Mary Jane (Marie Jeanne) was one of eleven children born in
Point Gatineau, Province of Quebec, Canada to Francois and Rose Landrier
Toutloff. Francois Toutloff lost his lumber business in floods that swelled the Gatineau River and carried away the plant. The family moved to the
United States to start a new life, and settled in De Pere, Wisconsin, where they
operated the Exchange Hotel.
Mary Jane was their ninth child. She married a boarder in
their hotel, Frank Wilbur Taylor, who
wrote of the marriage ceremony, ”E. M. Clough and wife were the only
witnesses. The ceremony was performed at 5:30 P. M. We had supper at Cook’s
Hotel in Green Bay and then drove five miles by horse and buggy to West St.
Pere where we had our house all furnished and where we began housekeeping at
once.”
Frank and Mary Jane had three children, Frank William
(Wilbur), born June 10, 1887, William James, born May 8, 1889, and Irene May,
born February 14, 1891. (she died Oct 31, 1901 at age ten of “brain fever.”) Taylor Klose recalled a story that his mother Virginia had told him about Mary Jane -- she had been a staunch Catholic but gave up her faith when she married Frank. However she apparently smuggled FWT Jr. out of the house and had him baptized!
Mary Jane died of nephritis (kidney disease) Jan 10, 1909 in
the family home on Cherry Street, Green Bay, and is buried in Woodlawn Cemetery.
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This biography is drawn from a report that Virginia Taylor
Klose put together in 1988, recording what her father, FWT Jr. had compiled
from notes FWT Sr. had written for him in the 1920’s.
