Ruby Fanny Florence (Sample) Anderson (1903 - 2006)

Born 31 Oct 1903 in Rural area of Poplar Bluff, MO

Ancestors

Died 25 Jan 2006 at age 102 in Poplar Bluff, Butler Co., MO

Biography

Florence (Sample) Anderson was very athletic and as a teenager she could beat all the boys racing bareback on their ponies & she could outrun them all too. She was tall, slim and a true tomboy. Rather than help her mother and sister in the house, Florence preferred helping her father and her brothers out on the farm.

She lived to be 103 and drove a car well into her 90s. The only thing that slowed her down was when she fell and broke a hip when she was 100.

She divorced her first husband in Detroit, Michigan, when divorcing just wasn't done. However, Florence was very independent and highly intelligent. She was determined not to live with a man who did not live up to her expectations. She went back home to Poplar Bluff, Missouri with her only child, Loyd, in tow. She made her living by managing a small grocery store, prior to her marriage to Ira Anderson, who was a widower, with two sons. Ira was a very nice man and a good husband and father to Florence and Loyd.

Florence wrote a book of her memoirs, which were filled with hilarious escapades, and insights into life in rural Poplar Bluff, Missouri in the 1910s & 1920s, when she was young.

She and her only sister, Myrtle Bertha (Sample) Brown were very close.

Sources

• my great aunt, Florence (Sample) Anderson.
• My grandmother, Myrtle Bertha (Sample) Brown.