52 Ancestors #25: Felix Leroy Duckworth

Again, I’m skipping around the generations because I’m trying to fill in some blanks in my family tree.
Felix Leroy Duckworth is a bit of a mystery.
I know a bit about his appearance based on the few photos of him that I’ve uncovered among family papers and scrapbooks, but little else to tell me anything about his life.

Felix Duckworth

Felix is the father of my great-grandmother, Amy Ruth Duckworth Simpson.
He was born July 25, 1881, in Indiana, son of Sylvester and Emma Russell Duckworth.
He was living in Posey County, Indiana, in 1900, according to U.S. Census records.
He made it to southeast Missouri sometime after the turn of the century because he and Bessie Pearl Clymer had two children together (Amy Ruth and Cecil).

I’ve found no verification that he and Bessie ever actually married. No marriage is recorded in Missouri and I have no reason to believe that she went to Indiana with him, though it could be possible.

Felix did register for the draft in 1918 back in Posey County, Indiana, listing his brother Charlie as his nearest relative.
He is also listed as having completed a draft card for WWII, also living in Indiana at the time.

I know very little else about him, including when he died or where.

Although he must have left his children behind to go back to Indiana, he did have contact with them. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have discovered any photos of him, or even know his name. So, there’s clearly more to his story that I’ll have to discover.

Sources: U.S. Census, 1900; draft registrations, 1918, 1930.