Adele Carson

Adele Lucille Carson was born March 10, 1918 in Muskegon, Michigan to William Anson Pringle and Mabel (Sholten) Pringle. Adele was born during the outbreak of Spanish Influenza that first appeared at Ft. Riley Kansas on March 4, 1918 and Queens, New York on March 11, 1918. Adele was the youngest of four children, with two sisters Geraldyne and Veronica and her brother Douglas.

Adele came from pioneer stock and traces her ancestry back to General Israel Putman of the American Revolution, one of the primary figures in the Battle of Bunker Hill, both in its planning and on the battlefield against the British. Her grandfather, Samuel E. Pringle, was born in 1856 and his family settled a homestead in Mears, Michigan in 1866. When North Dakota opened to homesteading later on, the family moved again to the Dakota Territories. In

1885, Samuel moved to Muskegon, Michigan with his wife, Henrietta Putman, a direct decedent of Israel Putman. One of their sons, William Anson Pringle was Adele's father.

Adele's mother, Mabel (Sholten) Pringle, was likewise from pioneer stock; her great-grandfather was a town Burgomaster (Mayor) in Northern Holland and acquired considerable wealth. His son, John Sholten, Adele's grandfather, though well-educated and fluent in seven languages, sought to make it on his own as a young man and immigrated to America. During the War of Northern Aggression (the Civil War) he served as an interpreter and settled in Muskegon, Michigan after the war and raised a family with his wife, Grace Sholten, until his death in 1924.

Adele's parents grew up in the early rough-and-tumble town Muskegon was in the early days as a logging town. Adele remembered the days of wooden sidewalks before the days of modern concrete and of watching the log rafts floated down the Muskegon River to Muskegon Lake and the paper mills on its banks. Though raised during the depression of the late 1920s and 1930s, Adele's family prospered with her father being a draftsman and mechanical engineer with Oldsmobile, Shaw-Box Crane and later Continental Motors during WWII.

In the fall of 1939, a young man named Leroy Thomas Carson, working at the Muskegon office of American Telephone and Telegraph (AT&T of Bell Telephone), was introduced to a young lady named Adele Carson by his father. A budding romance ensued that was interrupted on December 7, 1941 by WWII. Though both were thinking of marriage, they decided to postpone any wedding talk until after the war. They corresponded throughout the war with Leroy going to England and later France on D-Day while Adele worked in the defense plants of Campbell, Wyant & Cannon and later Continental Motors in the Time Study Departments. Sgt. Leroy Carson returned to Muskegon after the war having survived the beaches of Normandy and the push to liberate Paris, earning a Bronze Star along the way.

Resuming their romance, Adele and Leroy were married on November 2, 1946. Though raised a Methodist, Adele became a Catholic, as was her husband. Sadly, Adele's mother had passed away on February 10, 1946 and her father followed a year to the day afterward, on February 10, 1947.

Leroy returned to work for AT&T in the Muskegon office and they settled into married life in a little house at 1522 Mona Avenue in Muskegon Heights.

Though wanting children, Adele and Leroy were told by doctors that she could not have children after a miscarriage. Though sad news, they were determined to have a family and turned to adoption. On May 29, 1948 a baby boy was born at Hackley Hospital, with his mother dying the next day. On August 30, 1949, Adele and Leroy adopted the boy, and named him Timothy Thomas Carson, starting their family. Surprisingly, in June of 1950, Adele learned the impossible had happened: she was pregnant! On December 29, 1950, the couple celebrated the birth of a beautiful baby girl, Sally Lynn Carson.

Leroy was transferred to the Grand Rapids office by AT&T in late 1949, and after carpooling back and forth for more than a year (and now with two children in a very small two-bedroom house in Muskegon), they decided to move to Grand Rapids. In 1951 they moved to 1835 Leith Street in the Leonard and Richmond Hill district. Though a two-bedroom ranch, Leroy enclosed a car port and finished off a third bedroom working nights and weekends on it. Life was good.

Not satisfied with the public school system, Tim and Sally were sent to the St. James Catholic Elementary School for a proper education.

Adele took to the role of housewife and mother to her two children, with Leroy being sent on "out of town" jobs all over Michigan, Indiana and Illinois quite often. Many times Leroy was only home on weekends. But one more surprise was yet to come.

In May of 1958, when she was pushing the age of 40, Adele was told the impossible had happened again: she was pregnant! Their second son, Theodore William Carson was born on November 29, 1958. Though the child-bearing years were now over for Adele, babies were still in the household for years to come. Adele and Leroy became foster parents to a number of babies that cycled through the Carson household by the State.

Leroy retired from AT&T after nearly 43 years at the company, following his first heart attack. At about the same time, something from Leroy’s past in WWII came back into their lives. Leroy had met two Mormons in Cherbourg, France after D-Day. He was quite impressed with them and never forgot the talks they had.

Both Leroy and Adele weren't happy with the Catholic Church any longer and one afternoon two young Mormon missionaries knocked on their door. After the missionaries left, Leroy and Adele talked quite a bit and decided they wanted to become Mormons and that's just what they did.

In their later years of retirement, they served missions in both the Washington, D.C. and Chicago Temples.

After 54 years of marriage, Adele lost her beloved Leroy on May 29, 2000. Leroy's death was not an easy one and he slipped in and out of dementia his last three days, but Adele wouldn't leave his side until almost forced to get something to eat or sleep. Though Adele felt relief when Leroy passed, in that he was no longer in pain or confusion, it was truly the most devastating event in her life.

Adele remained living alone in her apartment until the summer of 2001 when she was invited to vacation in the Missouri Ozarks where her oldest son lived. While there Adele suffered her first stroke but recovered quickly.

Adele found she liked the Ozarks and her son asked her to move down and live with them. In January of 2002 Adele moved to the Missouri Ozarks to her son's small farm just outside Houston, Missouri. Adele loved the Ozarks, and with some changes in her diet, lost almost 100 pounds! She also became very active in the local Mormon Church Ward and traveled across Missouri and Illinois to see several of the Mormon historic sites.

She also took to the life on a small farm, to the point of bottle-feeding baby pigs and rocking them to sleep afterwards, or just sitting on the front porch with a 125-pound Great Dane at her side, watching the cows graze in the surrounding pastures.

In 2005, Adele suffered a second stroke. Though she recovered physically, she was diagnosed with Second Stage Alzheimer's Disease. In 2006, the disease progressed significantly, until her son and daughter-in-law could no longer care for her in their home and Adele was admitted to the Houston House extended care facility in Houston, Missouri.

Adele progressively worsened until October 2007, when she no longer recognized anyone. On January 10, 2008 Adele passed in her sleep to be with Leroy.