Wednesday, August 6, 2025

Zimmermans, Sheffers, Pike, Baldwins and Haneys

I'm going to preface this by noting that this post is a very, VERY old draft that has been sitting out here since 2016. It's now August 2025. I never finished it (as I was gonna include the Weimer photos who are also tangentially related), but seeing as how I sent some of the Zimmermans and Sheffers home last week, figured may as well post it!

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OKAY. I've been researching this batch of photos I purchased last June and they are all one gigantic family. So I'm going to try and fit them all into one blog post, and hope that I don't confuse the crap out of anybody who stumbles upon this.

Let's start with the Zimmerman children, because I think that it's the oldest photo. Or at the very least highest up on the tree?


Zimmermans!
Back L to R: Catherine Elizabeth, Lucinda Jane, Naomi.
Front L to R: Rose Elva, William Ross, Mary Olive

John Jacob Zimmerman (born September 12, 1825) and Mary Ann Miller (born April 20, 1828) had 6 children: Catherine Elizabeth, Lucinda Jane, William Ross, Rose Elva, Mary Olive and Naomi. I haven't had much luck finding birth dates for Mary Olive or Naomi. I found Mary Olive's marriage record, but so far the only record of Naomi I have is this photo and the hand written note on the back that says she married a man with the surname Tiley or Tilley? 

Anywho, of those 6, I have the most photos going down Catherine Elizabeth's line. Catherine married Banner R Sheffer and they had 5 children: Ida May, Guy Z, Bertha Alice, Ora Nina and Roy Ross.

Banner had 3 brothers - William, Barton and Dennis. One of the photos I purchased was Banner & Catherine with some of their children as well as his brother's Barton & William along with their wives and children. Yay in-laws! :)

Back row: Craig, Ray & Lina Sheffer (children of Barton Sheffer), Guy, Ora &
Roy Sheffer (children of Banner Sheffer), Waldo Sheffer (son of William Sheffer).
Seated: Barton Sheffer & wife Eva, Banner Sheffer & wife Catherine,
William Sheffer & wife Eliza with daughter Ethel
Guy Sheffer
Guy Sheffer & wife Gertrude Giles
wedding photo
Okay, so of Banner & Catherine's kids I really only have extra photos of two. Guy Sheffer (born December 1873) married Gertrude Iva Giles (born April 25, 1889). They had a son Lee G Sheffer who was born around 1908. I can't find much on Lee, unfortunately. I know he married Margaret Link in 1932, but I can't find a death record or any newspaper clippings about them so I don't know if there are any living descendants. Guy Sheffer died in 1910 and Gertrude didn't die until 1940 so it's possible she remarried, but also can't find any documentation to back that up.


Back Row: Mrs & Mr Baldwin, Stephen Pike, Ida (Sheffer) Pike
Front Row: Mr Baldwin's mother, Eva Baldwin Pike holding Marguerite,
Basil Pike holding Edwin, Catherine Elizabeth Sheffer (mother of Ida Pike)
Banner & Catherine's daughter Ida May (born March 1870) married Stephen A Pike (born January 1855) in 1888. They had 3 children together: Glen Haven Pike, Basil A Pike & Stephen A Pike Jr. Their son Basil married Mary Eva Baldwin and they had 2 children together  (pictured above!) Edwin Richard Pike and Mary Marguerite Pike. I know Marguerite married Paul Riley Staats who died in 2002, and I think Edwin died a bachelor in 2001, but again no documentation to back that up.

Oh! And even though their names weren't recorded on the back on the above photograph, the people identified as Eva Baldwin's parents in the back row would be Freda & Scott Baldwin (haven't found Freda's maiden name), and the elderly woman in the front row identified as Scott Baldwin's mother would be Catherine Baldwin (nee Butcher).

