In Search Of A Sister

Joan Lee Turpen - Eighth Grade

This is a story I have been wishing to complete since I first learned that I had a sister when I was about six years old. I was somewhat raised as an only child. I had a brother at home growing up when I was very young, but he had entered the Air Force by the time I was in my grade school years. When he came back he got married and was living on his own, so I never really remember having a sibling at home.

Today, I have one person who I affectionately call "Sis" as she has the personality and understanding of me in a way that I would envision that a sister would... she lives on the west coast and we only see each other about once a year, but we work for the same company and she is always just a phone call away. Thank you Shannon Marshall for being the sister I never had. You are exactly what I believe a great sister would be.

Here I am going to broach the subject of the biological sister I never knew and have, through this endeavor, at least gleaned enough information that I can say I am now comfortable in my knowledge of her. The "not knowing" has eaten at me for years.

My first memories of learning that my sister "Joanie" had

Joanie and my Dad - circa 1959

even existed were those of riding with Dad a few times a year, sometimes in his unmarked Plymouth Fury police car, to put flowers on his daughter's grave. I was probably six years old. This was probably around 1970. I would always sit in the passenger seat, looking over the large Motorola radio control head with it's two large red and green lights as Dad would spend a few minutes putting those flowers on her headstone. I listened to Evansville Police Department radio traffic while Dad visited with his only daughter and did the only thing he could; mark her grave marker with flowers.

I was a kid. The import of these moments was lost on me back then. My primary thoughts were probably the fact that I was surrounded by the dead in a "grave yard."

Over the years, I thought about learning more about her. All Dad would ever say was that she was married and she had "gotten a shot from some country doctor and she had gotten Hepatitis from it and died." He never wanted to say more than those few words. His eyes would get distant even saying that, so I never asked more than a few times before I stopped the inquiries. My Mother (not Joanie's mother as I was a product of my Father's second marriage) had always told me that Joanie was prepared for her death stating "she laid out the clothes she wanted to be buried in six months before she died."

These two tidbits of information were all I ever knew. I did not even know much about my Father's first wife (Joanie's Mother), as they had divorced many years before my birth in the 1940's. 

For years I have had a picture of her on my shelf at work. Simply as a testament to the sister I never knew, always telling myself I would someday learn more. I never realized that the clock was ticking the whole time as people who had known her would become few over time.

So after visiting the grave site a few times over the last few years I finally decided to do something. I went to a group on Facebook called "You Grew Up In Evansville, IN if" and posted a copy of the photo in my office with a request for information.

This was less than a week ago.

The floodgates opened. People who were both in Evansville and those from afar who had lived here gave me pieces of the puzzle. I was emailed a death certificate... pictures... yearbook clips stating activities. I even learned her husbands name and received information on him as well. Each piece of information lead to another... and another... and another. The people around here are gems and unselfish in trying to help gather information.

So, here is a story I need to tell. I need to tell it as her life was cut short by illness and the Joanie that could have been... never was. It is now 2017, and I just want to tell the story so that my sister can be known and maybe it is just a little bit of catharsis for me as well.

1305 E. Franklin as it appears today.

Joan Lee Turpen was born in 1939 to Gordon and Gertrude Turpen of 1305 East Franklin Street. Gordon's mother Elizabeth (my grandmother) ran the Grocery store at the end of the block (Willow and Franklin) and lived near there as well. Gordon's father Martin owned a shoe store and "Turpen's Tavern" in the 1200 block of Division about three blocks to the south (the buildings of these two businesses on Division Street no longer exist and the property lies under the pedestrian walkway approach on the north side of the Lloyd

The Turpen Grocery as it is today.

Expressway).

In a telephone discussion with a classmate who now lives in the Indianapolis Area, I learned that Joanie went to Howard Roosa grade school from Kindergarten through Eighth grade. It was great to speak for 30 minutes to someone who had known her that young. She was described as being "very shy, very sweet and very quiet." This is also where I got the information that she had lived in front of the railroad tracks on Franklin Street. They had played together there often. This is also the area my grandmother had lived in until her death. This individual stated that she lost track of Joanie when they entered high school but assumed that she had went to Bosse high school. I was able to confirm this by some information that had been sent to me via a Facebook respondent who had found information that she had married another Bosse high school graduate.

