November 10, 2026
Introduction: In this article, the second of two parts, James Pylant describes the misfortune and heartaches in famed actress Lana Turner’s personal life, including seven marriages and divorces. James is an editor at GenealogyMagazine.com and author for JacobusBooks.com, is an award-winning historical true-crime writer, and authorized celebrity biographer.
In Part 1, I discussed movie star Lana Turner’s paternal roots and her childhood tragedy: the unsolved murder of her father in San Francisco.
Today, I discuss Lana’s maternal roots. Sadly, her mother also lost a parent early in life, as did her mother – making Lana the third generation to lose a parent in childhood.
Lana’s mother, Mildred Frances Cowan, was born on 12 February 1904 in Lamar, Johnson County, Arkansas, to Arthur Willis Cowan and Julia Ann (Cullum) Cowan. (1) Her parents were married there on 9 May 1903.
Julia was born on 24 March 1885 and died at age 19 on 28 July 1904, five months after daughter Mildred’s birth. Lana Turner later explained that her grandmother’s death was due to complications from childbirth and suspected it was due to a congenital Rh factor. (2) Mildred was raised by a grandaunt. (3) In the 1910 federal census, six-year-old Mildred lived with a widowed aunt, Mary C. Waldon, in Lamar, Johnson County, Arkansas. (4)
The Cullums
Julia Ann Cullum is the daughter of Francis Marion Cullum and Julia Ann (Porter) Cullum, who were married on 28 November 1883 in Van Buren County, Arkansas. Julia Ann (Porter) Cullum died on 7 April 1885, 14 days after giving birth to her namesake daughter.
When his daughter was six, Francis M. Cullum remarried on 31 December 1891 to Martha Jane “Mattie” Scott. Julia made her home with her father and stepmother, as reported in the 1900 federal census. However, it was an unhappy home. The couple’s only child died, and Cullum said that his wife became quarrelsome and abusive, “charging him with improper relations with his widowed sister.” (5) He filed for divorce, which was granted in April 1907.
The following year, Cullum received a state physician’s license as an eclectic practitioner. Remaining in Johnson County, he managed his practice, remarried, and started another family. That new life would be short-lived. On 3 November 1913, Dr. Cullum drowned after falling into a well at his home.
The Cowans
Lana’s grandfather, Arthur Willis Cowan, was born on 30 January 1882 in Lamar, Arkansas. In California, he worked as a seaman and lived with daughter Mildred. He later remarried Florence Wolf, but they divorced. He died at age 56 on 11 February 1938 in Los Angeles. Lana’s mother, Mildred (Cowan) Turner, did not know the names of her grandparents.
Dr. Michael S. Cole traced the Johnson County Cowans for his 1994 book, Cowan Connections. His research showed Arthur Willis Cowan was born to Dr. James Martin Cowan and his first wife, Sarah M. (Willis) Cowan, who were married on 17 October 1877 in Johnson County. (6)
Arthur’s half-brother (and Lana’s granduncle), Edgar Cowan, was a baseball player in the Texas League and Southern Association from 1907 to 1917. His 1953 obituary mentioned his famous grandniece.
James Martin Cowan, M.D., died in Lamar, Arkansas, on 12 December 1912. Arthur Cowan was named among his heirs when the Bank of Lamar filed suit against the estate.
Dr. Cowan was born in Arkansas in March 1857, the son of Stephen Cowan and Elizabeth (Long) Cowan. (7) Stephen Cowan, who served as a private in Company A, 2nd Arkansas Infantry during the Civil War, was born on 7 March 1825 and died on 11 October 1907. According to his obituary:
“Mr. Cowan and his wife were both borned [sic] in Tennessee. They were married in Texas and moved to Arkansas where they remained the last five years.” (8)
However, another source say the Cowan-Long wedding took place on 7 February 1847 in Buzzards Roost, Franklin County, Alabama. (9) Stephen Cowan served as sheriff of Johnson County, Arkansas, in 1872, having been appointed by the governor. (10)
Stephen was the son of Samuel Cowan and Sarah Margaret (Keith) Cowan, who was mentioned in a 1912 letter written by her great-granddaughter, Mary Jane Ely Lee, who said she was called:
“Old Aunt Peggy Borden Keith. She was a Baptist Preacher, of course, she wasn’t ordained at that age, I guess she was a strong gospel preacher.” (11)
Sarah Margaret, daughter of Nichodemus Keith and Margaret “Peggy” (Borden) Keith, was born c. 1778, possibly in Bedford County, Virginia, and died c. 1849 in Titus County, Texas.
