Given that events central to the Iron Dog's story occurred nearly 150 years ago, and because scrupulous records of those events are not known to exist, judging the veracity of the dog's story is left to corroboration through discovery and study of the scant available peripheral records.

This page will present what is known of the Cranes, through research of public records such as birth and burial information, the United States Census, land ownership data, legal records, newspaper accounts and the like.

On Saturday, September 2, 1905, The Dayton Herald announced the death of Sarah Ann Woodward Crane, wife of the late Dr. E. L. Crane of Tippecanoe City, Ohio. According to her obituary, around 1816 Sara, along with her older sister and parents, moved from Jersey Shore, Pennsylvania to an area two miles east of Tippecanoe City.

She was united in marriage with E. L. Crane in 1830. The couple moved to West Charleston, Ohio sometime after, but eventually moved back to Tippecanoe City in 1857. They reportedly lived on Main Street the rest of their lives. He, a well-known and respected physician, she an active homemaker. He died eighteen years before her in 1887.

William Woodward Crane, Van Eli's older brother, was a physician. After William's service as a surgeon in the Civil War ended, he retired from medicine and turned his talents toward managing Acacia, the large Crane family farm just south of Tippecanoe City. There, William established a new breed of cattle, the "Double Standard Polled-Durham". This photo, courtesy of John Powers, is of a document in the Tippecanoe Historical Society collection.

Based primarily on cemetery burials and census records, it appears that Sara and E. L. Crane had seven children, four of which died at age four or younger. The three that lived well into adulthood were William Woodward, Van Eli, and Alvina Crane Sheets.

Van Eli Crane is said to be the father of the boy whose grave was guarded by the Tippecanoe City Iron Dog. Van Eli looks to have been married three times,¹ with his first wife Callie (Caroline) Hubbard Crane being the only wife of the three that could have birthed the Iron Dog boy, assuming the few details in the story are correct.

The Crane family tree below illustrates relationships among the family members involved to varying degrees in the Iron Dog's story. The tree is not based on an exhaustive study of the Crane family, but on information found primarily at the Find-A-Grave website, as well as those maintained or contributed to by Maple Hill Cemetery² in Tipp City, Ohio, Lakeside Cemetery³ in Port Huron, Michigan, and New Carlisle Cemetery⁴ in New Carlisle, Ohio.

Emphasis in the Crane tree is on Van Eli Crane, his wives and children - they are shaded in blue. The bright red square labeled "BOY CRANE?" calls attention the unknown child that is central to the Tippecanoe City, Ohio Iron Dog tale. The "Edward Lewis" entry, in light green shading, is the Crane family member that related the story of the dog to Tipp City historian Grace Kinney.

The table that follows summarizes the census data from 1840 until 1910 for Van Eli Crane, as well as the women thought to have been his wives. The timespan was chosen to encompass the lifespan of Van, as well as all of his wives.

The census information presented here is based entirely on imaging and transcription summaries found at Ancestry.com. Greyed out entries indicate that no census could be found for that person/year combination, the entry would have been redundant, or superfluous. The names and ages are presented just as transcribed by Ancestry.com, and links to those transcriptions, as well to images of the actual census pages, are provided.

Callie (or Caroline) Hubbard was Van Crane's first wife, and would have to be the wife that bore him the boy at the center of this story. They were married in 1860, and were apparently divorced sometime between 1870 and 1876.⁵ She remarried in 1883, taking the surname Smith. Crane's second wife was Francelia Mallory, with Anna Lindeman his third.⁶ Van and his wives' (future, current and former) first names are highlighted in red.

Almost certainly the most important detail to come out of a study of the census information is that the 1900 and 1910 census appear to show that Callie Hubbard Smith had no children, living or dead.

The Crane family apparently enjoyed some degree of prominence in the Tippecanoe City area for a century. This was likely tied in some degree to their various real estate holdings, both locally and elsewhere. A cursory review of Miami County, Ohio recorder records reveal significant purchase and sale of lands in the county by those with the surname Crane, from about 1813 until 1916.⁷ Although an exhaustive study of Crane family landholdings seemed unnecessary as part of judging the veracity of the Iron Dog story, an in-depth examination of some specific holdings yielded useful information.⁸

A colorized photograph from a postcard, ca. 1912, of what is thought to be the house owned by E. L. Crane at Broadway and Third Streets, in Tippecanoe City. At the time this photo was taken, the home was owned by the St. John The Baptist's Catholic Church, who built their church adjacent to it in 1912.10 (Located at the MyMiamiCounty.com website)

In Samuel Stuart Smith's account of seeing Boy Crane, Smith states that "...Van Crane was our Ed Crane's uncle and he at that time lived on Broadway south side of street where Catholic Parsonage and Church stands between 2nd & 3rd st...." A request was made by the author to the Miami County Recorder's Office⁹ concerning Crane family ownership of land on Broadway St. in Tippecanoe City, in the range of years in question. Records show that E. L. Crane owned property at the corner of Broadway and Third Streets in Tippecanoe City from February, 1865, until his death in 1887. This serves to bolster Smith's account, as the Cranes did own land on Broadway during the correct timeframe.

