David & Luvisa Shanks (nee Fisher)

More photos I bought back in January while visiting in-laws in California. If I hadn't found Luvisa's photo, I probably would not have purchased David's because a later generation had only labeled the back as "Grandfather Shanks, age 21". Unhelpful. Also, Luvisa actually signed the back of hers which is pretty cool.

David Shanks was born December 23, 1832 in Crab Orchard, Kentucky to parents William Shanks and Rebecca Baughman. He married Luvisa Fisher - daughter of William Paterson Fisher and Mary Truesdale Pennington, born March 11, 1837 -  on September 22nd, 1853 in Lincoln County, Kentucky. They had 9 children - Judith, Rebecca, Ephraim, Mary, Susan, Kate, Nannie (Mamie?), Samuel and C Walter Shanks. David died August 5, 1882 and Luvisa died January 6, 1915.

Photos by Cathy & Thomas (David's) and Christina Bishop (Luvisa's) via FindAGrave.com

I didn't find much going backwards documentation-wise. I found a couple trees that traced David's line back to Thomas Owsley (1730-1796, Illinois). If that's true... then David's grand uncle was William Owsley, the 16th Governor of Kentucky... which is pretty cool. He even has his own Wikipedia page!

Going forwards, I've managed to follow their oldest daughter Judith's line down quite a ways... to 8 great great great grandchildren, who as far as I know are still alive.... and I'm just starting to work my way down Kate's line. With so many living descendants, I'm very hopeful that I can find somebody interested in owning these photos. :)

Frances Virginia Wilcoxen

Frances Virginia Wilcoxen

I almost didn't buy this photo. I walked past it a few times and then ultimately decided it was too adorable not to go back for.

I also put off researching it because the photo has no photographer's mark or hint of location. The only identification on the photo says "Frances Wilcoxen, Stella's daughter". Tonight I happened to pull up the back a bit to find that it was a postcard photograph and had started to be addressed to "Aunt Gussie". So I ran with that and blindly started researching the first Frances Wilcoxen I could find who had Stella listed as her mother. Many census records later... I found Aunt Gussie!

Frances Virginia Wilcoxen was born November 11, 1916 in Fayetteville, Arkansas to parents Clarence Alva Wilcoxen and Stella Adair Miller. She married John "Jack" Albert Weeks April 13, 1940. They had 2 children - Betty J and Roy J Weeks. Frances died May 20, 1995.

Graves of Frances V & Jack A Weeks

photos by k75evad via FindAGrave.com

Jack A. Weeks, 65, of 4218 E 62nd, died Thursday at Baptist Memorial Hospital. He was born in Osage County Missouri and had lived in the Kansas City area most of his life. He retired in 1969 after 15 years as a business agent for the International Brotherhood of Painters District Council No. 3. He leaves his wife, Mrs. Frances V. Weeks of the home; a son, Roy J Weeks, 5723 E 40th Terrace; a daughter, Mrs. Betty J Ruzick, 1519 N 45th Terrace, Kansas City, Kansas; two brothers, William P. Weeks, Golden, Mo., and Edward E. Weeks, Moline, Ill.; five sisters, Mrs. Cecil T. Stoneking, Westmont, Ill.; Mrs. Sara M. Mahany, 6300 Farrow, Kansas City, Kansas; Mrs Hazel E. Hunt and Mrs. Elsie A Olson, both of Golden, and Mrs. Elma L. Kendall, Dayton, Ohio, four grandchildren and a great-grandson. Service will be held at 1 p.m. Monday at the Floral Hills Chapel; burial in Floral Hill Cemetery. Friends may call from 6 to 8 p.m. Sunday at the chapel.


I've tracked her family down to her great great grandson... and while I can't seem to find an email address for him online, I have found his snail mail address (yay White Pages!). So I'll mail him a little note on Monday and see if he's interested in the photo or if somebody else in his family is the family historian.

The Barnes Family

So, after posting that last post about Frank & Nellie, I remembered that the same time I had purchased that photo (over a month ago)... I had also purchased a few other photos labeled Barnes.