Yearbook photos had confirmed that she had graduated from Bosse in 1957. The information in the 1957 yearbook said that she was involved in several activities: S&G (?) (UPDATE: S&G stands for Scarlet and Grey, the school colors, which is a designation given for above satisfactory performance and behavior), Yell Leaders Club (a group that yelled cheers from the stands along with the cheerleaders), Modeling Club and the Seventeen Club. I was also sent a copy of the 1956 Yearbook photo of her husband to be, Russell Allen Coomer who is listed to have been in S&G, a Hall Monitor, the Chess Club, the Camera Club and Vice-President of the Rod & Gun Club.

I was then able to make contact, again due to the Facebook Post, with I person that I have now found to be a cousin of mine. She grew up with Joanie and also lived on Franklin Street. Patty Singer is the daughter of Thomas Turpen, my Father's brother and my uncle. She knew Joanie growing up and through the time of her death. She said that Joanie was very unselfish at all times.

I soon learned that Joanie and Russell knew each other in high school and that Joanie wanted to marry him so badly that as soon as she had graduated in 1957, she had asked my father to sign for her so she could marry at age 17. Joan Lee Turpen became Joan Lee Coomer on June 15, 1957 shortly after her senior year ended.

I can only assume from his high school activities list and Joanie's desire to marry him that she loved him dearly and he must have met with my father's approval (my dad was a police officer after all). I choose to believe that he must have been a wonderful man. I have been unable to find much on him and he died in Evansville in 1997. Attempted contact with his possible family members have not yielded further information on Joanie.

They were married at Washington Avenue Baptist Church by the Reverend Herman Henning. The newspaper records her Maid of Honor as a Carolyn Powell who I still believe to be living in Evansville today (am still attempting to contact). A gray scale photo of her in her wedding dress accompanies the wedding announcement.

1335 East Franklin as it appears today.

Shortly after they were married, they lived at 1335 East Franklin Street (in the middle of the block between her parents and the grocery). They soon moved to Fairfield, Illinois and took up residence at 406 NW 10th Street.

I do not have much information regarding the three years between their marriage and her death.

One night at their home in Fairfield, probably in early 1959, Joanie fell ill. There are not a lot of details about this but she was ill enough that Russell had went to find a doctor who would come to the house. According to what Joanie had told my cousin after this night was that the doctor had given her "a shot" while at the house and that his "black doctor's bag was the dirtiest, filthiest thing she had ever seen."

406 NW 10th Street Fairfield, IL as it appears today.
Thank you to the local Eagle Scout who took this picture.

By the summer of 1959, Joanie had become ill again, this time diagnosed with Infectious Hepatitis, most likely acquired by the earlier injection. This information correlates with some of the small amount of information my father had imparted when I was young.

Joanie would have three major lapses with the Hepatitis, eventually moving back onto Franklin Street with her parents to be closer to treatment at St, Mary's Hospital. These times were described as her being very ill.

The third re-lapse took her life. She died on December 1st, 1960. She was just two weeks past turning 21 years old.

Reverend Henning, who had officiated her wedding, now delivered the message at her funeral. Services were held at the Lowe Funeral Home on West Franklin Street (now Pierre Funeral Home). She is buried just a few yards north of Covert Avenue in Parklawn Cemetery on Green River Road.

Her death certificate is signed by Dr. Mason Baker, who would deliver me and become my Doctor just four years later. I remember him well.

Many of the details above were found during the search. I have learned a lot about my family during the few days since that Facebook post. The house that Joanie and Russell had lived in on Franklin is where my grandmother lived as I was growing up. That somewhat explains the large picture of her that was always prominent in my grandmother's living room. As a paramedic, this house has meaning to me today. I worked the cardiac arrest on my grandmother in the kitchen as a young paramedic and another cardiac arrest there in later years. Who knew...

This is all I know. Even though I desire to know more, and I may as more information comes to light, I feel this much feels in the gaps.

She was sweet. She was unselfish. She was greatly loved. She was taken by a medical mistake by a caregiver which is they very function I work to prevent in my job today. In this act I will honor her memory. 

Her grave has not seen flowers in many years since my father's passing. This will soon change. It is hard for me to stand at her grave and only be a few feet away and never have met her. 

Today is my birthday. I am going to hit the "publish" button on this blog, shed a few tears, have a drink and come back to 2017. But I will never forget.

Rest in peace until we finally meet Joan Lee Coomer Turpen.