Lizzy and James Ward

Portrait of a woman with short hair wearing an apron. — Elizabeth (Lizzy) Bowen Ward.

Elizabeth (Lizzy) Bowen Ward was born 22 September 1887 in Kodiak, Alaska, and died 25 July 1923.

She married James Ward who was a friend of her father, Henry. James was born 15 May 1864 in Portland, Oregon, of pioneer parents who crossed the plains in 1855. He was a sea captain and later went to work for the Alaska Railroad until he retired. She lived in Seldovia with her husband and children who were:

Jesse Richard, born 11 March 1910 in Seldovia; died 8 September 1984.
Laura Elizabeth (Lorinda), born 21 April 1913. She died 4 March 1973.
James L., born 1916, Kodiak, died January 1975, Anchorage, Alaska.
Edward Rufas, born 26 April 1917, Seldovia; died 27 December 1996.
Stanley Orville, born 10 June 1922, Anchorage; died 4 June 1983, Palm Beach.

Barbara Bowen Husby Wick took care of Eddie Ward after his mother died for two years before going to the Jesse Lee Home in Seward. He was led to believe that Barbara was his mother, and was so happy to learn that all the other children were his siblings.

Megan Ward said that the name Ward might have been changed from Wing. She also thinks that they came over on the Mayflower.

Show genealogy . . .

Laura (Lorinda) Ward married Donald Edward Watson on 31 January 1941. Lorinda and Donald’s son:

Dewey Evans Watson, born about 1946.

Children of Dewey and Mary Canning:

Douglas.
Tommy.

Jesse R. Ward married Barbara Ruth Movius on 18 October 1944. Jesse and Barbara’s children:

James L. (Jim), born about 1946.
William R. (Bill), born about 1947.
Melissa, born about 1949.
Debbie, born about 1950.

Stanley Orville Ward married Anne Patricia (Pat) Grinwich (12 February 1925 - died 5 November 1994). Stan and Pat’s children:

Jess Barry, born 19 February 1953.
William (Jamie), born 8 April 1955 (goes by Jamie).
Megan Elizabeth Allaire Ward, born 3 December 1959.

In the 1970s, Stan married and divorced Georgia Davis(?), living in the Miami area.

Jess married four times. He married Denise (Olson) Heindselman. He married Vickie Lea Brown on 8 September 1971. He married Karen Sue Hinkhouse on 14 February 1987. He married Linda Diane Jeambey, born 14 June 1951, on 8 December 1990.

Denise’s child:

Michael Stephen Heindselman, born 10 September 1971.

Jess and Vickie’s child:

Tara Alicia Ward, born 14 January 1976.

Linda’s children:

Ericka Jeambey, stepdaughter to Jess born about 1972.
Tony Jeambey, stepson to Jess born about 1975.

Megan married David Robert Antin, born 20 November 1953, on 21 July 1988.

Two boys and a large Mickey Mouse head. — Lizzy Bowen’s great grandchildren: Tommy and Douglas.

Four children, the two older are standing, the girl in a dress and the boy in suspenders. — Jesse Ward’s children: Melissa, Jim, Debbie, and Bill.

Captain Ward Returns for Summer

—Wrangell Sentinel, 13 May 1938

After an absence of 26 years Captain James Ward returned to Wrangell this week, accompanied by his youngest son Edward, to spend the summer here.

Born in Portland, Oregon, of pioneer parents who crossed the plains in 1855, he has spent an eventful life on the Pacific Ocean rim, his farthest incursion into the interior of the United States having been one trip to Walla, Walla, Washington.

As a boy he signed on as a deckhand on the old steamship Idaho, plying between Seattle and Sitka with stops at Wrangell and Juneau. Ordinarily, the round trip required about a month as navigation had to be a cautious procedure. The waters were not chartered, he says, and the old Russian charts would quickly put them on the rocks if the captain trusted to them, alone.

Trading Post

Wrangell was a little trading post, without decks or side walks. Steamers coming into the harbor, however, would scarcely get their anchors over, before they were surrounded by Indians in dugout canoes and even the big war canoes. Freight was brought ashore in these canoes and the ship’s boats.

Juneau, he recalls, consisted of a few tents on the beach in 1882 and was not so good as present-day steerage.

In 1886, Captain Ward, who has worked up to quartermaster, left the Idaho and signed on the Alameda which that year started running from San Francisco to Melbourne, Sydney and other Australia ports. For two years his run took him to the orient and “down under,” then he returned to Juneau where he bought the schooner Annie and engaged in coastwise trade for several years.

Joins Klondike Bush

Captain Ward was in Juneau when the Johnson party came out of the Klondike with stories of the big gold discovery there, so he sold the schooner and joined a party at the old trading post of Dyea, early in the year o f1897 and mushed over the Chilkoot Pass, and into the Dawson country. The best of the creeks has by that time been staked by the miners who had rushed up the ice from the Forty Mile and Circle City after George Carmacks had brought word there of the gold discovery.

Captain Ward did very well by working lays in the Klondike and later joined in the Nome rush, leaving Nome a year later with a $30,000 stake. From Nome he returned to southeastern Alaska and went to the new town of Ketchikan where hs stayed until 1901 when he put in a year at the Olympic Mining Company’s camp on Duncan Canal. During this time he was in and out of Wrangell frequently.

Russian Missionaries

Mrs. Ward’s mother was born in Alaska, the daughter of missionaries sent from St. Petersburg, Russia, to carry on the work of the Greek Catholic church.

When the Alaska railroad was building in 1915, Captain Ward moved to Anchorage where he was employed by the Alaska Railroad Commission until his retirement on pension two years ago. His wife died in 1924 leaving him with five children of whom he is very proud. His daughter, who is English teacher in the Palmer high school in the Matanuska Valley, he hopes will join him here a little later.