The University of Iowa Libraries

Dorothy Mills, born December 30,1897, attended Iowa State Teachers College in Cedar Falls, Iowa, acquiring a one-year college diploma on August 29, 1919. Mills married Erwin Joseph Buess, a barnstorming pilot from Cicero, Illinois on December 27, 1922. They settled down in Coggan, Iowa where he established an automobile garage business. Their daughter, Genevieve Buess, born September 23, 1929, attended Coe College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa for one year and then graduated from the University of Iowa with a degree in elementary education. She taught in the Iowa City School District for seventeen years. On June 6, 1948, Genevieve Buess married Oren Jay Taylor, the son of Edward E. and Leona P. Taylor. Oren Jay Taylor, originally named Laurell Mork, is the son adopted by the Taylors on November 25, 1924, at The Willows Maternity Sanitarium in Kansas City, Missouri.

The Genevieve Taylor papers date from 1916 to 1997 and measure 1 linear inch. The papers include a paper on equal suffrage written for an English class by Dorothy Mills, dated March 24, 1916.

Included also is correspondence between the secretary in charge of adoptions at The Willows Maternity Sanitarium in Kansas City, Missouri and Mrs. Edward E. Taylor; 2 laboratory reports on the adoptee, Laurel Mork, from a pathologist, Dr. D.E. Stewart; a receipt for the adoption process which includes payment for two baby bottles, total cost, 28 dollars; and a card giving statistics of the newborn and the adoptee's new parents. There is also a document from the Circuit Court of Jackson County, Missouri in Kansas City, verifying the adoption, dated January 3,1925, a duplicate of same; a document verifying the adoption from the District Court in Benton County, Iowa is also included.

There are two letters from Leona P. Taylor, the adoptee's mother. One is to the Willows Maternity Sanitarium requesting a birth certificate for the baby, dated April 12, 1977.That letter was returned as undeliverable. A letter from Leona P. Taylor dated April 16, 1977, is directed to Jay and Genevieve Taylor enclosing the returned letter and other information about the adoption.

There are two brief essays written by Genevieve Taylor dated November 1997. One describes the trip Leona Petro Taylor (the adoptee's new mother) made to Kansas City to pick up the adopted baby; the other provides background information about Dorothy Mills Buess. A memoir written by her husband completes the collection.

Arrangement: One folder, shelved in SCVF.

Access: The papers are open for research.

Use: Copyright held by the donor has been transferred to The University of Iowa.

Acquisition: The papers (donor no. 481) were donated by Genevieve Taylor in 1997.

Preferred Citation: Genevieve Buess Taylor papers, Iowa Women's Archives, The University of Iowa Libraries, Iowa City.

Repository:	Iowa Women's Archives
Address:	100 Main Library University of Iowa Libraries Iowa City, IA 52242
Phone:	319-335-5068
Curator:	Kären Mason
Email:	lib-women@uiowa.edu
Website:	http://www.lib.uiowa.edu/iwa

This collection is indexed under the following subject terms.

Geographic Names:
Iowa City (Iowa)

Browse:
Woman Suffrage Movement