Fortner Family Home
thanks to Mike Fortner for all photos
Mike and Jane (Barnes) Fortner's original cabin.
This is a colored pencil drawing that someone in the family made in 1896.
Mike Fortner took this photo of the original drawing at a family reunion
in Bedford, Indiana in October 1990.
Mike and Jane (Barnes) Fortner's new house that replaced the
log cabin.
This is a colored pencil drawing that someone in the family made in 1896.
Mike Fortner took this photo of the original drawing at a family reunion
in Bedford, Indiana in October 1990.
This a photo of the stone walkway in front of the Fortner
house.
Mike Fortner took this photo in 1990.
If you refer to the slabs you see in this photo,
you notice only two slabs instead of the original three in the middle photo
above.
This is because a porch was added later, and one slab was removed to make room
for it.
Mike was told this by Mildred Fortner, a daughter of Tom Fortner - son of Mike
Fortner, Jr.
She was born and raised in that house.
per Mike Fortner:
I managed to find and go the the farm and home site when I was
there in 1990.
I have the original township map and got a modern map from Crane,
and their people sat down with me and helped coordinate the old and new
roads.
They guided me right to it. Mildred was with me, and she was able to identify
and confirm.
We walked into the woods a bit and thought I was walking along a
filled in irrigation ditch but no, it was the old wagon road.
We followed the route on the township map perfectly.
She was able to identify where the old well had been, then we found the slabs.
The trees behind the slabs is where the new house was and the cabin was right
behind it.