Anora—a fresh look

Anora (“Anna”, “Annie”) (Lee) (Horan) Prettyman (1847–1892) was my 3rd-great-grandmother and she has been something of an enigma to all recent researchers—myself included—who have tried to discover who she was and where she came from.

Thanks to new information I’ve gotten from a handful of newly discovered cousins, I think I’ve got a much better handle on Anora. While there are still large gaps and unknowns in her story, I’ve revised so much of her history that a new post is warranted. Most notably, I had the misidentified her parents (there were two girls named Anora/Anna/Annie Lee born in Indiana at the same time, and I was tracking the wrong one) and I got some details of her early years wrong.

I’d like to thank my newly discovered cousins Lorna, Suzette, and Michael for sharing what they know about our shared Prettyman ancestors as well as Anora’s first husband, William Horan. I’d like to give special recognition to Lorna for responsibly caring for, recording, and organizing so much Horan and Prettyman history and photos. Without her and her late father’s impressive memory, many of the details of Anora’s life would have been lost forever. Continue reading

Who was Anora Lee Horan Prettyman?

[NOTE: Do not read this post. Nearly all of the information in this post is incorrect. I realized only in 2021 that there were two Annie Lees born in Indiana around 1850, and I had chased down the wrong set of parents. I’ll leave this post here so that the comments can survive, but will strike out all inaccurate details. I recommend you read this revised post on Anora instead: https://blackenedroots.com/blog/anora-a-fresh-look/.]

In my previous post, I concluded that my 3rd-great-grandmother Anna/Annie Horan and Anora Lee Prettyman (the wife of my 3rd-great-uncle Francis M Prettyman) were the same person. In this post, I’d like to present what I know about who Anora Lee was and where she came from. I’ll focus here on her pre-marriage years, as I’ve already written a bit on what she did once she got married and had kids.

Anora (aka “Anna”, “Annie”, and “Anny”) Lee was born in Wayne Township, Randolph County, Indiana. Modern Wayne Township has a population of 4,611, and includes the western two-thirds of Union City, as well as the small towns of Harrisville and South Salem. Wayne township used to be the location of five towns: Bartonia, Harrisville, Randolph, Salem, and Union City. Randolph ceased being a town before 1850 according to the History of Randolph County, Indiana.

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Were Annie Horan and Anora Lee Prettyman the same person?

[NOTE: I recommend you read this revised post on Anora instead: https://blackenedroots.com/blog/anora-a-fresh-look/.]

confusedfamilytreeIn yesterday’s post, I investigated the birth family of my great-great-grandmother Mary Ann Horan. I learned that her parents were William and Anna (“Annie”) Horan. William Horan apparently disappeared (died? divorced?) around 1880. Annie Horan is listed on the federal census of 1880 as being the head of her household, while also marked as being married but not marked as being a widow.

Five years later, in 1885, Annie Horan also appears to have disappeared or died and her children appear to have been adopted a brother-in-law and next-door neighbor of Mary Horan, her husband’s older brother Francis (“Frank”) Marian Prettyman and his wife Anora Lee Prettyman.

When doing further research today into the mystery, I discovered a growing number of similarities between Anna Horan and Anora Lee Prettyman that make me now think that they were quite possibly the same person. If this is true, then my great-great-grandmother’s mother was also her sister-in-law! Continue reading