Aunt Ida (Sheffer) Pike, baby Dale Pike, Glen Pike (Dale's father) Grandma Sheffer
I also have this great picture of Ida May Sheffer with her mother Catherine Elizabeth (seated), her son Glen Haven Pike and grandson Dale Thornbury Pike. I'm pretty sure I can track down living descendants through Dale Pike. :)


Banner Pierce Haney, Bertha Blanch Zimmerman, Walter Jack Castator
Next up! Adorable triple baby picture. Okay... so using the Zimmerman siblings as our starting point... Banner Pierce Haney is the grandson of Banner Sheffer & Catherine Zimmerman (parents are Allen Haney & Bertha Alice Sheffer), Bertha Blanch Zimmerman is the daughter of William Ross Zimmerman & Christina (no maiden name found yet) and Walter Jack Castator is the youngest son of Oscar Castator & Rose Elva Zimmerman. I'm pretty sure I have tracked down Banner Pierce Haney and Walter Castator to potentially alive descendants... but I haven't had much luck tracking Bertha Zimmerman down.

Also related to this tree - though not quite so directly to the Zimmermans which I started this post with -



Grandma Zimmerman, mother, Ida, Glen
UNSURE on this one, but fairly sure it goes along with this family. The back is labeled Grandma Zimmerman, but it looks NOTHING like Catherine Elizabeth to me (and she should be Grandma Sheffer, not Zimmerman). While I can believe that little boy could be Glen Haven Pike... neither of the standing women look like Ida May to me based off previous photos. And logically the only this could be Grandma Zimmerman was if this was either Christina (William Ross Zimmeran's wife)... or... his mother Mary Ann Zimmerman (nee Miller)? But then who are Ida & Glen? And who is "mother"? Mystery!

Bertha Sheffer
Carl 9 years
Glen 11 years
Fay 1 year
Again, entirely plausible that the oldest boy there is Glen Haven Pike. But I have yet to find a Carl or a Fay in the tree.... so.... ???


And the biggest mystery of all. I actually bought this one on accident - I had so many photos in my "to buy" pile that I failed to recognize that the back of the photo only read "Property of B A Sheffer". So I have no idea who this girl is. Or where she fits on the tree. Possibly a Haney? She's kinda got Natalie Haney's eye shape.

Saturday, May 30, 2020

Edwin Jonas Kosier

I have 2 binders stuffed full of photos I bought from antique stores. Some which I've started research on, but most that I haven't.

Do you think I spent a solid 3 hours on any of them last night?

NOPE!

Because my very good friend who knows I love this stuff sent me these two screengrabs from a local Chandler, AZ Facebook group she's part of and I absolutely could not resist. Look at this AMAZING photo!!!







And honestly, bless whichever child labeled the back of the photo with his birthday. With no photographer's mark denoting a location I could zero in on and with the last name being questionable (I was convinced at first it was Kosell, but also tried Kosiec), I finally gave up and just searched for an Edwin Jonas born on that date.

The 3rd result was a VA index for an Edwin Jonas Kosier. 

Lykens Register, 21 Dec 1967, Thu  •  Page 17
Edwin Jonas Kosier, born July 31st to George & Elizabeth Kosier (nee Williard). Oldest of two (younger sister Emily Catherine, born February 4th, 1901). He worked as an architect from at least the late 1920s-1940s per census records & his obituary, as well as a WWI vetran. In January 1928 he  married Mary Jane Speraw and they had 6 children (Edwin Jonas Jr, Robert Charles, Howard Whitmoyer, Patricia A, James F C and Mary Katherine). At some point he and Mary Jane separated, because his obituary states that he's married to Dorthea Emma Kosier (nee Dockey). He died December 11, 1967. 

I found one of his granddaughters on Facebook and messaged her through her business page, and now this amazing photo is heading home!




Wednesday, November 14, 2018

Will Aunt Rena please stand up?

Aunt Rena & Eleanor Cannan

Me a year ago when I bought this photo: Even though this photo doesn't have a photographer's mark with a location, I bet I can find an Eleanor Cannan with an Aunt Rena! I'll buy it!

Me today: WHY DID I BUY THIS PHOTO?!?!

Needless to say, my search is not going well. So I figure this photo is probably from 1920-1930 based off Aunt Rena's dress? That narrows down when baby Eleanor could have been born. Since my initial FamilySearch peek gave me Eleanor Cannan b. 1930 in NJ, Eleanor Cannan b. 1903 in Pennsylvania and Eleanor Cannan b. 1819 on the Isle of Man.... I decided to just go for NJ Eleanor.

