DS: 52 Ancestors Prompt "Thief"

DS: Thief and Escape Artist

Note: DS is still living, as is his ex-wife, my cousin. Therefore I am not including their names in this blog post.

                It’s rather ironic that my Uncle J, the police officer for our tiny town, would have two criminals in his immediate family. The worst by far was his son-in-law DS. He not only had a long rap sheet, but was a repeated prison escapee!

                I’ve been unable to find any birth record for DS. His birth date according to the Kansas prison system is February 1-, 1937, and he seems to have spent some of his early years in Amboy, Minnesota. He first appears in the newspapers at 16, when he attempted to break out of the Blue Earth County Jail with another teen prisoner. The boys were in custody because they had broken out of the reform school in Red Wing, Minnesota and had been captured near DS’s home in Amboy. The pathetic thing was that DS attempted this escape just two days before his scheduled release date. What an idiot! He’d already broken out of the Red Wing facility four times over a two year period, so at 16 he'd broken out of jail five times already.

                                

During the jail break, the boys beat two other prisoners, leaving one with broken ribs and internal injuries, and took the second guy hostage using razor blades, threatening to slash his throat if the guards didn’t release them. The guards tackled the boys, stripped them, and locked them back up. Presumably they got some hard time after this incident.          

DS must have been out of jail by the beginning of 1967, as that is when he met my cousin JO, whose father was police officer J, and whose mother was my dad’s sister. JO and DS were married on May 25, 1967. Their only son, DGS, was born a year later on May 16, 1968.

Unfortunately, marriage didn’t reform DS. According to the stories I heard whispered as a child, DS dragged JO along in his car on a burglary spree, breaking into a brick ranch home outside Mankato—a house we always drove past on our way to visit our grandparents. He was caught and sent back to prison. I am not sure of the date of that arrest—I couldn’t find the newspaper article. However, there was an article dated July 17, 1969 reporting that DS, then 26, had broken out of the prison in Stillwater, Minnesota with another burglary convict, 44-year-old Jay Burnett. The state police had fifty officers searching the heavily wooded area where the pair were first sighted. Burnett was eventually recaptured in Dickenson North Dakota on July 20. I’m not sure when DS was recaptured.

                    Stillwater Prison, Stillwater MN

The next newspaper article featuring the break-out artist was dated February 13, 1980. DS, now 42, was recaptured in Garden City, Kansas following yet another escape from a minimum security facility in Minnesota. He was sent back to Minnesota to serve the rest of his sentence.

JO divorced DS after he was caught burglarizing the Mankato property. Their son, DGS, had developmental delays and died young, on November 29, 1998 at age thirty.

DS must have grown attached to Kansas during his days on the lam there, for now, in his 80s, he is living in Wichita. A website that provides info on convicts included this photo of him. I hope by now his burglary and prison break days are behind him. He apparently had the ability to charm women, as records indicate he remarried several times over the years.

                                     

James Corbin: 52 Ancestors Prompt "Soldier"

James Corbin: 1702-1759

A Soldier’s Brutal Death

            James Corbin is my 6^th great-grandfather, the father of my 5^th great-grandmother Sarah Corbin. She married Nathaniel Mills, who were the parents of one of the Dane family wives. James was born February 24, 1702 in Woodstock, Connecticutt to parents James Corbin and Hannah Eastman Corbin. He came from a large family and had five brothers and three sisters.

On June 19, 1728, he married Susannah Bacon. He was 26 years old, and she was two years older. The couple had a daughter, Abigail, who was born in 1729, and another daughter Susannah who was born in 1731. By that time, the couple no longer seemed to be living in Woodstock; the baptism records show the minister baptized the girls in “Kickamochoag” which seems to be a corruption of the Native American name for the river Coginchaug, near the town of Durham.

            By 1732, the family had moved to Massachusetts, settling in the town of Dudley in Worcester County.  There are no records explaining the move, or indicating James’ profession. Presumably he was a farmer. The couple went on to have eight more children; my fifth great-grandmother was the fifth child, born in 1739.  

            At some point, James became a soldier for the British in the French and Indian War. The Massachusetts colony raised a large number of troops for the effort. The war used both militia men, who were unpaid volunteers, and provincial troops, who were paid by the colonial government for a specific amount of service time, usually a single campaign season. As Wikipedia notes, “Offering money induced propertyless men to enlist.” The Wikipedia article also noted that while other colonies tended to send only the very young, unmarried men. the Massachusetts troops came from a broader swathe of the population.

