A Tale as Old as Time: 52 Ancestors 2025 “Oldest Story”

Love at First Sight Fades Quickly For Macbeth Teen

Zella Macbeth: 1888-1951 (Maternal First Cousin 1x Removed)
 

Young, impulsive love: truly the world’s oldest story. Sadly, it’s a story that rarely ends happily, and Zella Macbeth’s teen marriage followed that pattern. However, her story was entertaining enough that it attracted plenty of press attention. It had all the elements of a great soap opera: carnival workers, a fast-talking young man who could also play a pretty tune on a calliope, a pretty teen girl, elopement, an angry father tracking down the young couple, and even the police wading in to jail the musical groom. Front page news!

Zella Macbeth was born November 11, 1888, to parents William H. Macbeth and Nettie Houk Macbeth. She was the oldest of their three children, and the only girl. Her parents moved back and forth between a farm property in LeRay Township in Blue Earth County, Minnesota, and a house on South Broad Street in nearby Mankato. William both farmed and worked as a real estate agent. Zella likely attended a one-room school in the country for her elementary education, and then went to high school in Mankato.

In July 1906, when Zella was seventeen years old, a carnival rolled into town. Mankato was a sleepy little city, so the Parker Carnival, with all its games, rides and shows, would have been an exciting diversion. The carnival employed a young New York man, Arthur Franklyn, as a calliope and piano player. Zella attended the carnival and met Arthur, and the two started a romance. The carnival was only in town for a week, so, as one news article stated, “good use had to be made of the time between performances.”

Vintage postcard of a circus calliope--Arthur Franklin would sit inside the calliope wagon to play, and could be seen by his audience.

Apparently, they made very good use of their limited time, for on July 13, Arthur went to the Blue Earth County Clerk’s office and obtained a marriage license. As you can see below, the license had a few “errors”. Firstly, despite Zella’s birth record and all other records on which she appeared showing her first name as “Zella”, the marriage license lists her as “Catherine Macbeth”. Secondly, while Arthur’s age is correctly listed as 28, his intended wife’s age is listed as twenty, three years older than Zella’s true age.

According to press accounts, Arthur and Zella “quietly sought a prominent divine, Rev. George W. Davis, pastor of the aristocratic First Presbyterian church. He quickly made them husband and wife, and then they sought the handsome home of the bride.”  The news reporters tended to exaggerate the Macbeths’ wealth. Their home was hardly in the ritzy part of town. It was nice, but not “handsome” and certainly not a mansion.

Broad Street just a block from the Macbeth House, circa 1910.

Predictably, William Macbeth was not pleased to be presented with a carnival musician for a son-in-law. One news report said he gave the couple “a marble heart” and “ordered Franklin to leave the city “on pain of arrest for perjury” due to the lies on the marriage license.

Franklin left the Macbeth house, but remained in the city, donning some sort of disguise. Zella and her brother Ralph drove downtown the next day, and the young couple spotted one another. The newspaper said “she at once flew to his side, while her younger brother pleaded with her to return.”

Ralph went home to get his father, who charged downtown, grabbed a policeman, and demanded that the officer arrest Franklin. The poor policeman refused to make an arrest without a warrant, so William, Zella, Franklin and a “great crowd of curious people” descended on City Hall. One article said the carnival even sent their lawyer over to defend Franklin. While the situation was ripe for a brawl, saner heads prevailed and an arrangement was worked out. Zella was sent home with her parents, and Franklin was ordered to head out with the carnival on their next stops in South Dakota and Canada. When the show returned to Minnesota in three weeks’ time, the young bride would be allowed to join her new husband.

Some of the articles were over the top. Here is a section from the Mankato Daily Review:

“Miss Macbeth saw Doc Franklin, and Doc looked at her. He was playing away in his faultless style when she confused him in his part, something which had never occurred before. There followed a short courtship, not exactly approved of by Lord and Lady Macbeth of Mankato, and they showed they did not carry their name in vain when they caused Doc to be arrested before the carnival was to leave town.”

Some news accounts had a tearful Zella begging the police officers to lock her up with her husband—that she could not bear to be parted from him. I suspect the actual scene was not quite as dramatic as that.

After three weeks, the couple was reunited in either Mankato, Brainerd, or St. Cloud, Minnesota, depending on which news account is to be believed. The Daily Review described it as follows:

“St. Cloud was the place where the lovers were united Sunday. Doc grinned yesterday when he was accosted by the Journal Press man and asked how he liked married life….[Doc responded] ‘I went from the church to the jail, and from the jail to heaven. It was a long trip by way of Sioux Falls, Winnipeg and Brainerd, but I found the heaven in St. Cloud.’  Mrs. Macbeth (sic) was radian and happy. A letter…from her father’s lawyer did not affect her in the least…that her father had changed his will, and his daughter Catherine was absolutely disinherited. But the music of the calliope sounds better to Mrs. Franklin than the jingle of silver…”

Zella apparently performed in the carnival in some fashion.  The Daily Review reported on August 7 that “Mrs. Franklin is taking part in one of the attractions and made her debut at St. Cloud Monday night. It is said she is not pleased with show life and is somewhat homesick.”