Further review of online county recorder records, as well as results of requests to that office for time periods not available online, reveal that Samuel Smith's father owned property in two locations in Tippecanoe City. Three small lots (97, 98 and 99) near the corner of First and South Streets, and one large lot (230) near the corner of Fourth and Plum Streets. Both property locations are near Crane owned properties on Broadway, and on Main, respectively. Hence, it seems reasonable that Smith could have been walking or riding near a Crane property on occasion and spied the boy and dog playing together. It should be noted that Boy Crane likely died before 1870; Smith was born in 1860. He was just a child himself when he saw the boy and dog, and Smith indeed mentions this in his account.

This portion of a Tippecanoe City 1871 plat map helps illustrate where the Cranes and Smiths may have lived when Boy Crane was alive. Crane properties are green; the Smith's in red. Although Tippecanoe was not that large in 1871 and could be transversed on foot in a reasonable amount of time, proximity none-the-less is an important consideration when hearing young Samuel Stuart's Smith account of seeing the boy and dog together. Work continues by the author, as of this writing, to completely document Crane and Smith land ownership in Tippecanoe City during this period. (Plat map located at the Gen-Search.com website)

In 1860, the United States Census shows Van and wife Callie (Caroline) living with Van's parents. According to an 1858 plat map of Tippecanoe City,¹¹ E. L. Crane was living on Lot 133 in Tippecanoe City, which was on Main, between Fourth and Fifth Streets. E. L. Crane purchased the lots (165 and 166) on Broadway in February of 1865, while Sarah Woodward Crane's substantial obituary states that she and her husband lived on Main their entire life, after moving to Tippecanoe in 1857.

The 1870 United States Census reveals that Van and wife Callie were now living alone. Given where they appear in the census in relation to Van's parents, they lived nearby, probably within a house of two of them. So how is it that Samuel Stuart Smith saw Boy Crane and the dog on Broadway, yet the 1860 census shows Van and Callie living with his parents on Main, and in 1870 living very close to his parents, who presumably were still living on Main Street? Is it possible that between 1860 and 1870 Van and Callie had a child, moved from Main to Broadway, Boy Crane died, and they moved back to a house very near Van's parents on Main Street?

Table 2 summarizes fourteen entries on each side of the E. L. Crane entry in both 1860 and 1870 United States Census. This table was created to help understand precisely where the Cranes lived during Boy Crane's lifetime, as part of addressing the possible discrepancy between the 1870 census and Smith's contention that Van, Callie and Boy Crane lived on Broadway.

In Table 2, the Dwelling/Family number, assigned by the census taker, is linked to the actual census page in question. Burials at Find A Grave are linked to via name. Land ownership noted in the Tippecanoe City Lot(s) column is an attempt to understand where the family may have been living at that time. This, in turn, might help confirm or refute that the Cranes were living on Main in Lot 133, as suggested by an 1858 plat map of Tippecanoe City. An entry in this column such as "P1858 - 123" denotes Lot 123 being purchased by the family in 1858. Similarly, "S1857 - 234" would indicate Lot 234 was sold by the family in 1857. Double asterisks "**" flag issues with the author's interpretation of online land records which are incomplete or unclear, and that will require more investigation.¹²

Not associated with the Crane's place of residence in Tippecanoe City, but none-the-less land related, is a small cemetery on Crane land just slightly southeast of the Maple Hill Cemetery location. 1871 and ca. 1875 plat maps place the cemetery there.¹³ Presumably, this was a Crane family cemetery, or the cemetery of the family that owned the land before the Cranes. E. L. and Sarah Crane had four children that died prior to 1850, now buried at Maple Hill. Maple Hill was not established until after 1873, so it seems reasonable to assume that these children may have originally been buried in the cemetery located on the Crane land. Perhaps when Maple Hill Cemetery was established, the Cranes moved the childs' bodies from their family cemetery to Maple Hill.

Is it possible that Boy Crane was buried in the Crane family cemetery for some period of time before being moved to Maple Hill? If Van had placed the dog on the boy's grave there, and given its proximity to the railroad tracks and what eventually would become Maple Hill Cemetery, could people riding past on the trains mistake the dog's location as being at Maple Hill rather than Crane farmland? If so, this might explain why no record or grave can be found for a Boy Crane at Maple Hill. That being said, this would assume that the although the dog eventually was removed from the grave, the Cranes never moved the boy's body to Maple Hill, or if they did, they neglected to place a conventional marker on the boy's grave. It seems unlikely, given their wealth and the fact that they apparently moved several other Crane children to Maple Hill at some point. Maple Hill Cemetery records contain information about the burials of the Crane children that died before 1850. It seems unlikely that no similar record of Boy Crane's interment at Maple Hill would have been created.

