More about Ida Amelia Shurtleff (1855–after 1930):
In 1892, Ida A. Shurtleff lives with Hiram and Elisa Blanchard in West Stewartstown, on the corner of Center St. (in 1880, Hiram is a "Stage driver", run his stage to Colebrook and Canaan). In 1892, Hiram is likely retired at the age of 74. He was born in 1818 in French Canada. He lives with his wife Elisa Blanchard 57 (madden name “Blood", and from her first marriage “Howe"; it is her second marriage with Hiram Blanchard in 1869).
Ida is Elisa's daughter from her previous marriage with William Howe (married 1852, died 1857). Ida B. Coté born in 1855 is then 25 years old. In the US Census 1880, she is listed as ''widowed and daughter-in-law'', but, she is actually divorced from Austin Coté. Ida will leave the Blanchards in 1881 for her second marriage with Lyman O. Shurtleff. After having two daughters with him, she will divorce him and will return to live with the Blanchards.
In the 1900 census, Elisa Blanchard, widowed since 1898, still lives with her daughter Ida, and her 2 grand-daughters Mabel 18 and Mildred 11. In 1908, Ida remarries for the third time and will go live in Maine.
In 1892, there was a lot of important persons in west Stewartstown, from the owner of the Saw Mill (Mrs. Allen), to Mr. Mayo, the local painter with a print shop, without forgetting the pastor of the Congregational Church. But, it was likely Ida Shurtleff that attracted most of the gossips. Ida is 38 years old (b.1854), divorced twice, and has 2 daughters, Mabel 10 years old and Mildred, 4 years old. With her kids, she rent rooms at her mother’s house, Mrs. Eliza Blanchard’s on Main Street, while her ex-husband, L. O. Shurtleff, has a house all for himself, not far, at the corner of Mill Street and Washington Street.
For the next ten years, Ida, Mabel, and Mildred will live with Ida’s mother, Mrs Eliza Blanchard (Eliza madden name is Blood, then becomes Howe by her 1st marriage in 1852 with William Howe who died in 1857, and finally Blanchard by her second marriage in 1868 with Hiram Blanchard. Ida’s father is William Howe).
She owns a store on Main Street by Mrs Fling's store. She is divorced which is not common in those days, and not only once, but twice (and will marry a third time in 1908). Ida is born Ida Howe, in Canaan, in 1854. In 1870, when 16, she first marries Austin Coté 24 (French Canadian descendant on his father’s side, but with an English mother); they live in Stewartstown. They have a daughter in 1872, Hattie, who dies in 1875, at age 3. They have a son Willie in 1875 who dies in 1879, at age 4. She divorces Coté, and in 1880 she is living on Main Street, West Stewartstown, with her mother, Eliza Blanchard and Eliza’s second husband Hiram Blanchard. There is no information about Austin Coté whereabouts after that.
In 1881, Ida marries Lyman O. Shurtleff from Stewartstown. She will have 2 daughters with him in 1882 and 1888. She divorces him before 1890, and with her very young children, she returns to live with her mother Eliza Blanchard. Mable marries in 1909, and Mildred marries in 1914.
For those who are interested to know more of her life. She marries again, in Colebrook, in 1908, at the age of 45, with Hardy Alvin Molton 38, also divorced, a salesman from Semington, Maine (born in 1888, first married with Annie Grace Wheeler in 1894; they will not have any children, and before 1908, they divorce. Annie remarries in 1911, and Hardy remarries in 1908).
Ida and Hardy move to Maine, By 1910, they live in Scarborough, Maine, with Seth and Emily Plummer. In 1920, They live in Portland, Maine; Hardy is an accountant. In 1930, now 65, we find Ida in Portland, Maine, head of the household, living with Walter E. Walker 55 (lodger). Her husband Hardy Moulton is a patient at the Western Maine Sanatorium, in Hebron, Maine (a hospital for the treatment of chronic diseases, such as tuberculosis which was common then.
