Francis Marion Benschoter and his wife Maud, had five daughters: Eloda Fay (Bryant), Zelta Viva (Mayeur), Alta Verl (McCain Murray), Lillian Elberta (Plumley), and Frances May (Dolson).

His daughter, Eloda Fay, wrote an extensive narrative of her father and their family's early life. Here are excerpts:

"As he grew older, he met and admired, then hopelessly fell in love with his first cousin, Maud Whitcomb. During the year of 1893, Maud's father, Olney Whitcomb and mother Margaret Catherine Craig Whitcomb, moved from their Humboldt, Nebraska home to Webster, Harris County, Texas bringing their family with them, including daughter Maud.... Frank was in Webster for some time before January 8, 1896 when he and Maud were married in Houston, Harris County, Texas. They rented a home in Webster. I think neither lived to see the day they regretted their marriage."

"...it was not long until our father left Webster to work in an oil field at High Island. What he did at first, I do not know, but was made a driller after he had been there a while. He had never been a man to smoke or drink. In an oil field such a man was a rare thing. He stuck to his beliefs. All men there lived in tents, two men to a tent. A much larger tent served as cook-house and mess hall. He did not like being away from home, but could not find work to his liking around Webster at that time. After he left his father and mother's home in Missouri, he never returned except for visits. I'm sure he missed them often."

"After the well drilling job was finished for our Grandfather Whitcomb, our father turned to carpenter work. In this he was rather proficient, and before he became older and quit the work altogether, he had contracted to build homes, had moved homes, had remodeled homes and taught some younger men their first lessons in carpenter work. This was over a period of many years, which were interrupted at times for other occupations."

"When I was old enough to go to school, our father became a member of the school board. I think from the time his first daughter entered school until the last finished, there were few years this man did not have a position on the school board. He never solicited the job, but did his best when once more elected."

"I believe it could rightly be said of our father that one of the fine traits he strongly gave evidence of, was influencing young men to take more interest in themselves and in their future."

"The day he bought his first new car was a real red-letter day. As with all of his car purchases, he paid cash. The first was an Essex. Now he was going to cruise around the countryside and take his little wife for a drive now and then. The idea worked well."

"When their time came, our mother was the first to go. In January of 1939 we lost her. The cruelty of one of an elderly couple remaining when the other is taken was shown to us many times after our father lived on without his wife....He lived about six years after losing his wife, and passed away in August 1946. He was placed beside our mother in the Forest Park Cemetery, Houston, Texas.

He was a man who lived a friendly life. Was respected by neighbors, even though at times his ideas differed from theirs on given subjects; they respected his views. At one time some neighbors (the W. H. Boughton family) were discussing at their supper table who was the most completely liked man in Webster, what man was the most respected and loved by young and old. In the final vote Frank Benschoter was chosen by them."

Excerpts by Eloda Fay Benschoter in book by Harry LaVird Craig Descendants of Jane Taliaferro Craig

~~mjp~~