#DayFHWChallenge-Day 2: Alice Murphy Cody

Day 2 challenge is to think of your ancestor as a character in a novel and describe them.  Here is a picture of my great-grandfather's sister, Alice Murphy Cody. Oh, how I wish that I would have known Alice!

Alice was born to William and Elizabeth Smith Murphy in 1870.  She was the only girl born to them; she had six brothers!  Alice had to have been tough to have dealt with that!  I think that Alice would have been rather short, with probably dark hair and blue eyes. Her mother died when she was thirteen.  Her father remarried the following year, and Alice was pretty much on her own after that. When her father died in 1891 Alice was twenty-one years old. Five years later she married Joe Cody and her two youngest brothers came to live with her and Joe.

I think that Alice was a strong, funny, bright woman.  She lost her parents early, but worked to keep the family together.  She had three daughters, but had lost two sons in infancy. Her second youngest brother suffered from mental illness all his life and he lived with her for years.

Joe Cody provided a nice living for his family and Alice had very nice things.  She dressed well, and had a beautiful home in the nicest area of town. She and Joe were very active in their church and generous with their wealth.  Joe died in 1927.  Alice continued living in the family home with her daughter, Mary.  Around 1940, Alice began to suffer from dementia and was kept upstairs in her room until she died in 1944 at the age of 74. She was remembered as being wickedly funny and incredibly generous.