Minerd.com Biography of Charlotte Magdalene (Younkin) Doyle Showman and Husbands of Patrick Joseph Doyle and Benton L. Showman of Connellsville, PA

Charlotte Magdalene 'Lena'
(Younkin) Doyle Showman
(1900-1972)

In 1926, Lena attended the 94th birthday party of her grandmother and partial namesake, Mary Magdalene (Whipkey) Harbaugh, held on the old Harbaugh homestead at what is now Clairton Lake near Scullton, Somerset County, PA. The event attracted some 225 family and friends, and became the first annual Harbaugh Reunion.

As a young woman Lena worked as a clerk in Connellsville. There, she boarded with her brother Osborne in the "rooming floors" above an old opera house owned by Alex Chinn.

Connellsville Daily Courier, 1926

In November 1926, the two narrowly escaped a disaster when their boarding house "was totally destroyed by fire." Among the possessions she rescued was the old Harbaugh Bible that she had borrowed from her grandmother. She and her brother David are said to have taken the drenched relic to brother Warren's home, where it was placed on towels on top of a heater, so it could be dried. The Bible’s covers and edges were scorched and stained with water damage, but was saved, thanks to Lena’s quick thinking and loving care afterward to help preserve it.

Later, the Bible served as major source material for the Harbaugh History book, published in 1947 by Cora Bell and J.L. Cooperider.

Lena served as maid of honor when Os married Katherine Williams two years later, in 1928.

On April 12, 1929, at age 29, Lena married 42-year-old Patrick Joseph Doyle (1887-1940), a native of County Durham, Ireland. He was the son of Thomas and Isabelle (Carberry) Doyle. She was employed as a clerk, and he a foreman, at the time of marriage. Justice of the peace H.S. Whipperman performed the nuptials at Somerset, Somerset County, PA.

The Doyles produced three children -- Patricia Greaff and John Louis Doyle and one other.

The B&O yards at Connellsville, with the city as a backdrop, and the Youghiogheny River in the foreground.

Patrick was an employee of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad, which had major operations in Connellsville. At the time of his death, in mid-summer 1940, he was a bookkeeper in the main office of the Works Progress Administration in the state capitol city of Harrisburg, Dauphin County, PA.

Lena was a member of the B&O Veterans Association. She also worked for Anchor Hocking Glass Company in Connellsville. They were members of the Immaculate Conception Roman Catholic Church, where she belonged to its Confraternity of Christian Mothers.

In 1934, when Lena’s brother Charles co-founded the Younkin National Home Coming Reunion, she supported the effort, and arranged for her young daughter to sing as part of the official schedule of events. In its heyday, the event drew more than 1,000 people annually.

Patrick suffered from heart-related illness and became deathly sick in the summer of 1940. He died at Connellsville State Hospital on July 26, 1940, at the age of 53. He was buried at St. Joseph's Cemetery in Connellsville, following high mass at Immaculate Conception Church.

Sometime after 1950, she re-married to widower Benton L. Showman (Jan. 28, 1883-1967), son of David and Emma (Grimm) Showman. His first wife Alice Johnson (1877-1956) had died in 1956. He brought a stepson into the second marriage, Earl Showman.

Benton was a retired conductor with the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, having logged 49 years of service to the company. He belonged to the B&O Veterans Association, the Railroad Veterans Unit 88 of Connellsville, the Retired Peoples Fellowship, the Connellsville Order of Eagles and was an original member of the local YMCA.

They lived in Benton's home at 703 Willow Street in Connellsville. Lena enjoyed the Harbaugh Reunions, and is known to have been in attendance in 1948, 1954 and 1965. Her son John won the "Furthest Traveled" Award in 1954, coming a distance of 700 miles. In 1965, her husband Benton received the "Oldest Man Award.

In his later years, Benton suffered from heart disease. When stricken with acute fluid buildup in the lungs, he was admitted to Connellsville State Hospital, where he died at the age of 84 on April 24, 1967. His remains were placed into rest beside his first wife in Normalville Cemetery, with Rev. Robert Gerrett officiating and an obituary printed in the Daily Courier.

