Charles and Edith Jarvis

Mom, Edith Conley, never said much about her first marriage and neither did anyone else, so this is what little we have. If you know more please share it, and I'll correct and fill in the story.

Charles Jarvis lived in Oka, Calhoun, West Virginia in 1930, but it seems that his family later moved to Akron, Ohio. Therefore he and Edith may have met in high school, at a USO dance, or around town.  Arthur John Merrick, Edith's second husband said, "I knew Charles Jarvis, too. He and I were truck drivers together."

A year before the end of WWII, on September 3, 1944, Charles and Edith married. They were both 21 years old. Charles was serving in the Army at this time, but we know nothing of where he served or what he did. It appears that they lived with Grandma Eunice Conley during their marriage. 

As Aunt Marie Conley Cendro explained, many of Grandma's children came back and lived with her at some time.  Marie remembered the summer of 1945 when she was only 14 years old and living at home on 508 Ohio Street in Akron. "Mill and Lorraine lived in the attic. Edith and Charles lived in the two little rooms at the back of the second floor below the attic. Mill and Lorraine had to go through there to get to the attic. Don and Ruth had the second floor, front, four room apartment, and they all shared the same second floor bathroom at the top of the stairs. . .  Edith got a divorce and later moved to the third floor across the street" with her three sons: Mel born March 29, 1945, Garrett born December 15, 1946, and Ken born November 10, 1948.

We think that Charles came and left several times during their marriage before Edith divorced him, but this is not confirmed. We do know that Edith had many rough years trying to provide for her three sons, but she didn't quit and she kept her family together. For a while she worked for the Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company. 

Ken does not have many memories of Charles, for it seems that they divorced shortly after he was born. Garrett was probably only two years old at this time and doesn't remember his father being in their home. Mel, we surmise, was about three or four years old at the time of his parents' divorce. He seems to have been the most deeply affected by his father's leaving.