            The war officially began in 1756. James was not the typical enlistee, since he had land, ten children, and was far from young—he was well into his fifties. He must have been desperate for the colonial government salary, which may have included an enlistment bonus.

            I have found no records regarding his service in the war—the battles he participated in, his date of enlistment, his commanding officer, etc. However, in 1758 or 1759, he returned to his home in Dudley. According to Rev. Harvey M Lawson, author of History and Genealogy of the Descendants of Clement Corbin of Muddy River (Brooklin) Mass. And Woodstock Conn.,

“He came home, claiming that his term of service was up, stoutly resisted arrest, was tied to his horse and taken to Springfield, Mass., where he died from rough handling in 1758.  His widow and son James were appointed administrators on his estate, appraised at £497 14s. 6d.”

            From other sources I have read, the soldiers were very aware of the length of their term of service. Warfare in those days was difficult and dangerous. Food was scarce, shelter limited, and illness was rampant. Men looked forward to the end of their service and would, like poor James, be eager to return home. I suspect the British treatment of James—basically treating him as a deserter—was meant to set an example to other soldiers that it was still up to the British officers to determine when your service was complete—you couldn’t just head home when you knew your time was up.

British military discipline was extremely brutal. One colonial officer’s account of his service describes his horror at witnessing a flogging—two men given 500 lashes apiece. While the men remained alive at the end of the flogging, the officer believed they would soon die as the skin on their backs hung in strips and infection would have set in.

I can only imagine James’ family’s horror when the British arrested him. They must have been terrified as he was tied to his horse and led away. Learning that he had died at his jailors’ hands would have been devastating. I suspect the family was forced to retrieve the body. I wonder what that benign phrase “rough handling” actually comprised. Was James flogged with a whip, or was he beaten with fists or weapons? His body was buried at the Dudley Cemetery. He shares a headstone with his wife Susannah, who lived until 1794 when she was 94 years old.

            I am surprised that his estate was valued at 497 pounds—that would indicate he wasn’t destitute. Perhaps that value was mostly in land and buildings, and that money for daily existence was lacking, motivating his enlistment.

            At the time of his death, my 5^th great-grandmother was 19 years old. His other children ranged in age from five to thirty. His two oldest sons, James, age 24, and Ephraim, age 20, seem to have taken over the farm and the support of the family.

            James Corbin’s tragic death shows that 18^th century soldiers faced hazards and perils far beyond the obvious risks of injury and death in battle.  

Source: History and Genealogy of the Desecendants of Clement Corbin of Muddy River (Brooklin), Mass. and Woodstock, Conn Compiled by Rev. Harvey M Lawson, PH.B, B.D.

Daniel Poor: 52 Ancestors Prompt "Poor Man"

Daniel Poor: 1624-1689

The prompt for this week was “Poor Man”.  I wanted to write about one of my distant ancestors who died in the county poor house, but I couldn’t remember which branch of my family he was in or what his name was, so I needed to take a different approach. I turned to the literal: one of my 8^th Great-grandfathers was Daniel Poor—a truly “Poor” man!

Daniel Poor was born around 1623 or 1624 in Wiltshire, England and emigrated to the colonies in 1638 at age 14. He traveled on the ship Bevis from Southhampton, and was listed on the ship’s register as “Dayell Poor, 14, servant”. He married my 8^th Great Grandmother Mary Farnum in Boston on October 20, 1650, and their marriage was one of the first recorded in Essex County Massachusetts. They settled in Andover, Massachusetts, home of Francis Dane, another one of my 8^th great-grandfathers.

Daniel’s occupation in area records was listed as “husbandman”, which was the 17^th century term for farmer. He seems to have been successful, and was obviously well respected in the community, as he served multiple roles in the governance of Andover. He was appointed surveyor in 1673, and served on the Andover Board of Selectmen in 1674, 1675, 1677, 1683, 1684, 1686 and 1687, and as the Grandjuryman in 1681.

By the time of his death in 1689, he had amassed a substantial estate, including hundreds of acres of land, herds of cattle, sheep, swine and horses, and a long list of household items. The will was filed with an inventory listing the value of his holdings and property—the total valuation was over 756 pounds, a large sum for that era. The herds of animals alone were valued at over 61 pounds.

