Cape Arago Highway started. They did not live there very long, Terry had 
to fight at school all the time in what was then a very rough neighborhood next to a 
sawmill and three houses of ill repute. Early in 1954 they bought the house on Oregon St 
in Englewood and lived there until 1976.

They bought Larson Inlet in 1963 after Grammie inherited $5000 from her mother Jessie. Gramp 
got the new 1964 Green Ford pickup then and paid grammie back with the money he saved from 
quitting smoking. They bought two parcels toalling 40 acres, with 8 acres of bottom land.
Gramp became buddies with Chet at Thorton's, Chet was still married to Larraine (Connie's 
mother) then, totally neurotic, good looking, of course.  

Anecodte on Chet Martin...  Born in Rexburg Idaho.   was a B17 Pilot in world war II
US Army Air Corp Flew 51 missions ( 25 was usually the cap, but was raised to 35 by 
end of the war, so he flew past the duty requirements )   
He related to several times flying back with only one out of four engines...  
Some how end up in Coos Bay after the war.   
Avid card player, sure he picked that up in the war...  Black Jack and Pinochle.  
Even when I was in the service, Pinochle was heavily played by the other sailors.   
He had owned an airport in his hometown in Idaho but it went bankrupt, and he found work as an electrician in Coos Bay.  
Eventually ended up as an applicance repairman (that we a serious job back in the 1960's and 1970's)   
THough he was a good electrician, he was not in the Union he was black balled and could no longer find work as one.


Then Gramp was working at Thorntons then later Uniroyal Tires (later Bay Tire) and Anita was in the office. 
Chet divorced, and supposedly Gramp arrainged a date for  them. 

The house Gramp bought in 1986 was a stones throw from the Motor view Drive-in just off Ocean 
Blvd in Empire. Grammie died in July 1987.  Gramp died Thanksgiving Day 2006.

They are buried at Rest Lawn Cemetery on the Territorial Highway North of Cheshire.

The partner in 3Ms Logging was Miner Mickelson, my ol' brain has a backround que it seems. 

Gordon  was born in Mears, near Hart Michigan..  his mother Phoebe May Harrah died in 1913 of Appendicitis... 
They botched the appendictomy 

Anna Blue: (Phoebes Mother)
An Orphan, who was adopted by the Blue(baugh) family. An 1850 Census and Phoebe's 
older brother Orville's Marriage license have the real last name, unfortunately 
both are in terrible handwriting, one looks like Hummer and the other looks like 
Homer. That is enough to provide for a starting point for further research.  
another document on Anna Maria Blue that has her last name as what seems to be Honor. 

Anna first married a Civil War Veteran with the last name of Ashbaugh about 1866, he died about 1869. 
She had a son by him Harry Ashbaugh from whom Gramp got his middle name Harold. She then 
married divorcee Samuel Harrah and had two children, Gramp's Uncle Orville and his mother Phoebe May. 
Samuel abandond her. In 1905(?) she was residing with Benjamin Mentzer across the street from 
George Lawrence Mentzer in Hart Michigan. She died in 1920 in the home of Orville who lived in 
Chicago Heights at the time.  In 1915 she lived in Hart to try to help with the kids per Naomi's letter. 

The letter where she tells Grampa Benjamin Mentzer spoke German and when she had an ear ache (infection) 
he would blow pipe smoke into her ear to relieve the pain. 

 Her Family tree is pretty damn good, even getting her Great Great Grandfather Samuel right. Though she 
may have gotten that info from Harry Martin who was her father's first cousin and the historian of the 
family. She also lived her later years in Marion Iowa where the Mentzer's first moved to from Ohio 

There were like five or six brothers of Bengamin Mentzer who stayed there as well as the families of o
Jonathan Mentzer's brother Joseph. Joseph late in life moved to Tacoma with like his third wife and 
had some kids there. No one I contacted in Tacoma seemed to know anything about thier family history. 





Letters from Naomi Mentzer



 Naomi Letter 01 page 01
 Naomi Letter 01 page 02
 Naomi Letter 02 page 01
 Naomi Letter 02 page 02
 Naomi Letter 03 pdf





From Family Search


Obiturary

Gordon Mentzer Obituary
Published by Legacy Remembers from Nov. 28 to Nov. 29, 2006.

March 6, 1911 - Nov. 23, 2006

A graveside inurnment service for Gordon Harold Mentzer, 95, of North Bend, will be held at 1 p.m. on Wednesday, Nov. 29, at Rest Lawn Memorial Park, 94335 Territorial Highway, in Junction City. His ashes will be placed next to his wife, Katherine. Cremation was at Ocean View Memory Gardens Crematory in Coos Bay.

Gordon was born March 6, 1911, in Mears, Mich., the son of George and Phoebe (Harrah) Mentzer. He died Nov. 23, 2006, in Coos Bay.

He spent time as a youth in Colorado and, from when he was 10 to an adult, on a ranch in San Simone, Ariz. During the Depression, his family moved to Los Angeles and Gordon worked crops up through California and Oregon.

He met his future wife, Katherine McCormick, in Eugene. They later married in Salinas, Calif. They had three children: George; Carolyn Joy (Mentzer) Collver; and Gordon Terrance Mentzer.

Gordon was a tire man by trade and longtime member of the Coos Mounted Sheriff's Posse.

He is survived by his son, Gordon Mentzer of Boise, Idaho; eight grandchildren; and 12 great-grandchildren.

Gordon was preceded in death by his infant son, George; and daughter, Carolyn, in 1990.

Arrangements are under the direction of Coos Bay Chapel, 267-3131.

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