Surprise! They're Nellie's relatives!

Harry, Joseph Alexander & Belle Barnes

So I haven't figured out where Belle fits in the tree yet... but Harry is Nellie's brother and Joseph is her half-brother. 

TO BE CONTINUED....

William Franklin & Ellen "Nellie" Altenburg (nee Barnes)

Frank & Nellie Altenburg

So this was a bit of an adventure last night. :) The back of this photo is actually labeled "Nettie & Frank Altenburg, Earnest's sister". The photographer's mark on the front is from Ithaca, Michigan. So of course, the first thing I did was search for a Francis Altenburg... or an Antoinette Altenburg in Michigan and came up empty. These people don't exist.

Plan B was to do a public tree search on Ancestry for Frank Altenburg and see if any of them had a wife whose name could be shortened to Nettie. Which is how I found William Franklin Altenburg and his wife Ellen - AKA Nellie. They lived in Newark, Michigan according to the 1910, 1920 and 1930 census records.

Despite having most of my extended family in Michigan, I don't actually know distances between Michigan cities. Luckily, Google Maps knows. Google knows everything.

You could probably spit into Ithaca from Newark if you had a good tail wind to help you (okay, maybe not... but they are REALLY close). This already seems pretty likely that William Franklin and Ellen are the people in this picture.

But of course I can't just stop the verification there. I had to find out if Ellen had a brother Earnest. According to Ellen's marriage record (and also the 1880 census), her parents were J.H. Barnes and Mary Harlow. I kinda cheated and went back to the public trees which had her father listed as John H and searched census records for John and Mary. Both the 1900 and 1910 censuses show John and Mary of having a son named Earnest (Ernie on 1900, Ernest on 1910).

The pièce de résistance... both Frank & Nellie are buried in Ithaca Cemetery. So I feel 99.9% confident that William Franklin Altenburg and Ellen "Nellie" Barnes are the two individuals in this photo and whoever labeled the back of it was a more distant relative of Frank's who thought his wife's name was Nettie instead of Nellie. Easy mistake to make if you weren't close.

Alas, Frank & Nellie did not have any children. Nellie died in 1935 and Frank remarried a woman who had 6 kids from a previous marriage.

Frank had a brother and sister (Warren & Sarah)... and Nellie had a crapton of siblings (Elizabeth, Lottie, Harry, Vern, Earnest, Leroy & Dewey)... so now it's just a matter of tracking down their descendants and reuniting this photo with them!

An unexpected gift!

So this was at my front door today. Completely unexpected. 

It's a thank you gift from Jan Fobes Mowat's son... for finding, purchasing, researching and sending him the photos of his father. This is so thoughtful and sweet. Gives me the warm fuzzies. 

I've never actually heard of Harry & David products, but various Facebook friends assure me it's great stuff. They look delicious. Can't wait for my husband to get more fresh bread from his baker tennis buddy so I can break these bad boys open!

Walker Merriam Philbrook

I went to California last weekend to visit in-laws... and made a slight detour to some local antique shops and went a little photo crazy. I feel a little bad, because I haven't even touched some of my last 2 batches of purchases... but I couldn't help myself. The lure of new antique stores called! 

This baby photo was one of the photos that screamed "buy me!"... because the back of it was labeled "Walker Merriam Philbrook 3 mo & a few days". I adore that whoever labeled the photo felt the need to include the 'few days' and the baby is a cutie to boot.

Walker Merriam Philbrook

So from what research I did on him, I don't think he has any living direct descendants. Walker was born September 8, 1893 in Rockport, Maine to parents Edward S Philbrook and Sophia G Merriam. He was their only child, as Edward died in 1900. Sometime between 1910 and 1920 Walker and his mother moved to California. April 24, 1925 Walker married Leonora Anita Griffin. February 14, 1927 they had a daughter named Elizabeth Louise ("Betty Lou"). Leonora died in 1954 and Walker in 1986.

Their daughter married Nial James Rider Jr and as far as I can tell, had no children. Nial died in 1975 and Elizabeth in 1997.