Daniel allowed a garrison house to be built on one of his outlying properties—this was a fortified house that used to protect the community from Indian attacks. An example of a garrison house is pictured below. 

The other photo shows the Benjamin Abbott house, an old Andover house built in 1685 near the time of Daniel’s death, providing an idea of what Daniel’s house might have looked like.

Daniel's will divided his property between his widow and his eleven surviving children—two sons and nine daughters, a large number of children to reach adulthood in that era! My direct ancestor Hannah Poor Dane had already received her portion, apparently at her marriage, so she received nothing at his death. My other direct ancestor, daughter Priscilla Poor Mooar, fared better. The will states: “I give to my daughter Priscilla my meadow on the west side of Shawshin River commonly called the Pond Meadow.” According to the inventory, the meadow land on the west side was worth 40 pounds.

Despite Daniel’s wealth, he apparently was not completely literate—probably not surprising since he was working as a servant at age 14 when he emigrated. His will was signed with “his mark”, shakily drawn initials “D” and “P”.

There is no record of his burial site. Presumably he was laid to rest in the older of Andover’s two burial grounds, but we cannot be sure. Despite Daniel’s surname, he was rich in family and property. His descendants still lived in the area in 1830, when the map below was drawn.

Hoffman Sister Photos: 52 Ancestors Prompt "Trick or Treat"

A Real Treat: Tricky Photos of the Hoffman Girls
Nora Hoffman Macbeth: 1899-1994

                My brother and I were looking through family photos from our maternal grandmother’s family, the children of William and Lena Funk Hoffman. We were surprised at the number of goofy photos featuring our grandmother. Grandma Nora Hoffman Macbeth never seemed the type of person to have clowned around as a young woman. We tended to imagine her working hard during the daytime, and spending evenings sewing and reading serious literature. So ridiculous!

                So for my Trick or Treat prompt, I’m featuring two photos that show my grandmother’s funny side. In the first photo, she and her eldest sister Grace are clowning around with a huge two-person saw, miming being lumberjacks. They probably had used the saw or at least tried to at some point, but in this shot it looks like they were just posing for laughs. The tree they are pretending to saw looks far too healthy and shade-providing to be the target for removal.

                The second photo is even sillier. Nora is perched on a fallen tree (not the one in the first photo, mind you!) with three of her siblings: her brother Elmer at the left, then Nora, then younger sisters Jennie and Edna on the right. Both Elmer and Jennie are sporting fake mustaches. Elmer has a crazy cap on and is pretending to smoke a pipe. Jennie is dressed entirely in men’s clothes, right down to a suit and tie and a spiffy hat.

                Why the costumes? The snow on the ground ensures it was long after Halloween. Amateur theatrics? Just family horseplay? Sadly, Grandma Nora is no longer around to answer the questions we have about the photo, but it certainly provoked some chuckles.

                Tricks and some treats for Grandma’s descendants! I’m sure she’d be pleased to know she can still surprise us!

Lena Funk Hoffman and Billy: 52 Ancestors Prompt "Transportation"

Billy: The Original "Horsepower"

            Looking back through family photos, I am struck by how rapidly means of transportation changed. In the span of a single century, people transitioned from the original “horse power”—a horse pulling a wagon or carriage—to the roaring horsepower of high-performance engines. Most of the photos feature men with horse teams or at the wheel of cars—Model Ts, Model A’s and then the growing variety of cars, trucks and tractors. So when I found a photo of my great-grandmother, Lena Funk Hoffman, holding the reins of a carriage, I was reminded that transportation wasn’t just the province of my male ancestors.

                Lena Hellena Funk was born in Blue Earth County Minnesota on February 12, 1869 to parents Charles Funk and Catherina Grentz. Lena had three half-siblings from her mother’s first marriage, and two full siblings.

                Lena married my great-grandfather William Henry Hoffman on January 31, 1889 at age nineteen. William took over Lena’s father’s farm just outside Mankato, and they had six daughters and one son, including my grandmother Nora Hoffman.

                Lena was obviously an active partner on the farm, so would have been comfortable around horses. I am sure she could harness the horses, hook up wagons and carriages, and handle farm equipment. From my grandmother’s stories, the whole family loved their horses—they were more than just a means of transportation.

