John Calvin Oates was the son of Robert Franklin Oates and Sarah Matthews Oates.
John Calvin "Cab" Oates was six years of age when his parents moved the family from Henry County, Alabama, to Texas, in December of 1872. The Oates Family lived in Newton, Texas until the spring of 1873 when they moved to Polk County where they lived on a rented farm near Bear Creek. From there, they moved to a farm near Sand Creek after Cab's father, Robert Oates, filed a 160-acre homestead claim. John Calvin "Cab" Oates was 12 years old when his father, Robert Oates, died in 1878.
John Calvin "Cab" Oates married Artie Missie Kirkland on March 5, 1891, in Tyler Co., Tx.
They were the parents of nine children; the youngest died as an infant.
Except for a brief time in Mitchell County, Texas, John C. "Cab" and Missie Kirkland Oates lived all their married life in the Dies Community in Tyler County, Texas. They moved back to Tyler County from Mitchell County because in the words of their late grandson, Elza Oates, "they nearly starved to death living out there".
At his death in 1951, Uncle Cab Oates was survived by his wife of 60 years, Aunt Missie Kirkland Oates; two sons, Robert E. "Bob" Oates and Luther Elza Oates; four daughters, Katherine Oates Sterling, Hettie Oates Swearingen, Emma Oates Hanks, and Merle Oates Creel; 23 grandchildren and several great-grandchildren; one brother, Wm. Henderson Oates; and one sister, Mae Hettie Oates Adams.
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Uncle Cab Oates was preceded in death by his parents, Robert Oates and Sarah Matthews Oates; a daughter, Maggie Oates Bostick; a son, Stephen Ben Oates; an infant son, John Calvin Oates; four grandchildren; four brothers, Stephen M. Oates, Charles S. Oates, Ephraim E. Oates, and James Robert Oates; and seven sisters, Mary Oates Davison, Elizabeth Oates Griner, Jane Oates Walding, Margaret Oates Gibson, Sarah Oates Gray, Sinia Oates Peavy, and Alabama Carl Oates Kirkland.