Eleanor Cannan was born February 11, 1930 to Charles Henry Cannan and Hazel A Irwin in Camden, New Jersey. She married Robert B Morris April of 1952 and died May of 1995.

Click me to make me legible.

And as you can see from what I've thrown together on Ancestry, she had no shortage of aunts.... but none of them were named Rena. Unless it was a nickname that I have no documentation of. Seemed like her aunt Emily Catherine went by Catherine for a while.... and I can see that maybe be shortened to Rena. Or Elnora?

OOOOOR....

I have the completely wrong family and this Eleanor Cannan is not my Eleanor Cannan. I'm kind of at a loss. Not sure where I'm going to go from here.

Tuesday, June 12, 2018

Beulah Althea Peckman

I typed this up in March, and then never published it. Personal fail.

So 2018 has been crazy between work and my dad getting a heart & kidney transplant that it took me until yesterday to realize that it was already March and I hadn't done any research on antique store photos this year and hadn't made a blog post since November. Work was slow-ish this week, so I occupied some spare time by picking out a photo and vowing to research it.

And then I had a moment of ADD and totally ignored that photo, and worked on research for Beulah Althea Peckman's baby photo instead.

Beulah Althea Peckman
Age 7 1/2 mo. Weight 18 lbs.
It's probably more frustrating than the original pic I planned to work on would have been, because I'm just not sure if the info I'm finding is the right person. As you can see, the photographer's mark on the photo is from Bradford, Pennsylvania. The name on the back is very clearly Beulah Althea Peckham. That is a very specific name, so she should be easy to find, right?

Well, I have been record stalking a Beulah Althea Peckham. She was born in New York in June 1892 to Frank Leroy Peckham & Myrta Althia Seely. She went to University of Missouri - Columbia and got her Bachelor of Arts & Bachelor of Science and then went onto Columbia University to get a Masters in Modern History.

I can track her through various school yearbooks both while she was at University of Missouri and later to a high school in New Jersey where he was a teacher.

But I can't for the life of me figure out why she has a baby photo from a photographer in Pennsylvania. :\

The closest I've gotten is finding a 1939 yearbook for a Troy, Pennsylvania where she taught. But that's later in life.... sooooo....

Troy High School, 1939


West Orange High School, 1943
Even though I think the odds are slim, it is entirely possible that there was another Beulah Althea Peckham out there and she is not this baby I bought from an antique store but a completely unrelated woman.

But assuming this isn't an unrelated woman...... I also can't find any siblings, spouses, children.... nada. I can't even find a death date. Beulah is a frustrating woman to research.

JUNE ADDENDUM: So there is a social security record for Beulah Peckham... born October 15, 1892, died June 1977. It seems highly probable this is her. I got the June 1892 from the 1900 census record, buuuuuuut, uh, well census records have been wrong before. But this also means that she likely died unmarried. So I guess her baby photo stays in my photo hoard collection.

Monday, November 20, 2017

A Small Burst of Research! [Wanker Sisters/Jennie Berglin]

My friend talked me into joining Mastodon last week. So I did because why not. I've actually been having a lot of fun on it... it's like a much chiller Twitter full of really talented, artistic people. I don't really have any artistic ability... but I do have genealogy! I thought maybe somebody else on the site might find it vaguely interesting - and it's been a slow week at work - so I "livetweeted" (livetooted, per Mastodon vernacular) some genealogy research as I was doing it.

Not sure how many people actually DID find it interesting, but... I've gotten some things accomplished!

Last Tuesday I found myself returning to the Wanker sisters. I've tried contacting a few descendants of Mary Ann to no avail... and damn it I really want to send this photo home because I love it so much.

Wanker Sisters: Mary, Emma, Lesta, Ella, Nellie Pearl


After lots of scrounging around newspapers I finally found the name of Ella's (the 2nd youngest sister) son. Using my work's Spokeo account I found an address for him - and who knows if it's actually correct - or if he's still alive since he'll be turning 70 next month. But I sent off a notecard to the address I found. FINGERS CROSSED.


Friday I researched a lady I hadn't done ANY research on. She was part of my big Cokato, Minnesota haul back in April. 