                By the time gas-powered cars and tractors came along, Lena was quite elderly. She probably never learned how to drive a car, but even in her later years, she was still getting around by horse and buggy. This charming photo was labeled by my grandmother Nora, and read “Ma and Billy”.  I am guessing that the photo was taken between 1915 and 1921, based on Lena’s appearance and clothing. The family had huge draft horses to pull the farm equipment, but Billy was a smaller horse used for lighter work.

I love that the family horses all had human names like “Billy” (Mom talked about Joe and Daisy as well). I also love how comfortable Lena looks with the reins in her hands. While she may have been limited to vehicles powered by a mere one or two horsepower during her lifetime, Lena was a competent, confident traveler.

Oscar Peterson, Juhl Peterson and Jacob Joramo: 52 Ancestors Prompt “Adventure”

Driving Uncle Jacob: Oscar and Juhl’s Mankato Adventure

            My father, Juhl Peterson, liked to tell my brother stories about his life while they were out in the soybean fields pulling weeds—it made a boring chore more interesting. My brother has shared some of the stories with me, including a funny one about my dad’s Uncle Jacob Joramo.


            Jacob married Jorgine “Stina” Lee when he was just 22 years old. By the time he was 34, he was a widower with four sons. Without a wife to keep him in line, he was known to drink and gamble and generally run a bit wild, at least in comparison to his more serious younger brother Paul Peterson, Juhl’s father. 


            Sometime in the late 1920s, my uncle Oscar Peterson, Paul’s second oldest son, got his first car. My father was only 11 or 12 at the time, and was very excited when Oscar invited him to ride along on a road trip to Mankato, Minnesota, about thirty miles from their farm near Hanska. This would be the furthest Oscar had driven his new Model A, so he was as excited as Juhl.

     Juhl and Oscar with his new Model A in front of Paul Peterson's original house


            Somehow, their Uncle Jacob found out about the trip. He turned up at the Peterson farm, and persuaded Oscar to let him ride along as well. The boys liked their uncle, who could be a lot of fun, so they were pleased to have him. The trip to Mankato was uneventful. When they arrived in town, Jacob took off, telling his nephews he’d be back in a couple hours. Oscar had some errands to run, and he and Juhl took care of them, returning to the car with their purchases at the appointed meeting time.

            To Oscar’s frustration, there was no sign of Jacob. Oscar and Juhl waited and waited, growing increasingly impatient. Suddenly, there was a shout. They turned to see Uncle Jacob running pell-mell down an alley, yelling at Oscar to “Start the car! Start the car!” Oscar and Juhl could see a mob of men following, yelling angrily at Jacob. 


            The Model A had a hand crank—I can imagine Oscar’s panic as he raced to crank the crankcase and start up the engine. I watched a You-Tube video on how to crank-start a Model A, and it is not a speedy operation! First you have to put the car in neutral gear, “retard the spark” (don’t ask me what that means!), advance the throttle, and turn the key. Then you start cranking. It often takes several cranks to get the engine to catch. I’m sure doing it under pressure was nerve-wracking!


            Oscar somehow managed to get the car running by the time Jacob reached them. Juhl climbed into the back so Jacob could throw himself into the front seat as Oscar hit the gas. Juhl recalled Jacob whooping in delight as he watched his pursuers disappear in a cloud of dust. 

                                  Jacob Joramo and oldest son Carl--approx. age 23


            Jacob refused to tell Oscar and Juhl what he’d done to upset all those men. Juhl assumed he’d either said something stupid while drinking, setting off a bar fight, or he’d cheated at cards. The details didn’t matter to Oscar, who was fuming. Oscar made sure to never, ever give his uncle a ride again. The trip to Mankato proved to be more of an adventure than Oscar wanted or expected!

Peterson vs. Joramo: 52 Ancesotors Prompt "Context"

The Surname Battle: Peterson vs. Joramo

Paul Peterson (1867-1942) and Jacob Joramo (1864-1934)

            My grandfather Paul Peterson emigrated from Norway with his parents and three siblings in 1870 when he was just three years old. Paul and his descendants used the surname “Peterson.” However, his brother and neighbor, Jacob, used the surname “Joramo”. Jacob’s descendants all say our side of the family uses the “wrong” surname, but our side insists they are the ones in the wrong. I could never understand how this conflict arose. How could two brothers end up with different surnames? Once I started researching Norwegian immigrants and surnames, I discovered the reason for the confusion and conflict. 