Her brother, John Borden Keith, was the great-great-great-great-grandfather of singer Willie Nelson, as discussed in Gary Boyd Roberts’s article, “Royal Descents, Notable Kin, and Printed Sources: Two Remarkable Descendants of the Bordens of Rhode Island,” posted at AmericanAncestors.org. Roberts’s article mentions another relative, though more distant: Lizzie Borden, the accused axe murderess.
These intertwined families – marked by early deaths, remarriages, and unexpected connections – formed the maternal roots Lana Turner never fully knew.
Along with tragedy stalking both the paternal and maternal roots in her family tree, Lana Turner experienced her own share of misfortune, including seven divorces, dying of cancer, and – in 1958 – her teenage daughter Cheryl stabbing Lana’s gangster lover Johnny Stompanato to death when she caught him beating her mother, as described in her obituary.
This article reports:
Her love life made even more headlines than her acting career. Miss Turner was married seven times and had publicized romances with Howard Hughes, Tyrone Power and Fernando Lamas.
One of her love affairs ended in abuse and sensational headlines when hoodlum Johnny Stompanato was killed. He was hitting Miss Turner in her Beverly Hills bedroom on April 5, 1958, when [her daughter Cheryl], then 15 years old, rushed in and fatally stabbed him with a carving knife. The killing was ruled a justifiable homicide.
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Note on the header image: Lana Turner with director George Cukor on the set of “A Life of Her Own,” 1 January 1950. Credit: MGM; Wikimedia Commons.
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(1) Mildred Frances Cowan birth certificate, no. 2166 (1904), “Arkansas, Birth Certificates, 1914–1922,” online database with images, Ancestry (www.ancestry.com: accessed 26 December 2024).
(2) Lana Turner, “Lana: The Lady, the Legend, the Truth,” pp. 14-15.
(3) Ibid.
(4) Mary C. Waldon household, 1910 U.S. census, Johnson County, Ark., pop. sched., Lamar, ED 64, SD 5, p. 142-B (stamped), dwelling 314, family 321, NARA microfilm T624-54.
(5) Martha J. Cullum household, 1910 U.S. census, Van Buren County, Ark., pop. sched., Linn Creek, ED 125, SD 3, p. 129-A (stamped), dwelling 44, family 46, NARA microfilm T624-66: mother of one child who was no longer living.
(6) Michael S. Cole, M.D., “Cowan Connections: The Genealogy of Samuel and Sarah (Keith) Cowan” (Fort Smith, Ark.: the author, 1994), pp. 19-20.
(7) Roy T. Marshall, “Descendants of Nichodemus Keith and Margaret Borden (Revised), Tennessee, Arkansas, Texas, Oklahoma, and New Mexico” (Eagle Lake, Texas: the compiler, 1989), pp. 6-7.
(8) “County Clipping,” Indian Journal (Eufaula, Okla.), 25 October 1907, p. 2, which states that Dr. James M. Cowan of Lamar, Arkansas, was present when his father died.
(9) Marshall, “Descendants of Nichodemus Keith and Margaret Borden (Revised),” p. 14.
(10) “Supreme Court,” Daily Arkansas Gazette (Little Rock, Ark.), 11 June 1872, p. 4.
(11) Marshall, “Descendants of Nichodemus Keith and Margaret Borden (Revised),” pp. 6-7.
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