Mary Eleanor Dondanville, the fourth child of Wallace Dondanville and Elizabeth Sherman was born on the farm in Serena Township, LaSalle County, Illinois on December 4th, 1875 . She attended school at St. Xavier's Academy in Ottawa, Illinois.

On January 30, 1896 she married John Henry Meyer at St. John The Baptist church in Somonauk. They established their home in Sheridan, Illinois their first two children Elizabeth Yvonne and Edward L, were born there.

About 1902 they moved to Whittemore Iowa, following many of the other second generation LaSalle county families seeking more plentiful farm land. Their third child Florence Dorothy was born in Iowa in 1903. From Iowa the family moved to a ranch near Denver, Colorado where John raised sheep. The year of that move is not clear. Varying accounts place the move between 1908 and 1912. Their fourth child Leo was born in Denver in 1917.

Lured by reports of good farmland in upstate New York, John Meyer headed east with his family in 1918. They arrived at Cortland, New York with several railway carloads of sheep and two Mexican ranch hands, and settled on a farm south of town. Neither the ranch hands nor the sheep acclimated to New York. The ranch hands returned to the west and the sheep were abandoned for chickens. The family moved to West Main Street in Cortland in 1922 and soon after built their home on Locust Avenue.

John Meyer died on July 12, 1938 following a long illness. Mary continued to live in the home on Locust Avenue with her youngest son Leo and her married daughter Florence Meyer Doe and two young grandsons. Mary died on October 14, 1959 and was buried next to her husband in the Catholic Cemetery in Cortland. Paul Theodore Doe, the oldest son of Florence, continues to live in the home on Locust Avenue.

124.1 Elizabeth Yvonne, 1896 -1981
married Cortland, New York 1925 Walter Davies 1897-1970 ;no children.

124.2 Edward L. 1900-1972
married Cortland, New York 1926 to Margaret C. Hogan 1904-1994; one son Charles Edward, 1927-1996.

124.3 Florence Dorothy , 1903- 2001
married Washington D.C. 1928 to Warren Theodore Doe 1905-1941; 2 sons, Paul Theodore, '30; Lawrence Warren,'31; Florence married Richard Pickering, 1906-1973, Freeville, New York 1966.

124.4 Leo John ,1917-1986
married Cortland, New York 1943 Helen Gould 1920- ; 3 sons John William, '44; James Leo, '46, and Thomas Edward,'50.

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