An article on a Norwegian immigrant history site explained it quite succinctly: “In Norway prior to the 1860s families did not use fixed surnames. They used a patronymic pattern in which children were named after their father. Hence, John Andersen = John, the son of Anders. And Mari Andersdatter = Mari, the daughter of Anders. Anders himself would be named Anders Olafsen = Anders, the son of Olaf. The full family unit could include Anders Olafsen (father), Mette Evensdatter (mother), John Andersen (son) and Mari Andersdatter (daughter). Mette Evensdatter will not have a name corresponding to her husband.” 

The author goes on to explain, “This system definitely gets confusing when you encounter names as common as Ole Olsen or Nils Hansen, so they often used their farm names to clarify their identity when conducting official business or traveling. In church records, for example, they would typically append the farm name to the patronymic name to be more precise, for example “Anders Olafsen Sandness” (or “Anders Olafsen på (from) Sandness” if Anders merely worked at Sandness). It’s very important to keep in mind that when a farm name is used, it is the farm at which they currently reside, rather than the farm at which they were born. The use of farm names is very helpful to keep in mind when looking at old records, since Norway only gradually adopted fixed surnames from the mid-1800s until they were required in 1923.”

This explains my family’s dual names. “Peterson” was the patronymic: Paul and Jacob’s father was Peder Pederson or Peter Peterson, depending on the record. He used the surname “Peterson/Pederson” fairly consistently. After his death in 1880, only ten years after the family arrived in Minnesota, the rest of the family swung back and forth between “Peterson” and what must have been the name of the farm where they lived in Norway, “Joramo”.  

                                      Jacob Joramo with wife Stina and son Carl about 1890

The 1875 state census listed the family as Peterson. The 1885 state census lists mother “Anna Joramoe” living with sons Jacob and Paul “Joramoe”. The 1895 census shows Paul Peterson and wife, plus Paul’s mother Anna Peterson, all living next door to Jacob Joramo and his wife. Paul and Jacob’s sister listed her maiden name on at least one record as “Marit Peterson Joramo”, so she split the difference, combining the patronymic with the farm name. Their other sister Julia gave her maiden name as “Peterson”. 

                           Paul Peterson and wife Regina Severson, 1892

My father said that his father Paul felt that Jacob was being disrespectful of their father, Peter, by choosing to adopt Joramo as a surname. I suspect Jacob felt Paul lacked respect for the land they left behind in Norway. Jacob was three years older than Paul, so probably had fond memories of the farm where he was born and the family they left behind in Norway, so place was more important to Jacob’s sense of identity. 

Jacob’s 1934 obituary lists his name as “Jacob Peterson Joramo”, so in the end, Jacob honored both the patronymic and the farm names. 

          Paul Peterson and his four Joramo nephews: Sam, Carl, Joe and Olaf, about 1940

Understanding the context of Norwegian surname variations helped me respect Jacob’s decision, However, I am glad my grandfather Paul chose the surname Peterson.  I am proud to have Peterson as my maiden name, and to honor the great-grandfather who died long before I was born. 

Quotes from “Understanding Norwegian Naming Patterns” by Eric https://norwegianridge.com/2011/07/10/understanding-norwegian-naming-patterns/

Peterson Farms: 52 Ancestors Prompt “Harvest”

Harvest Time in the Early Twentieth Century on the Paul and Oscar Peterson Farms

             Farming has changed so much over the last century. My brother grows some of the same crops as his father and grandfather did on the same land outside Hanska, Minnesota, but the equipment he uses to harvest it is amazingly different.

My grandfather needed to hire crews of threshers to harvest his wheat crops, as small farmers couldn’t afford to buy big threshing machines themselves, and didn’t have the large number of workers needed to run them. 

            The photo below shows a threshing crew. Most of the men would have been part of a traveling crew who moved from farm to farm over huge swathes of the Midwest, but probably a couple are my uncles, possibly Oscar or Phillip Peterson, or their cousins the Joramos. It was an exciting but busy time when the threshing crews arrived. Everyone enjoyed the company—extended family members joined the hired crews. The women were cooking non-stop to provide huge pot-luck meals to feed all the workers. Children were put to work at small tasks and caring for the animals while the men were in the fields for long hours. 

