Daughter of Lewis Erwin Showen and Susannah Phalen. Susannah appears in the 1880 Putnam County Census with her parents and is listed as 1 year old in the “Poca District – Pocatalico so where Poca appears” according to the Census taker’s notation. On the same page, the families in the vicinity are listed as Dwelling #1 Phlen A(ndrew) J and Mary J; #4. Phalen Andrew and Elizabeth; #5. Walters John and Elizabeth; and #6. Showen L. E. and Susanah.
Susannah, whose middle name could be “Elizabeth,” was the youngest child of Lewis and Susannah. She had two older brothers: William Lewis Showen, b. 7 Nov 1873, d. 29 March 1880 and John Andrew Showen b. 29 Aug 1877, d. 15 Apr 1880. Both boys were diagnosed with “Quinsy: an inflammation of the throat, especially an abscess in the region of the tonsils.” The two boys died 15 days apart. According to her headstone in the Showen Cemetery at Bancroft, young Susannah died on 2 Nov 1899, about 20 years old. I’ve yet to discover her cause of death or a death record.
In 1910, her parents Lewis and Susannah were still living at Poca according to the Census but evidently moved shortly after to Racine, Miegs County, Ohio. It is at Racine, OH that mother Susannah Phalen Showen died in 1911 and her remains sent back to “Plymouth Cemetery” for interment. If there is a headstone for her, no one has photographed it.
Before you start thinking that the “Plymouth Cemetery” is somewhere out the holler beyond Plymouth Backwater, you need to understand that at that time, most, if not all, of what we know as Bancroft, WV was called or known as Plymouth. That includes Showen’s/Schowen’s Cemetery back up on the hill. Once George Bancroft and his mining company came to the area and began to mine coal at Plymouth, another town sprung up south of Plymouth. The two towns were separated by what is now known as 5th Avenue in Bancroft. This should help you understand why the north-to-south streets do not line up. Viewing the town from the Kanawha River on 5th Avenue, all the houses on the left were in Plymouth; all the houses on the right (including the current property where the firestation sits) were in Bancroft. Bancroft was incorporated in 1952 and encompassed both small villages.
Lewis Showen remarried after his wife’s death to Filena/Lena Mae Rand with whom he was living in the 1920 Census at Gallipolis, OH. Lewis Erwin Showen d. 26 Feb 1935 at Point Pleasant, Mason County, WV and is doubtless buried in Schowen’s Hill Cemetery near his first wife and/or children. His death record (WVCulture.org) gives the place of burial as Bancroft, WV.