Jennie L Berglin, born November 16th, 1882 in Cokato, Minnesota to Swedish immigrant farmers Nels & Mary Berglin (nee Johnson). She married John Nelson and they had 3 children. She died April 9th, 1977.

No interesting stories/newspaper clippings about her that I could find, but the backs of the photos mention that she worked for whoever owned these photos originally as a cook... and somebody named Margaret visited her in an elder care home back in 1970. None of the census records show her having a job. Her husband John was a butcher, so maybe she worked in the butcher shop with him? I honestly don't know.

I did manage to trace her line down to some living grandchildren and great grandchildren so hopefully I'll be able to send the photos off before Thanksgiving. :)

Tuesday, April 4, 2017

Organization! (+a mighty haul!)

I have accumulated a lot of photos. Last year I decided to upload them all to a Tumblr account (here) so I could research them even if I wasn't near the image files. Well, I went through the entire Tumblr account and added tags to organize things better for my sanity. If you're interested, you can see what photos I've started research on and which ones I haven't (haha, stop buying new things Toni). There's a tag for what I have available to return and for extra feel good, you can see everything I've reunited with family members (my fave tag). I also tagged them with surnames. Or names I think are the surnames.

With that done, I had a HUGE haul on Sunday. The lovely gentleman I returned all the Goettling/Gateman photos to was super sweet and sent me reimbursement. It was generous (more than what I spent on photos & shipping), so I went on a spree at Call It New, Call It Antique.



I'm really excited about the teaching certificate. It's from 1870 and is something a little different. I just hope I can find somebody who wants it. I have done a little research on it, and the woman never married. Anywho, you can see proper scans of all these things over on the Tumblr while I work on researching some of them!

Friday, March 17, 2017

Libbie Sherman

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Libbie E Sherman was born September 2, 1886 in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The only child of Elliot H Sherman & Clara E Kelly. She married William Guy Waters on June 5, 1915. She died February 1970 in Grand Rapids.

With only a 20 minute throw together of Libbie Sherman's family tree, I have a feeling this one is going to sit in my binder for a while. :( No kids, no siblings, no 1st cousins.... but it's such a cute photo, I don't regret buying it. Not sure where that leaves me research-wise though. Maybe a 2nd or 3rd cousin would want Libbie's photo? 

Thursday, March 16, 2017

Gatemans & Goettlings

I've previously made smaller posts about this batch of photos (Ernest Goettling & Susanna Gateman and Sophia Goettling)... and had a draft of a post sitting in my Blogger since January where I was going to post more.



But as fate would have it, Sophia's great grandson found me and reached out! So today the 11 photos I bought of the Gateman/Goettling families were sent off! I'm delighted to be able to send them off - not just because it clears 11 spaces in my overstuffed binder - but because I've had these photos for almost 2 years and was starting to hit that "maybe nobody wants these" point.

So yay! On to the next!

Wednesday, January 11, 2017

Re: David & Luvisa Shanks (nee Fisher)

One of my New Years Resolutions this year is to be better at updating this blog even if nothing particularly exciting research-wise is happening. Also to get more photos sent back to their families because my binder of photos doth overfloweth! In August, I converted my secondary Facebook account (that I had previously used for spammy game stuff) into a Facebook account for Wayward Objects. Because really, Facebook SHOULD - in theory - make connecting photos back to families easier.

IN THEORY.

I've been trying to get a hold of somebody - anybody - descended from David & Luvisa Shanks (previously posted about back in April 2015). I have lots of options, they had 9 children and I have uncovered a lot of great great great grandchildren. The problem comes when they aren't very active on Facebook... or they are and they don't see my private message... or (in one case) they are and they are just blatantly ignoring me for some bizarre reason. But I won't give up! Short term goal is to get David & Luvisa back to their family before the month is over!

Wednesday, November 30, 2016

Re: Frances Virginia Wilcoxen

I have been notoriously bad at updating this blog this year for reasons... but I did want to take a second to post that I finally reunited this adorable photo of Frances Wilcoxen to her great grandson's family last week! :) My original research post from last March is here.

Frances went home!

