Sunday's Obituary - Eleanor Prosser nee Brown

I decided to prepare some posts on the Neil and Bridget Brown (nee Brown) family. I recently uploaded my family tree onto Ancestry. I had been holding off wanting to get everything just perfect before uploading it. How silly is that though! Are we ever truly finished with our family trees? No! So I uploaded it, but kept it private. I know some people think it's counter-productive to keep it private, but I disagree. I can still interact with others and they can interact with me, but they have to contact me for most information as opposed to just copying it and running away. Isn’t that what we want anyway?

So as I was clicking on the little leaf-hints after uploading my tree I saw that someone else had a tree with people from my Brown line. I contacted her and asked if she wanted to collaborate. Since I was looking at this line’s information and hadn’t shared much I figured that now was a good time.

“Eleanor Brown Prosser

Hazleton Standard Speaker,
14OCT1972, pg 16

Mrs. Eleanor Brown Prosser, of 635 N. James St., died at 9 a.m. yesterday in St. Joseph Hospital, where she had been a patient since Sept. 22.

Born in this city where she spent the greater part of her life, she was a daughter of  the late Neil and Bridget (Brown) Brown, and was a member of St. Gabriel’s Church.

She was graduated from the former St. Gabriel’s High School and the Hazleton State General Hospital School of Nursing.

She was preceded in death by a brother, Neil and a sister, Mrs. William (Rita) Dermott.

Surviving are three sons, Thomas J., of Camp Hill; Robert C. and J. Paul, both of Reading; five grandchildren and the following brothers and sisters, Mrs. Nancy Harkins, Newark, Del.; Mrs. Clyde (Mary) Barth, James and Charles Brown, all of this city; Eugene, of Levittown; Paul, Meadville; John, of Philadelphia; and Mrs. Charles (Joan) Cann, this city.

The funeral will be held from the Boyle Funeral Home, 100 S. Wyoming St., at 9 a.m. Monday, with a Mass of the Resurrection in St. Gabriel’s Church at 9:30. Interment will be in the Calvary Cemetery, Drums.

Friends may call from 2 to 4 and 7 to 9 p.m. Sunday.”

What wasn’t mentioned in this obituary was Eleanor’s husband’s name. I’ve seen plenty of obituaries where the spouse was mentioned and not the parents, but I haven’t seen many where the husband was left out. My assumption is that Rodney died before his wife. To me the fact that he isn’t listed as surviving Eleanor implies this, but I’ll have to see what I can turn up. So far nothing on Ancestry or Newspapers.com confirms this, but I have little on Rodney to start from. He was a member of a family tree that my late cousin, Nancy O’Donoghue nee Brown, sent me and she had no dates of birth or death for him. As for Eleanor, she is my first cousin twice removed.