Anna Louise "Annie" Straube

http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/titanic-survivor/anna-annie-mc...

• Name: Miss Anna Louise McGowan
• Titanic Survivor
• Born: Thursday 5th July 1894 in Scranton, Pennsylvania, United States
• Age: 17 years 9 months and 10 days (Female)
• Marital Status: Single
• Last Residence: in Massbrook, County Mayo, Ireland
• 3rd Class Passengers
• First Embarked: Queenstown on Thursday 11th April 1912
• Ticket No.: 330923, £8 7d
• Destination: 3241 North Ashland Avenue, Chicago, Illinois, United States
• Rescued: (Possibly Boat 13)
• Disembarked Carpathia: New York City on Thursday 18th April 1912
• Died: Tuesday 30th January 1990 aged 95 years
• Buried: All Saints Cemetery, Des Plaines, Illinois, United States
• Reference: https://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/titanic-lifeboat-13/ Life Boat No. 13
• Reference: https://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/titanic-deckplans/ R.M.S. Titanic deck plans

Miss Ann "Annie" F. McGowan, 14 (15?), was born on 5 July 1897 [1] in Scranton, Pennsylvania, the daughter of John McGowan and Marie Heneghan.

She was travelling to Chicago, Illinois with her aunt Katherine McGowan . They were to meet Katherine's sister, Mrs Thomas McDermott, 3241 North Ashland Avenue. They boarded at Queenstown and travelled in third class. Annie survived (possibly in lifeboat 13), while her aunt died.

Anna spent several days at the St. Vincent's hospital in New York City. She left the hospital dressed in her nightgown, a pair of old shoes, and a coat. She travelled to Chicago with fellow survivor, Anna Kelly. They were met in Chicago by Dr. Mary O'Brien Porter of the Catholic Woman's league protectorate. Dr. O'Brien Porter appealed to the Mayor of Chicago to give some of the funds raised in the city to the two young women.

Anna ‘Annie’ McGowan later married a man by the name of Straube. She died on 30 January 1990 in Chicago, Illinois aged 92.

Anna Louise McGowan was a Third Class passenger of the Titanic. She survived the sinking.

She was the daughter of Irish Roman Catholic immigrants John McGowan (b. 1867), an illiterate farmer, and Maria Heneghan (b. 1867) who both hailed from the Addergoole district of Co Mayo and who had married in 1893. They shortly emigrated to the USA, settling in Scranton where Annie and her brother Anthony (b. 1895) were born. The stay in America was a short one and they returned to Co Mayo around 1896 where a further five children were born: Maria (b. 1897), Margaret (b. 1899), Thomas Henry (b. 1901), John (b. 1904) and Bridget (b. 1906).

Annie first appears on the 1901 Irish census living at house 2 in Massbrook, Addergoole, Co Mayo, the home of her widowed grandfather Anthony McGowan, a farmer. Her grandfather had passed away by the time of the 1911 census when the family were living in the same locale in Addergoole, Annie described as a scholar.

In late 1911 Annie's aunt Catherine McGowan, her father's younger unmarried sister, had returned home to Ireland from Chicago, Illinois with the intent on chaperoning her niece across the Atlantic and they were part of a group of over a dozen steerage passengers from their locale making the same journey aboard Titanic. Annie and her aunt boarded Titanic at Queenstown on April 11th, 1912 (ticket 330923 which cost £7, 15s, 7d) and her destination was to the home of another aunt, Mrs Thomas McDermott of 3241 North Ashland Avenue, Chicago.

Annie McGowan survived the sinking (possibly in lifeboat 13). In later years she recalled the bitter cold of the open Atlantic whilst in the lifeboat, the screams of those left behind and how the ship "just busted in half" whilst sinking. She never saw her aunt Catherine again.

Annie McGowan was hospitalised in New York following her ordeal, alongside her friend from Mayo: Annie Kelly, being treated for shock and exposure before later completing her journey to Chicago where her aunt awaited her. The American Red Cross assisted in her education by sending her to a business school, following which she worked to support herself and it was not until 1920 that she was married. Her husband was Raymond Albert Straube (b. August 7th, 1898); a plumber and a Chicago native of German descent and the couple set up home in Chicago and had three daughters: Frances Audrey (1921 - 1960, later Mrs Arthur Kopp), Jacqueline (1923 - 2002, later Mrs. Peter Komay) and Mary (b. 1936, later Kapolnek).

Annie never cared to speak about the Titanic and was only drawn to on seldom occasions for her grandchildren when they were doing school projects or for a very rare newspaper article. She was widowed in 1965 and continued to make her home in Chicago, surrounded by her children and grandchildren. She died on January 30th, 1990 at the ripe age of 95 and was later buried in All Saints Cemetery, Des Plaines, Illinois. Her death left only one remaining Titanic survivor of Irish background, Ellen Shine Callaghan of Long Island, New York