LIVING HISTORY
the cattle business, his mind was elsewhere in his youth.
At 17, he marries Thelma Alderman, 18, of Okeechobee. A
notice in the Miami Herald says the wedding is performed at
the groom’s parents’ home and Frank Raulerson gives the
bride away.
But the handsome playboy’s marriage doesn’t last. Alfred
apparently divorces Thelma and in April 1923, at the age
of 19, marries 20-year-old Willie Mae Ford in Hot Springs,
Arkansas. Debra Sloan says it’s likely that Alfred met Willie
Mae during a vacation in Arkansas, where Frank and Annie
Louise were known to travel.
The marriage to Willie Mae doesn’t last long, either. Records
show Alfred, then 23, marries a third woman, 22-year-old
Mae Pearce of Okeechobee, on June 15, 1927, in Indian River
County. That marriage enjoys more permanence and the
couple produces two daughters: Katherine Louise, who was
born in 1928 but died just four months later; and Jo Ann, who
was born July 22, 1930 and would become the sole inheritor to
Frank’s estate and the keeper of the Raulerson tradition.
“He spoiled her,’’ says Kathy Sloan Blanton, Jo Ann’s oldest
daughter. “He doted on her. Nobody could dote on her more.
She was just the apple of his eye.’’
With a daughter and his marital inclinations stabilized,
Alfred joins his father in the cattle business, with the 1931 city
directory listing his occupation as cattle raiser.
Newspaperman and historian C.S. Miley said Alfred Raulerson
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started out with one black calf that later produced six
bulls in a row. “It was only after his father gave him a cow
and a heifer calf that he had the nucleus of a small herd,’’
Miley writes. “In time, his cattle roamed over Indian River,
Brevard and Osceola counties.’’
FLORIDA PHOTOGRAPHIC CONCERN
Jo Ann Raulerson, born in 1930, would become the heir to cattle baron
Frank Raulerson’s fortune.
POOR LITTLE RICH GIRL?
Despite the fact that they are held in the grips of the Depression,
many of Jo Ann’s early birthdays are celebrated in
grand style with her extended family.
A 1937 newspaper item reports that “Jo Ann Raulerson,
daughter of Mr. And Mrs. Alfred Raulerson, was feted with
an afternoon party Tuesday at the home of her grandparents,
Mr. And Mrs. C.F. Raulerson, the occasion celebrating her
seventh birthday anniversary.’’
Alfred would only spend one more birthday with his
daughter. He is killed Labor Day weekend 1938 when the
boat he is piloting at night and carrying wife Mae and fellow
boatman Hansel Smith strikes a channel marker and then a
dredge pipeline pontoon in the Fort Pierce Inlet near its intersection
with the Indian River.
Newspaper accounts report that Alfred, 34, was thrown
from the boat and suffered a gash to the head. His body, hit
by the boat propeller, was recovered the next day. Alfred’s
wife and Smith escape without serious injuries.
With Alfred’s sudden death, Annie Louise and Frank immediately
move to take custody of 8-year-old Jo Ann. The
Raulersons, apparently without the need for court action,
persuade Mae that they could better raise her daughter.
“They had the money and they thought it was better,’’
daughter Kathy says.
“Alfred drank a lot,’’ Debra says. “Mother never said a
thing about Mae being a drinker. I believe that Frank and
Annie Louise had the means to take better care of Mother.’’
Jo Ann Raulerson, about age 3, with her father Alfred Keightley Raulerson. >>