My antique store photo binder is still overflowing with other ancestors that I haven't even started researching. Perhaps that will be part of my New Years resolutions.

Wednesday, April 27, 2016

The Wanker Sisters

Just a super quickie post since I'm mailing off a letter to a snail mail address I found and want to have a blog post about this awesome photo I bought a couple weekends ago. <3

Wanker Girls
Mary, Emma, Lesta, Ella, Nellie Pearl
Even though there was no photographer's mark with a location on this photo... I figured 5 women with the surname Wanker couldn't be that hard to find. I was right. I found Nellie Pearl right away.

The Wanker sisters (Emma M b.1870, Mary Ann b.1877, Celestia "Lesta" b.1878, Ella b.1884 and Nellie Pearl b.1888) were born to parents Antonio Wanker (Wauker?) who immigrated from France and Margaret Jane Swank. Antonio & Margaret also had 3 sons - Elijah, Samuel & Ralph.

I'm actually having a hell of a time getting further than the sister's children, with the exception Mary Ann's line. Still lots of research for me to try to do with this family - and I'll probably do a follow up post if this letter I'm sending doesn't reach it's intended target or an interested party - but I wanted to post something just in case. :)

UPDATE: Letter got returned. Bummer. :( Back to research.

UPDATE 7/8/16: Mailed off a note to a different descendant of Mary Ann's line who I think lives/lived in Prescott. Hoping for better results.

Tuesday, March 29, 2016

RE: The Barnes Family

I totally forgot to post about this! The Barnes family who I posted about back in February of last year (here and here!) were reunited with family last month! A very lovely lady who was a descendant of John Barnes found the photos on Ancestry and noticed they were in a tree called "Antique Store Photo Purchases", so she contacted us to ask if we still had them.

ALSO. She solved the mystery of Belle for me! She was Joseph Barnes' wife Lavina. Belle was her middle name which she went by! :D So huzzah! Another four photos successfully reunited with family. Always feels good.

Saturday, March 26, 2016

John Wade Paul & Gertrude Florence Swik

John & Gertrude on their wedding day!
Antique Plaza continues to be my favourite place to buy old, labeled photos. Paul & Gertrude here were from a particularly good haul last month and a couple days ago when work was a little slow I decided to see what I could find on them. Unfortunately, the city name on the cabinet card at but cut off, so step one was seeing if I could find "McDonald" on 1537 Larimer St. Thanks to Google (and the Denver Public Library) that didn't take too long.

John Wade Paul was born in November 14, 1867 in Kansas to Julius Wilson Paul and Nancy Jane Jones. He was the 2nd of 8 kids.

On December 21, 1897 in Denver, Colorado he married Gertrude "Gertie" Florence Swik - born on August 23, 1877, in Germany to Herman & Martha Swik.

John & Gertie marriage record report

They had five children - Martha J, John W, Gladys Lillian, Violet L and Gertrude M.. John died on February 28, 1926, in Tempe, Arizona, at the age of 58 and Gertrude died on May 14, 1938, in Tempe, Arizona, at the age of 60.

John Wade Paul death certificate

Gertrude FlorencePaul death certificate
Can't make out mother's maiden name though. Clanker? Clunker?

I also found this news article about the Golden Anniversary of their daughter Violet that talks about how they came from Colorado to Arizona by wagon train in 1919, which is pretty interesting!

Arthur C. "Tubby" Upton had a delicious childhood - his father owned the Upton Ice Cream and Candy Co. 

Upton who was born into this happy circumstance in Quincy, Okla., moved with his family (via wagon train) to Globe in 1909. There the Upton Ice Cream and Candy Co. was established.

Violet Paul Upton traveled with her family (also by wagon train) from Arvada, Colo., to Flagstaff in the summer of 1919. Later that year they moved to Globe where she met her favorite "candyman" and married him on Aug. 11, 1924, in Florence. 


