Robert Charles Martin

Robert Charles Martin, son of Robert Earle Martin and Magdlen Pauline Gilmore, was born 9 February 1920 in Champaign, Champaign County, IL. He graduated from Urbana High School and attended Illinois Commercial College.

In the early 1930s, not long after the birth of Robert’s only sibling, John Eugene Martin, the marriage of Earle and Magdlen fell apart. Earle left. At first he sought shelter with his aunt Viola Smith in Green County, WI, then went on to Boulder, CO for several years, and finally moved to the Los Angeles, CA area, where he died in the early 1940s. Robert had no regular contact with his father after the age of twelve or so. He understandably had strong feelings about this abandonment and over the course of his life seldom spoke of his father. The head of the household during Robert’s teen years was his grandfather Charles Holland Gilmore -- Magdlen and her boys having been taken in by her parents, whose home was in Urbana.

Unlike his father and paternal grandfather, Robert did not spend much of his young adulthood as a bachelor. At twenty-one, he married Marguerite Florence McMurray. Known as Marge, she had been born 24 July 1919 at Hoopeston, Vermilion County, IL. She was a daughter of Jesse Earl McMurray, who had passed away during Marge’s childhood, and of Alma Cary Franklin. The union was opposed by Alma, but her daughter and her beau were certain they were a match for each other. They eloped. The wedding therefore took place 11 August 1941 in Mexico, Audrain County, MO. Alma saw over time her opposition was unwarranted. Robert and Marge enjoyed a marriage of over fifty years and would raise three sons together.

Being a married man did not stop Robert from being swept up in World War II. Enlisting 23 March 1943, he completed basic training at Atlantic City, NJ in June. He spent the next two months at Fort Collins, CO attending an Army Air Force technical training school for engineering and operations clerks. Deployed to England, he was given the position of materiel clerk at the headquarters of the A-20 light bombardment group of the Ninth Air Force Division.

Back in civilian life, Robert returned to his place of origin. It does not appear he resided outside Champaign County at any point thereafter. He worked for many years at Collegiate Cap & Gown Company, retiring as a transportation manager. This was also Marge’s employer; she was a secretary with the company for three decades.

Marge died 19 April 1994 at Covenant Medical Center in Urbana. Robert spent a little more than four years as a widower. He passed away Friday, 19 June 1998 in Champaign. The graves of both wife and husband are at Woodlawn Cemetery in Urbana.

(Robert is not to be confused with Robert Clifford Martin of Rantoul, Champaign County, IL. The latter was only two years younger, and also served in World War II, being wounded at Iwo Jima. Robert Clifford Martin went on to be a Champaign County deputy sheriff, circuit clerk, and county recorder. Most public documents about “Robert C. Martin” of Champaign County have to do with him, and not with Robert Charles Martin of the Nathaniel Martin/Hannah Strader clan.)

Descendants of Robert Charles Martin with Marguerite Florence McMurray

Details of Generation Five -- the great-great-grandchildren of Nathaniel Martin and Hannah Strader -- and beyond are kept off-line. However, we can say that Robert’s line consists of three children, six grandchildren, and at least five great-grandchildren. His son James Alan Martin (18 February 1953 - 19 December 2011) is deceased. As of 2011, Robert’s line is the only one springing from Nathaniel and Hannah that still includes living individuals who carry on the Martin surname from its source. There are many hundreds of Nathaniel and Hannah’s descendants alive today, but the only other ones with the name have it because a great great granddaughter of Nathaniel and Hannah happened to marry a man of an entirely separate Martin clan.

To go back one generation, click here. To return to the Martin/Strader Family main page, click here.