Ed and Billie Brown

On October 30, 1925 Frances Jane Whitman (Billie) went with her older sister, Marge, to downtown Oklahoma City for Marge to meet her current beau, Clifford Brown. When they arrived at their destination they found that Clifford had brought his brother, Ed, with him.

Apparently, Billie and Ed hit it off right away and during their flirting, Ed dared her to meet him downtown the next day and marry him. Surprising everyone, probably including herself, she did just that.

They met on October 30, 1925 and were married on Halloween, October 31, 1925. Billie was 15; Ed was 19. Both were already out of high school and Ed, who was originally from Detroit, was living on his own and working a full-time job.

After the wedding, Billie went home to her mother and Ed went back to the boarding house he was living in with Clifford. It wasn't until six weeks later that their families found out about the marriage.

Sometime after the wedding, Billie left for Texas to either live with or visit her father. I don't know if she and Ed had remained in touch during this time but it seems reasonable to think that they had.

After a few weeks she apparently finally got up her nerve to tell her father that she was married. I do remember her saying that her stepmother thought that she must be pregnant, which was not the case at all. She and Ed had never even spent any time alone together. And, she had NO idea where babies came from. Since most babies were born at home in 1925 and the doctor attended the pregnant woman there, Billie still thought that the doctor brought them in his bag.

At any rate, John contacted Hattie with this alarming news. I think Billie was then sent back to Oklahoma City to deal with her mother's wrath and begin living life as a married woman. When Ed came to pick her up from her mother's house it was the first time the newlyweds had seen each other since their wedding day.

Ed and Billie moved into a apartment house in Oklahoma City. Ed was working at the Semple Manufacturing Company as a serviceman, probably servicing refrigerators which were brand new at the time. Here is a picture of the apartment building they lived in in 1925. Although it's an abandoned, deteriorating building today it was most likely a very respectable apartment house in 1925.

The Children of Edward Frank Brown and Frances (Billie) Brown