Anywho, long story short... I tracked this family down to a living descendant through John & Gertie's daughter Gladys.... and she LITERALLY lives less then a mile away from my parents in Mesa. So I'll be going over to her house this afternoon and giving her the photo along with my 3 days of research since she sounded interested in genealogy. She probably has everything I've collected since, as I mentioned, it's really only 3 days of research. But maybe she doesn't. I don't know. I just want to be nice. <3

Thursday, January 21, 2016

Elton Levi Henry Cook & Sadie Imogene Cook


Sadie and Elton Cook

So I spent a week or so completely convinced that I could trace these two back to Mayflower descendants since their paternal grandparent's names were Cook and Howland and they lived in Massachusetts - and how awesome would it have been to reunite a photo and say, "OH BY THE WAY, you can apply to the Mayflower Society. Here's all my research." Alas, I couldn't get anything to link up. I couldn't even get further back then their great grandfather Artemas Cook. Still have no clue who his parents were.

I DID however discover that Sadie connects to my tree. She married a 4th cousin of mine. But I digress.

Elton Levi Henry Cook was born on December 27, 1893, in Taunton, Massachusetts to parents Walter & Helen Cook (nee Welch). He had one son and one daughter with Ruth A between 1930 and 1935. He died on September 6, 1958, at the age of 64.

Sadie Imogene Cook was born on February 1, 1896, in Taunton, Massachusetts,  She married Hatsel Keith Crosby on October 14, 1914, in Massachusetts. They had one child during their marriage. She died in February 1967 in Hyannis, Massachusetts, at the age of 71.

Hastel & Sadie Crosby headstone
Photo by Caryn via FindAGrave.com
I traced Sadie's line down to her great grandkids and found her great granddaughter on Facebook. So this photo has been reunited with a direct descendant. 

Tuesday, November 17, 2015

The Goettlings: Sophia Goettling (Part 2)

Continuing the Goettling family! Sophia is Ernest's sister. See "Part 1" post here.

Sophia Goettling

Sophia Goettling was born on February 28, 1870, in Beinstein, Baden-Württemberg, Germany. She married John Jacob Dinger and they had six children together (Walter G, Albert, Otto, Edward W, Victor E and Edith Delona). John died July 12, 1900. She then married Fredlieb Lautenschlager in 1917. She died in 1945 in Waterloo, Ontario, at the age of 75.

I couldn't find much on her beyond some Canadian census records. Her headstone was on Canada Gen Web, and another Ancestry user had uploaded her obituary.


Photo by Doug Smith via CanadaGenWeb

Mrs. Sophie Lautenschlager, a highly respected resident of New Dundee for many years passed away on Saturday after a brief illness at the home of her daughter and son-in-law, Mr. and Mrs. L. Bacher, 744 King St. E., Kitchener.

She was born in Germany 75 years ago on Feb. 28, 1870, a daughter of the late Mr. and Mrs. Gottlieb Goettling. She came to Ontario with her parents at an early age and the family settled at Pine Hill. She was first married to John Jacob Dinger who predecesased her in 1900 and in 1917 she married Friedlieb Lautenschlager who passed away in 1932. Since the death of her husband the late Mrs. Lautenschlager has made her home with her son, Victor Dinger, New Dundee. The deceased was a member of the local Baptist Church and of the Women's Missionary Circle.


Surviving are: five sons, Walter, Albert, Otto and Edward Dinger of the United States and Victor Dinger of New Dundee; one daughter, Mrs. L. (Edith) Bacher, Kitchener; three stepsons, Phillip Lautenschlager, Southampton; Alvin Lautenschlager, New Dundee, and Sydney Lautenschlager, Kitchener; eleven grandchildren; seven great-grandchildren; one sister, Mrs. Pauline Riehm of Kitchener; and five brothers, Christian, Gottlieb and Ernest Goettling of the United States, William Goettling, New Dundee and Albert Goettling of Kitchener R.R. 2.


The funeral will be held on Wednesday afternoon at 2:30 o'clock from the home of her son, Victor Dinger to the Baptist Church for service. Rev. H.F. Schade will officiate and interment will be made in thew New Dundee Union Cemetery.


I suspect Sophia has quite a few living descendants between 6 children, most of who went on to have families of their own as far as I can tell. :) So it's just a matter of tracking one of them down or one of them stumbling across the blog!



