Lula Ethel Leard 1894 - 1937
Lula Leard Mills
Lula Mills
Lula Leard was the daughter of Joseph Earl Leard (1869-1908) and Sarah L. Cook (1870-1934). She was born on 25 June 1894 in Wayne County, Mississippi, USA.
Lula married Edgar Mills (1881-1961) between 1910 and 1914 in Wayne County. They had the following children:
James Gordon "Gordon" Mills (1914-2002)
Harmon Victor "H.V." Mills (1916-2007)
Lula first appeared in the census records with her parents in 1900 in Wayne County. (census image here)
Lula's father died in 1908 and her older sister Lela got married between 1900 and 1910 but Lula and her mother and the rest of her surviving siblings showed up in the census again in 1910 in Wayne County. (census image here)
Between 1910 and 1914 Lula married Edgar Mills. Both of their sons were born in Mississippi, but they didn't stay there, moving away in 1916. Edgar had bought some land in Mississippi, possibly as much as 750 acres. It is not clear to me if they moved directly to Ohio or moved to Arkansas and then Ohio, but the 1918 draft registration records place Edgar in Summit County, Ohio, and the 1920 census found the couple and their two boys in the same place. (Draft registration image here) (census image here)
After the family moved to Ohio Edgar got a job at the Goodyear Tire Company, and apparently Lula also got a job working for their competition, B.F. Goodrich. The couple owned a house in Cuyahoga Falls in Summit County. Edgar held onto the land he owned in Mississippi until 1927, when he sold it to one of his ex-neighbors in Mississippi. At some point the couple started having marital problems, this may have led to a decision to leave Ohio in 1929 and move to Randolph County, Arkansas, where they bought approximately 80 acres of land. This is where they showed up in the 1930 census in Roanoke Township (the census records don't indicate whether it was West Roanoke Township or East Roanoke Township). (census image here)
Edgar and Lula separated after 1930 but did not divorce. Their property was split up, Lula got the land in Arkansas and Edgar kept the house in Ohio, which they had not sold before they moved (Edgar later sold the house, apparently before 1940). Gordon married Ruby Mae Fullington in 1930 and later moved to Los Angeles, California.
Lula was alive for the birth of all of her son Gordon's children: Edna Mae, James Gordon Jr., and her youngest (at that time) granddaughter. Sadly, Lula was diagnosed with cancer and died in a hospital in Memphis, Tennessee, on 22 January 1937 at age 42. She was buried in Fairview Cemetery in Randolph County, which was her place of residence before her death.
There are oral traditions that are sources for some of this information, from a series of conversations with Lula's son H.V. that took place in 2003. There are other things about Lula which tell a bit more about her than the dry facts of her life. Apparently she loved to dance. When she and Edgar were living in Ohio she went to a Methodist church there, but stopped going to church after they moved to Arkansas.
Around 1980 her son H.V. paid a visit to Lula's grave and decided her headstone was a disgrace and ordered a new one. I have not been there personally to view her grave but I have a picture in my possession of the new memorial, it must have been a vast improvement over the old one.
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Lula Leard Mills page at Find A Grave
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