            Early corn harvests required a corn picker machine, which removed the cobs from the stalks. The cobs then needed to be fed through a “sheller” which removed the kernals from the cob. When the first combines were developed—machines that could simultaneously pick the cobs and shell them, spewing the shelled corn from a chute into a wagon, with the stalks, leaves and cobs expelled from the back of the machine—it was a great time saver.

            Here is a photo of my Aunt Thelma Peterson with my cousin Elaine Peterson, Thelma’s niece. The men behind them are shelling corn, and are my father, Juhl Peterson, and one of his cousins, either Loren or Junen Kyllo. They are working at Juhl’s brother Oscar’s farm, located just down the road from Juhl and Paul’s property.

            Below is a photo of my grandfather Paul with another man who may be his son Oscar, sitting next to a sheller. I believe they are at Paul’s farm. The original photo was very small—only 2x3 inches—and it was impossible to identify the people. I was delighted to discover my grandfather, in his old age, in the photo when I blew up the scanned photo. 

            Current combine harvesters are more expensive than many homes, starting at over $400,000. I wonder what my grandfather Paul Peterson would have said about that! Farming has become an expensive and complicated business, and I admire my brother’s commitment to it. Finding photos of my Peterson ancestors at work on their farms reminds me that Kent’s commitment was shared by my father, grandfather and great-grandfather—a century of hard work and sacrifice that I honor.

Hoffmans and Macbeths: 52 Ancestors Prompt “Map It Out”

Geography, Love and Marriage in the Early Twentieth Century

            I recently started studying plat maps from the early twentieth century, looking up my grandparents’ farm sites in southern Minnesota to better understand the geography of the places I’d visited as a child. I was surprised to discover how close many extended family members had lived in the years between 1900 and 1930. Suddenly I had a whole new understanding of family relationships.

            The map below shows parts of two townships in Blue Earth County, Minnesota—Mankato Township and Le Ray Township. The plat map was prepared in 1916. The highlighted “plats” or acres of land were farms owned by my extended family members. Dozens of my ancestors lived mere miles from one another—the furthest distances between the highlighted farm places are perhaps five miles at most.

            Seeing the physical proximity of these families helped me understand how couples met and fell in love—three of my grandmother’s sisters literally married the “boy next door” —Nora Hoffman’s family, William and Lena Hoffman, lived at site No. 3, and the Seltenreich boys, the three young men Nora’s sisters married, lived right across the road at site No. 4.

            My grandmother Nora married a boy just down the road a few miles; Ivan Macbeth grew up at site No. 8. Nora’s brother, Elmer Hoffman, married Mildred Edwards, whose family lived nearby at site No. 6. This romance led to Elmer’s sister, Jennie Hoffman, pairing up with Mildred’s brother Delbert Edwards. Nora’s youngest sister married Robert Miller, who grew up at site No. 1, the Charles Miller farm.

Elmer Hoffman and Mildred Edwards Wedding--I think man on left may be Delbert Edwards and woman to right Jennie Hoffman, who married later.

            The Hoffmans weren’t the only family who found familiarity breeding love rather than contempt. My grandfather Ivan Macbeth’s extended family also married neighbors. Ivan’s father, Walter, also grew up at site No. 8. His brother Charles farmed the site next door, site No. 9. Nearby at site No. 10, several members of the extended Britt family lived and farmed. The Britts intermarried with the Macbeths several times over several generations. Walter Macbeth married Lucy Dane, whose grandmother was a Britt. Walter’s sister Caroline Macbeth married William C Britt, and his sister Mary E. Macbeth married Handy E. Britt.

            A generation later, Walter’s daughter (and my grandfather Ivan’s sister) Ethel Mary Macbeth married a neighbor to the west, George Ott, who owned site No. 7. Another of Walter’s daughters, Annie Macbeth, married Gus Schostag, who lived at site No. 5.

            Travel in the early part of the twentieth century was still slow and often difficult, so meeting potential romantic partners could be difficult. Most of these families were farmers, so worked at home, never meeting other people at a workplace. Schools and churches tended to be small and nearby—the schools these families attended were one room, usually with fewer than thirty pupils total. Young people simply didn’t meet many people of the opposite sex, so had few potential partners to choose amongst. I wonder whether my ancestors’ choices to marry were based on romantic love or were they more of a practical decision? Can you really find true love in a five mile radius? I hope my ancestors did.