On Dec. 14, 1972, Lena died at the Connellsville State General Hospital at the age of 72.

John was united in matrimony with Linda Lowery ( ? - ? ), a native of Lewiston, ID.

They were the parents of William D. Doyle, Patricia Vodjansky Tamerhoulet and Michael J. Doyle.

After the war's end, John and Linda established a home in Hawaii. There, he was employed by Pan American Airlines and she as a housing manager specialist and director of customer service at the Navy Aloha Center Housing Office at Pearl Harbor.

Sadness blanketed the family when Linda died at the age of 55 on Aug. 1, 1998 in Kaiser Hospital. Her funeral mass was sung at St. Philomena Church, with Aloha attive, and burial following in Portland, OR. The Honolulu Star Advertiser ran an obituary.

The widowed John he returned to Connellsville and shared a home with his married sister.

John was admitted to the Veterand Administration Hospital in Oakland near Pittsburgh where he died at the age of 69 on Dec. 2, 2005. An obituary was published in the Connellsville Daily Courier.

Son William D. Doyle ( ? - ? ) entered into marriage with Ellen. They dwelled in Germany in 2005.

Daughter Patricia Ann "Pat" Doyle ( ? - ? ) grew up in Hawaii. She is believed to have been twice-wed. Her first spouse was (?) Vodjansky ( ? - ? ). Her home in the late 1990s was in Salem, OR. Then in 1997, at the age of 30, she tied the marital cord with 39-year-old Rebai Tamerhoulet ( ? - ? ). Rebai received his bachelor's degree in civil engineering in 1982 from the University of Constantine in Algeria and his master of science in structural engineering in 1985 from the University of Washington in Seattle. Theirs' is a family of five children, including a set of twins. As of 2000-2005, she remained in Salem. Patricia was profiled in the Salem Statesman Journal in 2000 for her work with the Islamic Society of Salem, focusig on dispelling myths about the Islamic religion and meeting needs of Muslim youth. The article said she "grew up in Hawaii, a place where a tall, fair-skinned Catholic girl could feel right at home amid the predominant Polynesian and Asian community.... It wasn't until the former Salem state worker married Rebai Tamerhoulet, a Muslin from Algeria, in 1997 that she felt the stares, whispers and questions. Many came from her fellow whites." Then in January 2001, Rebai was mentioned in a Statesman Journal story about a group of local messianic Jews attending a candlelight vigil to show solidarity for Jews in Israel. Rebai served on the board of the Muslim Educational Trust in the early 2000s. The family pulled up stakes in August 2008 and relocated to the United Arab Emirates. They apparently returned to Salem where in 2013 Rebai was employed as division engineer and acting building administrator for the city. He eventually became Salem Building and Safety Division Manager and in 2019 received the honor of Oregon Building Official of the Year.

Daughter Patricia Jane Younkin (1930- ? ) was born in about 1930 in West Virginia.

She was wed to Kenneth Earl Greaff (Nov. 12, 1925-1981), son of Joseph C. and Hazel (Stillwagon) Greaff.

They lived at 208 North Pittsburgh Street in Connellsville and produced one known son, Richard Doyle Greaff.

Kenneth stood 5 feet, 9 inches tall in adulthood and weighed 172 lbs. During World War II, he served in the U.S. Navy, enlisting on July 28, 1943 and receiving his discharge on Dec. 16, 1945. He was assigned to the Construction Battalion (SeaBees) with subsequent transfers to the Third Naval Construction Regiment and the 59th and 76th Construction Battalions, and with a posting to Guam.

When the federal census enumeration was made in 1950, Kenneth earned a living in Connellsville as a truck driver for a wholesale meat company.

Kenneth died on June 12, 1981, at the age of 55, with interment in St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Cemetery in Connellsville.

Son Richard Doyle Greaff (1948-1996) was born on June 11, 1948 in Connellsville State Hospital. News of his birth was published in the Connellsville Daily Courier. He was involved in an incident at the age of 18 in which he was accused of burglary and larcey in Connellsville. He died in Connellsville on Feb. 15, 1996 at about the age of 49, with burial in St. Joseph's Roman Catholic Cemetery in Connellsville.