Anna Annabelle Pope was born in Farmington, Minnesota on April 18, 1878. Her parents were Seymour Pope (1845-1907) and Mary Florence Williams Pope (1850-1931). Anna’s grandparents were Edmund Pope (1802-1858) and Jerusha Taylor Pope (1804-1851); and Jonathan D. Williams (1805-1857) and Elizabeth B. Matteson.
Anna’s great-great-great-great-great-great-grandfather, Thomas Pope, was born in England in 1608 and died in Dartmouth, Massachusetts, was on the Mayflower, and came to Plymouth Colony as a settler-colonist, as did several members of her relatives. Plymouth Colony (sometimes Plimouth) was the first permanent English colony in New England from 1620 to 1691 and the second permanent English colony in North America, after the Jamestown Colony, according to Wikipedia.
Other great-great-great-great-great-grandparents of Anna were Ensign Jacob Mitchell (1645-1675) and Susannah Pope Mitchell (1649-1675). Jacob and Susannah were involved in King Philip’s War, sometimes called the First Indian War, Pometacomet’s Rebellion, or Metacom’s Rebellion. It was an armed conflict in 1675-1676 between indigenous inhabitants of New England and New England settler-colonists and their indigenous allies. The war is named for Metacom, the Wampanoag chief who adopted the name Philip because of the friendly relations between his father Massasoit and the Mayflower Pilgrims, according to Wikipedia.
Ensign Mitchell and Susannah were slain by Phillip’s warriors “early in the morning as they were going to the garrison, wither they had sent their children the afternoon before,” according to The New England Historical and Genealogical Register, Boston at the New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1847. (Online database: AmericanAncestors.org, New England Historic Genealogical Society, 2001-2009.)
Anna, along with Ida Dorothea Busse, became the first graduates of Union School in Shakopee, in 1898. Students before them had graduated in Shakopee, but this was the first time that a state signed approval based on the good rank among schools of the state in the matter of examinations, according to the Scott County Argus, May 23, 1898.
In the Scott County Argus on June 19, 1898, the first annual commencement of Union School happened Tuesday evening, June 7, 1898, at the Lander Opera House on the corner of Holmes and First Avenue in Shakopee. The program was listened with rapt attention by an audience “which tested the capacity of the big hall.”
It started with a march by the stringed orchestra, made up of “mandolins, guitar, and ‘cello.” Anna and Ida marched in, along with the school board, Professor McBee, and the speaker, Hon. William H. Eustis. Rev. J.B. Ferguson invoked the Divine blessing. Then Mrs. R.P. Starr, in a piano solo, sang “Selections from Faust.” According to the Scott County Argus, “The surprising ease and grace with which Mrs. Starr brings into play all the techniques of her art, at the same time never failing to express the thought of a composition, entitle her to high rank as a musician, and in the opinion of many she excels any pianist, professional or amateur, that has been heard in Shakopee.” She then sang “Narcissus”as an encore.
Other performers included Mabel Peck who sang “Angel’s Serenade,” Mae Plumstead sang a few soprano solos, and then Anna Annabelle Pope spoke about Colonial Women, probably from her family remembrance, and “it was a pleasure to hear her good thoughts in clearly denunciated words and expressive sentences. At the conclusion of her essay she was given quite an ovation, amid which a handsome bunch of roses was tendered her.”
After Ida spoke and a few more songs, Hon. William H. Eustis spoke for 45 minutes about his thoughts. Eustis likened the condition of his mind to his grandmother’s workbasket, in which there were many varied spools, some with much wound upon them and some with less. Finally, William Willson presented the diplomas to Anna and Ida, and after the benediction by Rev. Ferguson, the audience was dismissed.
As for Anna? After graduation, Anna stayed in Shakopee for a short time, and on June 22, 1904, in Shakopee she married Arthur Hubert Alexander of Northfield. Arthur’s parents were Jonas C. Alexander and Eliza Jane Nichols Alexander.
Anna and Arthur moved to Waterford, Minnesota, and by 1910 they had moved Bucoda, Washington. In 1935 they moved to Soledad, in Los Angeles County.
Anna died July 31, 1957, in Los Angeles, California.
Arthur died Aug. 23, 1962, according to The Signal, Santa Clarita, California on Thursday, Aug. 8, 1957. He was buried in Los Angeles, next to the first graduate of Union School in Shakopee, Anna Annabelle Pope Alexander.