LeRoy L. Gragg
LeRoy L. Gragg was born on 31 December 1900 near McAlester, in the Choctaw Nation of Indian Territory, the son of Emanuel H. Gragg, called Manuel, and Laura McAninch. His grandfather William Henry Gragg and his great-uncle Samuel Gragg had come down from Henry County, Missouri, with their families before 1900 and farmed near each other. In 1910 LeRoy, called Roy, was nine and living in Diamond Township, Haskell County, with his parents and his brothers and sisters Sylvia, Manuel, Daymond and Lucy. His mother died within the next few years.
On 17 July 1923 he married Grace Florence Hulvey, the daughter of Lewis Howard Hulvey and Elizabeth Riller Jones. They had eleven children. The ones remembered are Geraldine, Virginia Lucille, LeRoy Jr., Manuel June (1928), Billie Jack, who died as a baby in 1929, Rudolph Howard, Robert Jack, James Charles, Raymond and Daymond Therrel (both 1942), and Lora Lou (1948).
LeRoy went into the mines, unlike the farmers before him. In 1930 the family was at Dow, a coal camp in Pittsburg County, and in 1940 at Machire in Haskell County. Grace died at McCurtain on 21 November 1948, aged 44, months after the birth of her last child.
About 1949 LeRoy moved to the Kansas City area, where several of his children settled. He died on 30 September 1969 at Trinity Lutheran Hospital in Kansas City, aged 68. The Kansas City paper wrote:
"LeRoy Gragg, sr., 68, Blue Springs, died yesterday at Trinity Lutheran hospital. He was born in Oklahoma and had lived here 20 years. He was a retired coal miner. Surviving are seven sons, LeRoy Gragg, jr., Shelby, Mont.; Manuel Gragg, California; Rudolph Gragg, 1400 East Linwood; Robert Gragg, Tulsa; James Gragg, Albuquerque, and Raymond Gragg and Daymond Gragg, both of Kansas City; three daughters, Mrs. Geraldine Young of the home; Mrs. Virginia Gibson, 3100 Harrison, and Mrs. Garland Blackwell, Tulsa; a brother, Daymond Gragg, Seattle; a sister, Mrs. Sylvia Kelly, Los Angeles; 17 grandchildren, and two great-grandchildren."
He was taken home to be buried beside Grace in the Miners Cemetery at McCurtain, Oklahoma.
Sources
If LeRoy L. Gragg is in your family, start your own tree.
Researched October 2026. Cite: Heirology, "LeRoy L. Gragg (1900-1969)", https://heirology.com/ancestors/leroy-l-gragg-1900-1969-bd0597.