The Seltenreich Double-First Cousins: 52 Ancestors Prompt “Cousins”

                So what exactly is a double first cousin? Double first cousins arise when two siblings reproduce with another set of siblings, and the resulting children are related to each other through both parents' families. Double first cousins share both sets of grandparents in common, aunts and uncles in common,  and have double the degree of consanguinity than ordinary first cousins. In other words, double first cousins should NOT become kissing cousins or marry!

                In my family, several of my grandmother’s nieces and one nephew were double-first cousins. My grandmother had four older sisters, and the three oldest became enamored of a neighbor’s three sons, and ended up marrying them.

                The first couple to wed was Grandma Nora’s eldest sister, Grace Ida Hoffman. Grace was born July 15, 1889, so was ten years older than my grandmother. She married the eldest of the three Seltenreich brothers, Carl Oscar, who was born September 24, 1887. The wedding was May 6, 1912, when Grace was 22 years old. The couple farmed near Mankato. They had three children: Reuben Julius, born May 28, 1914; Stella Lucille, born June 26, 1916; and Smila Deloris, born August 13, 1930. 

             Oscar Seltenreich, Grace Seltenreich, and their children Stella and Reuben

                Martha Hoffman, the next oldest daughter born September 17, 1891, married the second oldest Seltenreich son, Julius “Jay” on September 20, 1916, when they were 25 and 24, respectively. Jay was born January 21, 1892, so was a little younger than Mart. Jay became a firefighter in Mankato, and they had one child, a daughter, Lucille Fae Seltenreich, born July 10, 1925.

                The third-oldest sister, Sadie Marie Hoffman, born February 12, 1894, married the youngest Seltenreich boy, Frederick Herman Adolph on June 6, 1917. Fred was born July 29, 1893. They were 23 and 24 when they married.  They lived just down the road from Grace and Oscar. Fred also farmed. Sadie and Fred had one daughter, Elnora June, born June 16, 1924.

Elnora Seltenreich as baby, and with boyfriend Bud Fisher and her parents Fred and Sadie Seltenreich.

                So these five children, Reuben, Stella, Smila, Lucille and Elnora, all shared the same four grandparents, the same aunts and uncles, and shared more genes than typical first cousins. I wonder if they ever realized how unusual their relationship was—that other cousins didn’t share the same grandparents and had a wider circle of relatives. They were very special cousins.

Funks and Grentzes: 52 Ancestors Prompt “Mistake”

Funks and Grentzes: My Research “Mistake”

While researching my great-grandmother and her family, I made a serious mistake based on a single census record. It took me a couple of years to correct the mistake, which crippled my research on a whole branch of my family tree.

My maternal great-grandmother, Lena Helena Funk, was born on February 12, 1869 to Charles or John Funk and a woman named Catherine or Catherina, whose surname was a bit of a mystery. All I knew for sure was that the family had moved to the Mankato, Minnesota area at some point prior to Lena’s birth, but I was struggling to confirm how many children the family had, and what happened to all the family members other than Lena.

My best piece of evidence was the 1870 census record, showing the Funks living near Mankato. The family was headed by father John, age 40, a cabinetmaker born in Prussia, and his wife Catherine, age 33, born in Ohio, who was “keeping house”. There are six children listed: William, age 12, born in Iowa, Sophia, age 10, born in Iowa, Mary, age 8, born in Iowa, Charles, age 6, born in Iowa, and 3-year-old Amelia and baby Lena, age 1, both born in Minnesota.

I dutifully added all these children to my tree under the surname “Funk”. I searched for them on later records, but poor Catherine and the three older children all disappeared. Father “John”, also known as Charles, appeared in the 1885 state census as a widower, so Catherine must have died. He lived with Lena and Charles, and I was able to find Amelia’s marriage records, so I knew she was alive. But I could find no trace of William, Sophia, and Mary Funk. Had they all died along with their mother, at some point between 1870 and 1885?

I was stuck until I found an obituary for Charles Funk, Lena’s brother. It had a wealth of information. First, it included his father’s death year, 1889. It also stated that his mother died when he was six years old, which would make her death year 1871. Third, it stated he was born in Burlington, Iowa, which gave me a location to search for records. And fourthly and most importantly, it stated he was survived by a half-sister, Mrs. Mary Gaffney of Redwood Falls, Minnesota.

I suddenly realized that the three “missing” older children weren’t necessarily missing. If they were half-siblings, they likely had a different surname than Funk. The census taker had mistakenly listed them as having their stepfather’s surname, and I had been searching for them using that erroneous information.

