Anna Smith Carley (1886-1981)

Born Annice Ann Smith on 16 May 1886 in rural Henrietta Township, Jackson County, Michigan, she would live to see more than 100 descendants brought into this world before her death at 94 years of age.  Throughout her life, she would be known as "Anna A." or simply by "Annie" to most of her family and friends, although she was named after her grandmother, Annice Ann Aldrich McCreery (1836-1924).

As a young girl, she attended the McCreery School, which was the first school in the township and built by her great grandfather, Joseph McCreery.  After her parents moved to a farm on Kennedy Road, she and her siblings would attend the Kennedy School.  Annie would become a teacher and taught for one year at the Holling School, a one roomed schoolhouse, located on Territorial Road in the northwest corner of Henrietta Township.  But her career would end when she became married to her former school mate, Jesse Carley on 16 August 1905.

Following her marriage to Jesse, Anna would reside at the Carley Farm are Sayers Road and for a time would include her in-laws Oren and Mary Carley.  Soon, Anna and Jesse would begin to have a family of their own, starting off with three daughters born in a row: Ila Pearl (1906), Iva May (1908) and Clara Bell (1909).  Soon these three would be a great help to their mother with cleaning, cooking and caring for their many younger siblings.


On the farm, the family would raise some livestock, such as cattle, pigs and chickens.  They also grew crops like corn and wheat.  Jesse's two older brothers, Edward and Alton both had farms adjacent to the Sayers Road homestead, and we assume that they all helped each other out when the time came for many hands to work the fields during harvest or with butchering.

The next four children to bless the Carley home were all boys: Oren D. (1912), Clifford (1916), J. Edwin (1917) and Lynn (1919), who undoubtedly became essential farm hands for their fathers growing farm operation.  The next decade would bring the final four siblings into the family, four girls: E. Ilene (1921), Esther (1922), Vera (1925), and Joyce (1927).

 The Carley's lived about 3 miles from the village of Munith, where uncle Ed Carley also operated a General Store and the rural telephone company.  They also attended the Methodist Church there.  To get to Munith for church activities or to see their friends they had to walk.  The most direct route to the village was walking along the Grand Trunk Railroad tracks that ran on the southern property border of the farm, only a short distance from their farmhouse.

Jesse and Anna wanted to keep their family close by and upon each of their children's marriages gave them 1 acre of land of the farm, where they could build a home and get a good start on life.  At least five of their children built homes on Sayers and Coon Hill Roads, adjacent to "Mother and Dads." 

Anna and Jesse would host many holiday's and other celebrations in their home during their lives.  But perhaps one of the most special was their Golden Wedding Anniversary in 1955.  Hundreds of their family and friends filled their home with good wishes and cheer.  Jesse would only survive three more years and died in the same home where he was brought into life in 1883.

Anna would remain in the farmhouse for a couple of more decades living on her own, but just a few years before her 90th Birthday, she found that it was becoming too difficult to manage on by herself.  Not long after she went to live with her daughter Iva, where she remained until her death as a result of a battle with cancer in 1981.

So today, we remember Anna Smith Carley on the 129th Anniversary of her birth.  Here is to a long and prosperous life!