A life, recovered / 1886–1937
Jessie Quenile Walker
From Navarro County to Oklahoma and back to Texas
Jessie Quenile Walker, my great-great-grandmother.
01
A Walker and Cope childhood
Jessie Quenile Walker was my great-great-grandmother. She was born in Navarro County, Texas, in August 1886, the daughter of Richard Merrick Walker and Mary E. Cope. Her mother died in 1888, when Jessie was still very young.
By 1900, Jessie was living with her aunt Rebecca Cope and Edward Walker in Navarro County’s Justice Precinct 6. The census lists her as Jessie Q. Walker, Edward’s thirteen-year-old niece. The Walker and Cope names were part of the same household and the same family story.
Sources: Jessie Quenile Walker — family profile and timeline · 1900 United States census — Navarro County, Texas
02
Jessie and Nolan
Jessie married Nolan David Smith in Navarro County on September 1, 1902. She was sixteen. Their family grew over the next two decades, with children born in both Texas and Oklahoma.
Willie Finest Smith was born in 1903, followed by Lula Idalia Faye “Duck” Smith in 1907. Tennie Lee Smith, my great-grandmother, was born in Pursley on May 16, 1910. Ora Melissa Smith followed in 1913 and Jake Walker Richard Smith in Waxahachie in 1917. Raymond Parker Smith was born in Oklahoma in 1921, and Thaura Dee Smith in Altus in 1923.
Through Tennie and her son Billy Guy Anderson—Papa Bill—Jessie’s story becomes part of the Anderson family history I grew up with.
Sources: Jessie Quenile Walker — family profile and timeline · Family recollections and photograph archive
03
The years in Oklahoma
The family’s early years were centered in Navarro County. By 1920, Jessie was living in Wilson, in Atoka County, Oklahoma. The younger children’s birthplaces carry that Oklahoma chapter forward: Raymond was born in the state, and Thaura Dee was born in Altus, in Jackson County.
In 1930, Jessie was living in Looney, in Harmon County. These were separate places and separate points in the family’s movement across Texas and Oklahoma. Her life was not confined to the county where she was born or the town where she was eventually buried.
Sources: Jessie Quenile Walker — family profile and timeline
04
Dallas and Addison
Jessie died at Parkland Hospital in Dallas on May 26, 1937. She was fifty. Her death certificate gives Addison as her usual residence, and her burial was recorded there.
Nolan lived until 1962. Their daughter Tennie married Guy William Anderson, and the family line continued through their children. Jessie’s portrait now sits alongside Tennie’s and Papa Bill’s in this family archive.
Sources: Texas death certificate 25425 — Jesse Smith · Jessie Quenile Walker — family profile and timeline · Family recollections and photograph archive
Look a little closer
The photographs
hold more of the story.
Open any image to see the complete photograph. Captions name the people and places in each photograph.
The opening image is the available visual record for this profile.
Continue through the archive
One life leads to another.
Behind this biography
Sources & further reading
These sources support the biography and its continuing research.
- Jessie Quenile Walker — family profile and timeline
Ancestry LifeStory and Facts exports supplied October 26, 2026; tree 14759972, person 18285772143. Family relationships, marriage, children and residence chronology.
- 1900 United States census — Navarro County, Texas
Justice Precinct 6, ED 107, sheet 30A, dwelling 541, family 542. Jessie Q. Walker, niece, age thirteen. Transcription preserved in the Anderson family research record.
- Texas death certificate 25425 — Jesse Smith
The Anderson family research record preserves the certificate’s May 26, 1937 death at Parkland Hospital, Dallas; Addison residence and burial/removal information.
- Family recollections and photograph archive
Jessie’s family relationship and portrait; the Smith and Anderson connection through Tennie Lee and Billy Guy Anderson.