Van Eli Crane is thought to have been married three times. First, to Callie (Caroline) Hubbard, next was Franceline Imogene Mallory, and last Anna Doretta Lindeman. In addition, Callie Hubbard married a second time, to William H. Smith. Records of marriage have been located at Ancestry.com for Van Eli Crane and Callie Hubbard, as well as Van Eli Crane and Francelia Imogene Mallory. In addition, Callie Hubbard's marriage to William H. Smith is documented there.

The Tippecanoe Historical Society is in possession of a Crane family bible, given to them by family member Virginia (Sherwood) McKay.¹⁴ Photographs of the bible were provided by Gaelann Gumbert Allcorn.

Exterior of the bible. It may date to the 1860s.
At left is a listing of marriages, and at right, births. Van Eli and Caroline (Callie) Hubbard's marriage is recorded here, but neither of Van's later marriages are. No children are shown for Van Eli and Caroline, despite entries that pre-date and post-date the likely time of birth of their child Boy Crane, around which the Iron Dog story revolves.
More births are shown at left, with deaths recorded at right. As with births, deaths bookend the period when Boy Crane would have lived, yet there is no mention of his death in the bible.
Crane family photographs. There is nothing visible identifying who these people are. The backs of the photographs have not been examined, as removal might damage them or the bible. Given that William Woodward Crane (1832-1904) was a colonel during the Civil War, in the page at left, this may well be him and wife Anna Martha Weakley Crane (1836-1916). Just below, at left, may be their second son, Edward Lewis Crane (1867-1951). In the page at right, perhaps this is William's sister, Alvina Crane Sheets (1842-1911).
In the page at left, the lower left image appears to be the same as that in the page pictured just above, but a second, older child can be seen in this page's larger window. This may well be the eldest son of William Woodward and Anna Martha Weakley Crane, William Crane (1862-1915). In the page at right, it seems likely that the couple are either the previously pictured William Woodward and Anna Weakly Crane, or Van Eli Crane (1839-1914) with first wife Caroline (1842-1916), or possibly second wife Jean (1849-1884).
William Woodward Crane's recollections of his father and mother's family lineage, written in 1895.
At left, more remembrances of William Woodward Crane's mother, authored by him. At right, a page with one relatively recent death recorded.

Birth, baptism, marriage, death and other records are sometimes kept by churches; hence they are potentially a valuable tool for locating Boy Crane, the child whose grave was marked by the Iron Dog.

E. R. Johnson, Minister of the Gospel, signed Van and Callie's record of marriage. A search on Ancestry.com turned up some important information about him, including the fact that he was a Presbyterian minister.¹⁵ This led to a query to Presbyterian researchers in Pittsburgh, revealing that Callie Hubbard was baptized at the Honey Creek Presbyterian Church on June 26, 1842. No other mentions of her, a child of hers, or any Crane family members were found from 1835 to 1885 in church records for two Presbyterian churches (First Presbyterian and Honey Creek) in the New Carlisle area at the time.

Reverend Isaac Newton Elwood married Van Eli Crane and Francelia Imogene Mallory on January 17, 1877. Photograph is courtesy of Janet Curtiss, from her collection.

Reverend Isaac Newton Elwood¹⁶ of the Methodist Episcopal Church in Port Huron, Michigan presided over Van Crane's marriage to his second wife, Francelia Imogene Mallory. It is unclear as to when Boy Crane died, but a reading of the accounts of E. L. Crane and Samuel Stuart Smith do not rule out that Boy Crane actually died in Port Huron but was buried in Tippecanoe City. Therefore, it is possible that church records in Port Huron might have some details of the boy's death. As of this writing, nothing has been located about any records that may exist for the Methodist Episcopal Church in Port Huron.

In a 1905 obituary, Van Crane's mother, Sarah Woodward Crane, was reported to have been a dedicated member of the Church of Christ.

Research is ongoing as to where this church was located,¹⁷ and whether it's possible that its records still exist. If so, given Sarah Crane's strong affiliation with the church, the potential exists that some record of her grandson Boy Crane's birth, baptism or death might be there.

Newspapers.com is a rich source of information about the Crane family. Table 3 below lists just some of the many articles about the Cranes available there. Searches were focused on Van Eli Crane and his immediate family, but a few articles concerning his extended family are also included.

Click on the headers to sort the table. The first click sorts in ascending order (A to Z). The second, descending order.

Probate records for E. L. Crane (Van Eli Crane's father) were requested from the Miami County, Ohio Probate Court. Records for E. L. Crane are also housed in Port Huron, Michigan, and were located online by Janet Curtiss.¹⁸

Although it seemed unlikely that E. L. Crane's will would provide any information about a grandchild of his that would have died fifteen years before it was created, it was none-the-less reviewed. Nothing was found about a Boy Crane, the one that is central to the Iron Dog's story. However, a phrase concerning Van Crane - "...the heirs of his body of legal marriage..." - makes it sound as though he might have had children out of marriage. If so, might Boy Crane be difficult to locate today because he was born out of marriage?

Although not necessarily germane to the discussion at hand, it is noteworthy that a dispute arose between Crane family members about the validity of E. L. Crane's will. Eventually a judge invalidated several codicils to it, necessitating additional settlement proceedings.