The bloom was off the rose of teen passion after just four weeks. It is unclear how long Zella remained on the road with Arthur. The Minneapolis Journal reported on Zella’s divorce petition on June 26, 1908.

“Judge Pfau has granted a divorce to Mrs. Zella Franklin (note that this is the first news article to use her real name of Zella rather than Catherine) from her husband, Arthur Franklin, on the ground of desertion and non-support, and she is allowed to resume her maiden name of Zella Macbeth. They were married in this city two years ago, after a few days’ acquaintance…Two months later, it is alleged, Franklin deserted his wife, who comes from a well-known family.”

So what happened to Zella following her divorce? A 1908 Mankato City Directory shows her living with her parents at 326 South Broad and working as a nurse. But by the 1910 census she had changed professions. She was still living at home but was now an actress in the theater industry. I found an article from an October 13, 1911, Mankato newspaper titled “Miss Zella Macbeth Meets with Success”. It stated that she “began her stage career three years ago. She studied at a theatrical school in Chicago for six months…” The article goes on to list some of her theater credits and reported that she was the leading lady in a touring show of a musical comedy called “The Girl from Bohemia” which would play in Mankato later that year.

I believe Zella started out performing under her middle name, Helen, as a Helen Macbeth appeared in a comedy at Garrick’s Theater in Chicago in May of 1909, around the time she would have completed theatrical school in the same city. She appears on records following 1909 as both Zella and Helen.

Zella disappears from records for a few years following the 1911 article. She married a man named Herbert Williams and they had a daughter, Jean Williams, around 1916. I have found no marriage or census records for them. The couple seem to have moved fairly frequently. According to census data, Jean was born in California. By the time Zella’s father William died March 23, 1931, the obituary listed survivors as Mrs. H. Williams of Detroit, Michigan. Another newspaper stated she was living in Toronto, Canada.

Zella, calling herself Helen Williams, appeared on the 1940 census living in in the Broad Street house in Mankato with her widowed mother and daughter Jean. Zella stated she was a widow and was retired, so Herbert Williams had died sometime prior to 1940. Zella had also shaved several years off her age; she stated she was 46 but in reality was nearly 52. The census record also noted that Zella and Jean had been living in London, England in 1935. Jean, then 24 years old in 1940, was working as a dental nurse in a dental office.

Zella made only one last appearance in the records, at her death on April 1, 1951. She died in a Long Beach California hospital, and had been living at 330 West Ocean Boulevard, a beachfront apartment highrise. Her obituary appeared in the Long Beach Press-Telegram, and continued Zella’s fictions about her life. She was listed as Helen Macbeth Williams, not Zella, and her age was given as 52 when she was actually 63. Her mother Nettie and daughter Jean were listed as survivors living in Mankato.

Headstone image from Findagrave. Photo by RB Hall-Gallea and MS Gallea.

Zella’s body was returned to Minnesota. She was buried in Glenwood Cemetery in Mankato near her parents. Her headstone lists her true name, Zella M Williams, and her true birthdate of 1888.

Sources:

“Surprise and Trouble.” Mankato Daily Review. Mankato, MN. Jul 14, 1906.

“Groom Did Not Leave City”. Mankato Daily Review. Mankato, MN. Jul 16, 1906

“Street Carnival Yields a Romance.” Minneapolis Journal. Minneapolis, MN. Jul 17, 1906.

“Sudden: Mankato Couple Become Acquainted, Wed and Separate All in One Week.” Minneapolis Star-Tribune. Minneapolis, MN. Jul 18, 1906.

Item on Franklins. Mankato Daily Review. Mankato, MN. Aug 7, 1906.

“Lovers United at St. Cloud.” Mankato Daily Review reprint of St. Cloud Journal-Press article. Mankato, MN. Aug 9, 1906

“Married in Haste”. Minneapolis Journal. Minneapolis, MN. Jun 26, 1908.

“Miss Zella Macbeth Meets With Success.” Mankato Daily Review. Mankato, MN. Oct. 13, 1911.

“Macbeth Funeral Will Be Saturday”. Mankato Free Press, Mankato MN, Mar 26, 1931.

Obituary for Mrs. Helen Macbeth Williams. Long Beach Press-Telegram. Long Beach, CA. Apr 3, 1951.