So what was the correct surname? I started researching Mary Gaffney of Redwood Falls, and eventually discovered her marriage record. Her maiden name was “Grentz”. She married George Gaffney of Janesville Minnesota when she was 17—he was ten years older. They had six children together.  

                                                            Mary Grentz Gaffney

I then backtracked to the Iowa records, finding a marriage record from Mahashka County, Iowa for C.N. Funk and Catherine Grentz dated November 21, 1863.  That led me to the 1860 census record for Louis Grentz, a brewer from Oskaloosa, Iowa, with a wife, Catherina, son William Louis, and daughter Sophia Grentz. The last Grentz daughter, Mary, was born in 1861 or 1862, around the same time that Louis Grentz must have died. I have yet to find death records for him that would give me a precise date.

I made the appropriate corrections to my family tree, so now William, Sophia and Mary are listed as the children of Louis Grentz, and as half-siblings to my great-grandmother Lena Funk and her siblings Charles and Amelia.

I managed to find Lena’s half-brother William Louis on the 1880 census. He was 19 years old, living in Mankato and working as an engineer. The census shows his surname as “Grantz”. I have found no further records for him under either Grentz or Grantz.

 I am still struggling to find any records at all for Sophia. Perhaps she died at the same time as her mother. But at least now I will be searching for her with the correct surname.

Annie Macbeth Schostag: 52 Ancestors Prompt “Back to School”

Annie Macbeth Schostag: 1893-1976

            “Back to School” calls to mind new pencils and notebooks and anxious children heading to a new classroom. But it also applies to the dedicated teachers who head back to work each fall—teachers like my great-aunt Annie Macbeth Schostag.

            Annie was my grandfather Ivan Macbeth’s middle sister. She was born June 1, 1893 to Walter Macbeth and Lucy Dane Macbeth, the second of their six children, and grew up on the family farm in LeRay Township, Blue Earth County, Minnesota.

            I am not sure when she became a school teacher. I believe she attended some sort of teacher training program—there is a city directory listing for her in 1914 listing her as a “student” and boarding in “rooms” at 513 North 5^th Street in Mankato. She was 21 years old then, so it must have been secondary school, probably Mankato Normal School which trained teachers at that time. I have not been able to find her in the Normal School yearbooks that still exist from that era, however. The photo below shows her with other young women that looks like it was taken in her early twenties, so it could be her with other teachers-in-training. She is at the far right.

            By the date of the 1920 census, Annie was 26 years old, living at home with her parents and two youngest brothers, and was working as a teacher, probably at the nearby Dickerson one-room school. My mother said that was where she taught, and she appears in the photo below of Dickerson School students as the teacher in the upper right corner.

I love the photo--it is fascinating to see the range of ages in the class. Annie may have had her own young brothers as students—they attended Dickerson, but may have been in high school by the date the photo was taken. Look at how cold the weather was—the students were all bundled up. Using the restroom involved going out in the cold to an outhouse. The inside of the school was probably heated by a wood or coal-burning stove, which wouldn’t have kept the building very warm in the winter months. Students sat at wooden desks fastened to the floor, with the youngest in the front at the smallest desks, and the older students at the back. Differentiated instruction was the rule of the day—teachers at these schools prepared dozens of lessons each day, teaching three or four levels of English, math, and history. It was a lonely, hard, and poorly paid life.

            I am not sure how many years Annie taught. By the 1930 census, she was married to Gustaf Schostag and was living in Decoria with him and his mother. She was no longer teaching; schools usually forbade hiring married women as teachers.

Annie

Gus

            Annie and Gus never had any children. Gus farmed for many years before retiring to the small town of St. Clair where they lived until their deaths. I remember them as a sweet old couple who we visited occasionally when I was in grade school. I remember on one occasion, probably around 1966 0r 1967, Annie made my brother and I chocolate milk shakes on a warm summer day, much to our delight. She was having a little trouble with daily tasks at that point—my grandmother had been appalled at the state of the house. I suspect Annie, then in her seventies, might have had the beginnings of dementia. She must have used spoiled milk in the milkshakes, as both my brother and I became violently ill a few hours after drinking them. My mother never felt comfortable eating there again. Poor Aunt Annie!

1961

            Annie died March 19, 1976 at age 82, and was buried in the Eagle Lake Cemetery.