This photo was taken in 1935 or 1936, directly in front of the Jacob Masemer House (also known later as the Keim House, and more recently, as Creekside) in the center of Browntown. The person taking the photo is facing north towards the Browntown bridge on the left, and the old Masemer Planing Mill building can be seen on the right. In the distance on the left you can just see a building that we believe may at one time have been a blacksmith’s shop.
The writing on the back of the photo titles it “Joe Sylvester’s Chevy”. Unfortunately, we have been unable to identify who Joe Sylvester was or to determine his relationship to the four people in the photo. However, we do know who those four people are. The two young ladies on the left are Syrene and Myrtle Manuel, who were sisters. Myrtle is the one at the front. The two, much younger, girls on the right are Helen Manuel Coleman and her friend Mildred Frances Mathews. Mildred is the one at the front.
We are going to guess that Joe Sylvester worked for a local company that rented out cars for special occasions. Both Myrtle and Syrene are dressed smartly in fashionable coats and hats and the two younger girls are wearing party dresses. Note also that Myrtle Manuel is displaying openly an engagement ring on her left hand. Could this have been Myrtle’s special day to celebrate her new engagement?
Another photo of Browntown in the thirties, with
Helen Coleman and Syrene Manuel on the left. On their right are Toy Cooper, Dewey Vaught and Carrie Edmunds.
MORE ABOUT THE FOUR PEOPLE IN THE FIRST PHOTO
SYRENE ROBERTA MANUEL COOPER (1916-2011)
Syrene was born in Browntown, Va., the daughter of Ashby Manuel and Lelia Swartz Manuel. She and her mother, Lelia, left Browntown in the late 1930s, for a new life in Washington D.C. Lelia had separated from Ashby, but Ashby had also moved to the nation’s capital. Ashby had found a job at Stone Straw, and Lelia found a job there also. Stone Straw was the inventor of paper straws, and business was booming. Later in the 1930s Syrene met and married Edmund W. Shamleffer. They lived in Browntown for the first few years of their married life. The 1940 census shows them living in Washington D.C. where Edmund had found a job with the Evening Star newspaper. They had one son, also named Edmund, and a daughter, Carole.
This picture of Syrene, and several members of her family was taken many years later. Syrene is the lady wearing the blue dress. Her husband, Edmund, is the man on the far right in this photo.
MYRTLE FRANCES MANUEL COOPER (1914-1988)
Married Toy Taft Cooper on July 4th, 1936. Myrtle, like her sister moved to DC later in 1936, Ann and then Jean were born there, and lived in the Brookland area.Their father was a hard worker, first working as a janitor at Trinity College, and at one time was working three jobs doing the same work for Bond Bread and D.C. public schools. Eventually he was Assistant Superintendent for D.C. Public Schools. Myrtle for many years worked at National Geographic, along with her sister Syrene. In 1977 Myrtle and Toy and their kids came back to Warren County and settled in Front Royal.
HELEN LOUISE MANUEL COLEMAN (1918-2011)
Helen Louise Manuel was born on May 6, 1918, in Front Royal, Virginia. Her father was Hubert George Manuel and her mother was Effie Lee Rudacille. Helen attended Browntown Elementary School and Warren County High School. She basically spent her entire life in Warren County except for a year that she lived and worked in Washington, DC.
In 1942, John Stuart Coleman of Mt Pleasant, South Carolina came to Front Royal and was stationed at the old Remount Station. One evening he came into town with some of his friends and met Helen for the first time. According to Helen “It was love at first sight”.
Helen married John Stuart Coleman on July 22, 1943, in Alexandria, Virginia. They had one daughter, Bonnie Coleman Sealock.
Photo of Helen Louise Manuel Coleman in her 80s
Helen died on January 30, 2011, in her hometown of Front Royal at the age of 92, and was buried there.
MILDRED FRANCES CLEM MATHEWS (1918-2009)
Gladys, Mildred’s mother, Gladys, was from Browntown, the daughter of Silas and Minnie Francis Good Thornhill. Gladys had two sisters and two brothers, all of whom lived their whole lives in Browntown. One of these brothers, Clyde, was an especially remarkable man. He was born in 1911 and became blind when he was about 18. He lived in the family home on Fetchett Road and took care of his ailing brother for several years. He did his own cooking on a wood stove, split his firewood, and built fires in his stove. If he wanted Orivel Baker, a neighbor, to stop by he would put a rock on the fence post or turn on a certain light.
Mildred was born in the Fork District of Warren County but when she was one year old her family moved to Browntown where they lived in a house that had been partially torn down. Her parents had four other children. In 1935 Gladys and Mildred’s father, Weaver, moved their family, except Mildred, to Washington D.C. when Weaver got a new job there.
Mildred did not go with them because she was engaged to marry Kenneth Mathews, the son of Milton and Annie Mathews. Mildred and Kenneth were both 16 when they got married. They lived with Kenneth’s parents for several years before moving to a house on Smith Run Road in Browntown. Mildred and Kenneth had one son, Jerry Lee Mathews, who was born in 1936.
Mildred and Kenneth had a very active social life during their years together, and especially enjoyed playing cards and dancing with their network of friends and other members of their extended family who lived locally. Mildred and Kenneth had milk cows so they sold cream and butter. This was the start of what would become a significant cattle business.
Mildred is remembered especially for her sewing skills. Over the years she sewed for hundreds of people, making dresses, suits, wedding gowns, etc. She even made clothes for people in California.