Monday, November 16, 2015

William Smith Kiser Weimer

William Smith Kiser Weimer was born on August 9, 1881, in Avilla, Indiana to Aby L. Haney and Simon Weimer. He married Nettie Belle Barr on November 24, 1908, in Noble County, Indiana. They had three children - Robert Dale, Maxine N and Mildred. Nettie died November 19, 1957, in Kendallville, Indiana, at the age of 72. William died on October 1973 in Albion, Indiana, at the age of 92.

I can't find any mention of him in any digitized newspapers - which is kind of a bummer - but his & Nettie's headstone is on FindAGrave.

Photo by J R N via FindAGrave.com


His son Robert Dale was born on November 14, 1909, in Indiana. He married in 1949 and had 2 daughters and a son. He died in 2004. I think I've found the address of one of his daughters, so I'm going to send off a note today and hope it's the right person. I haven't had much luck sending out snail mail to families. 

Sunday, October 18, 2015

Re: Anna May Stevens

So instead of working any of the dozen new photos I've purchased or finishing the 2 draft blog posts that have been sitting in my drafts for months now.... I felt the need to revisit Anna May Stevens, the very first photo I blogged about. I don't know why it's suddenly bothering me that I've been in possession of this photo for almost 2 years now. But it is.

Anna May Stevens


Previously I only had done some brief research about Anna, through both of her marriages (and utterly adorable first marriage announcement which is still one of my favourite stories ever), move to Florida and subsequent death... and a little bit of her parents. She had 2 younger brothers that I never really looked into. I'm hoping that one of her brother's descendants will stumble across this and I can finally reunite Anna with her family.

The older brother, George Black Stevens was born December 15, 1876. He married Edith W. Hoffman on June 15, 1904, in his hometown. They had two children during their marriage - Helen (born around 1906) and George Black (born July 18, 1907). He died on September 29, 1907, in Roaring Spring, Pennsylvania, at the age of 30 due to complications during appendicitis surgery.

George Black Stevens death certificate

I couldn't find anything on Helen, but George Black Junior was married and had a son also named George Black.

The younger brother, James Howe Stevens was born September 14, 1879. He had one son - Adie Allen Stevens II -  with Mary M. on November 7, 1909. He died on March 30, 1914, in Tyrone, Pennsylvania, at the age of 34 of spinal meningitis.

James Howe Stevens death certificate

Adie Allen Stevens II had 4 children... and that seems like my best chance to perhaps find a home for this photo of Anna May.

Sunday, July 19, 2015

The Goettlings: Ernest Goettling & Susanna "Susie" Rose Gateman (Part 1)

I'm going to have to divide these posts up into parts, otherwise this is going to be the longest blog post ever. Two months ago I found one of my biggest hauls of a single (labeled!) family at an antique store. Needless to say, I was very excited.



And work got insane and all genealogy got put on hold because by the time I was done with my day, all I wanted to do was curl up in a little ball and not think about anything. I picked these back up last week and decided I was going to find where every single person it into this family.

Ernest Goettling was born on February 14, 1874, in Germany to parents Gottlieb and Johanna Goettling (nee Krauss). He married Susanna "Susie" Rose Gateman on December 25, 1903, in Waterloo, Canada. They had five children in 16 years. He died on September 27, 1948, in Tacoma, Washington, at the age of 74.

 
Ernest and Susanna Goettling

As far as newspaper clippings go, I didn't find much online. There were a few real estate transactions that mentioned Ernest - the most notable of which is where he bought land to build his home for his new bride - and a vague birth announcement for their daughter Katharine.

From the Tacoma Daily News (Tacoma, WA), February 27, 1904. Page 10.
Also found in this photo batch was a picture of their daughter Ruth, born November 20, 1904. She married Gilford Schoeffler and had one daughter. She died May 26, 2001 in Tempe, Arizona. 

Daughter Ruth
Which explains how all these family photos ended up in Arizona. I, of course, can't find Ruth's obituary online, so one of these weekends I'm going to have to trek down the library and see if I can dig it up. 

There were also a few photos of Susanna with her siblings which are pretty marvelous.

Susanna with sisters. From left: Mary, Esther, Susanna and Miranda

Susanna, Leander and Mary Gateman

To be continued.... with other branches of the Goettling family!