Colleen's parents, Charles R. Morrison and Agnes Kelly were married in Port Huron on October 23rd, 1897. The first few years they lived with Charles' parents, but after the birth of their daughter Kathleen (Colleen), the moved from the Morrison homestead, which was a few blocks from the St. Clair River, and into the Kelly home at 817 Ontario Street (Port Huron City, St Clair County, 1900 census, sheet 9, lines 10 – 14). The original Kelly house had burnt down in 1894; Patrick Kelly (Colleen's maternal grandfather) was on the fire crew that fought the fire. A new house had gone up on the property, two stories and a gothic copula in one corner. Colleen's aunts Josephine, Liberty (Elizabeth), and Kathleen were still living at home at the time. By Kathleen's birth, the Kelly house was nearly empty. Patrick had died recently, and the only daughter left in the house was Kathleen, who worked as a stenographer at O’Neill Bros and Company. With Mary Kelly’s children moved out there would be plenty of space for a child to grow up, and with the passing of Patrick, Mary Moylan found herself the matriarch of a growing family. A house still stands on the site which looks, from the architecture, like it could be the structure in which Kathleen lived.

 

In 1900 Agnes discovered she was pregnant again, and soon gave birth to Kathleen's brother Cleeve. Shortly after the death of his father in 1902, Charles moved his young family out of the Kelly home at 817 Ontario Street and relocated two blocks north, to 1027 Ontario. By 1904, she had relocated to a different home,perhaps in preperation for the Morrison family move tot heir next home. In her autobiography "Silent Star" Colleen wrote of being the center of attention among her mother's sisters. “Of my mother’s six sisters, three of them… had no children of their own,” she wrote, and so they showered her with gifts and toys. Her aunt Beatrice had two children: Jack and Lisbeth; perpetually youthful-looking Jack would later appear in “Lilac Time.”  Her Aunt May had three boys. Her namesake Aunt Kathleen had a daughter. Her family was, in fact, much larger. There were several aunts and uncles in the area, including those from Charles’s side of the family. Special thanks goes to Jeff Gardocki of Port Huron for his photography and for all the research help he's provided. When the family moved to this home, Kathleen's grandmother mary came with them.