Notes for: Elvira Gaston
Elvira Gaston and her husband, Lester Ward Platt, worked as missionaries with the Pawnee Indians in Nebraska for years. There is much written about her because, as one descendant observed, "she made history." [Bob Gaston, Longview, WA]
"Elvira Gaston Platt was born in Danby, New York, on July 16, 1818. Her family moved to Ohio in 1834 and she became a student at Oberlin College the following year. She later taught at a rural school in Russia Township, Ohio. In 1841 she married Lester Ward Platt and moved with him to Nebraska to teach the Pawnee Indians. Both were devoted to the causes of abolishing slavery and whiskey. After her husband died in 1875, Elvira Gaston Platt taught in the Industrial School for Indians in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, and served as matron in a school for Indians in Geoa, Nebraska. She died on January 24, 1914."
[ http://www.oberlin.edu/archive/holdings/finding/RG30/SG199/biography.html ]
"Elvira Gaston Platt, teacher and abolitionist and underground railroad worker, was born in Danby, Thompkins County, New York, on July 15, 1818. She studied at Oberlin College in Ohio in 1835 and 1836 and began teaching in area rural schools. In 1841 Elvira Gaston married Lester Ward Platt and in 1842 they began teaching Pawnee Indians in the western territory, in what is now Nebraska. In 1847 they moved to Fremont County, Iowa, turned to farming, and began assisting fleeing slaves on the underground railroad.
In 1861 Elvira Platt returned to teaching Pawnee children, which she continued until 1872 with a few interruptions for Civil War work. Lester Platt died in 1875 and Elvira Platt joined the staff of the Industrial School for Indians in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, in 1880. Three years later she became matron of a new school for Native Americans in Genoa, Nebraska, where she worked until she retired in 1887. She lived in Tabor, Iowa, until 1897, when she moved to Oberlin, Ohio. She died there on January 25, 1914." [ http://sdrc.lib.uiowa.edu/iwa/findingaids/html/PlattElvira.htm ]
HER OBITUARY:
"Elvira Gaston Platt, aged 95 years, died at Oberlin, Ohio, Sunday, January 25, of pneumonia, where a funeral service was read. The body was then brought to Tabor for interment in the Gaston lot where her husband and other relatives lie. Services were held here on Wednesday, January 28, conducted by Rev. C. F. Fisher.
Elvira Gaston Platt was a sister of George B. Gaston, one of the founders of Tabor College, and an aunt of Ed Rossiter, Loren Hume and Harry Gilbert of Tabor. Coming from her native state, New York, she and her father were pioneers of the Oberlin colony, where she was married in 1841, to Lester W. Platt, with whom she soon afterward moved to Nebraska. Here at different intervals, in the Pawnee Indian Nation school she taught and also in the Carlyle school in Pennsylvania, all her life being spent in educational work.
At Percival (then known as Civil Bend) she lived, her home a "shrine" to young and old.
She served in the Sanitary Commission during the civil war, and was later matron of the Soldiers’ Orphan Home at Cedar Falls.
Mrs. Platt made her home in Tabor for many years and made her life felt here for uplift. For the last seventeen years she has lived at Oberlin. In the 95 years of her life, Mrs. Platt has combined manifold experiences, and has seen and helped in the upbuilding of our western country.
She was known throughout many states as a woman of great power. A memorial service will be given in her honor here at Tabor."
[ http://iagenweb.org/fremont/obits/platt_elvira-hiatt_elizabeth1914.htm ]