Photo by countedx58 via FindAGrave.com

I did find one person on Ancestry that had Walker listed in their tree, but I think they're releated to Sophia's side of the tree... and might not necessarily be interested in a baby photo of Walker.

I couldn't find any newspaper articles about Walker. Not even an obit. The search for family continues...

Orlando Stephen Thompson

I keep putting off writing this post because I keep thinking I'll find something more interesting on Orlando. Alas, searching for newspaper articles on both Newspapers.com and GenealogyBank.com comes up with a lot of nothing. And a lot of articles from Orlando, Florida. Curse being named after a city!

Orlando Stephen Thompson

Orlando Stephen Thompson. Born 26 Feb 1894 in Harvey, Illinois to parents Wilder B Thompson and Laura Cloud. He married Polly Anna Randall and had a daughter Doris Jean (born 27 Jun 1919 also in Harvey, Illinois). He died 18 Jul 1988 in Englewood, Florida.

I actually found a pretty interesting article that mentioned Orlando's father Wilder from 1899. 

HARVEY HAS A SALOON FIGHT
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Liquor Me Win First Round and Buy Lot Owned by Methodist

Harvey's saloon fight is on in earnest. Mayor Braley vetoed the license ordinance passed two weeks ago. Monday evening the ordinance was passed over the mayor's head by the two-thirds license majority in  the council. A saloon location near the Grand Trunk depot at One Hundred and Fifty-Second street and Columbia avenue has already been secured by George Freeman, alderman of the Second ward, and the keeper of a saloon just across the Harvey bored in Thornton.

Until the sale of this land to Freeman by Wilder B. Thompson, a prominent member of the Methodist church, the Anti-Salloon league had confidently counted on the inability of prospective seekers for saloon sites to find any desirable ones inside the city limits. 

"Brother Thompson will never sell his lot for saloon purposes," said a speaker at an anti-saloon mass meeting held in the Congregational church last Sunday afternoon. When the announcement concerning the probable action of "Brother" Thompson was made there were many "amens," and the meeting adjourned with a sense of security insofar as the invasion of the down-town section of Harvey was concerned.

Mr. Thompson, when seen in reference to the sale of his land, admitted it. There was another available lot adjacent to his property and if a saloon was to come he might as well sell as another. It was a business proposition and Mr. Thompson said he treated it from that standpoint.

The hope of the antis lies in Mayor Braley. The major is a large property owner. He will only sign the ordinance passed over his veto upon compulsion. There are said to be material flaws in the ordinance as passed, which even the friends of the measure admit to be one of the most "liberal" saloon license ordinances ever passed by a city council. 

Ejectment proceedings will be brought against certain border saloons. Eugene Carey, trustee, has served notice to vacate permises upon Simon F. Schuts, who recently purchased the saloon formerly kept by "Billy" McHatchy at Halsted street and One Hundred and Fifty-Fifth place. The ground of the action is a prohibitory clause in Eugene Carey subdivision similar to those upon Harvey lots.

Orlando had two brothers, Harwell Cloud and Albert Wilder Thompson. Harwell was a US air mail service pilot who died tragically in a plane crash.

Harwell Cloud Thompson

MAIL PILOT KILLED WHEN PLAN FALLS

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Pilot Harwell C. Thompson of the United States air mail service crashed to his death yesterday near Liberty Center, O., while carring mail from Cleveland to Chicago.

A veteran of this war, during which he served overseas as a lieutenant in the air service, and with three years experience in the air mail division. Thomspon came to his end when his plane sideslipped while he was trying to make a forced landing. He died shortly after being taken to the Wauseon (O.) hospital.

He left Cleveland with the Chicago mail yesterday morning at 9:07 and was due in Chicago at noon. Immediately upon receipt of word of Thompson's death, H.B. Shaver, superintendent of the air mail station at Glenn L. Martin field, sent Pilot Warren D. Williams to the scene of the wreck with orders to pick up the mail and carry on.

The article goes on to mention he left behind his wife who was 6 weeks away from giving birth. :( So sad.

His other brother Albert, lived the ripe old age of 95.

Albert Wilder Thompson, 95, former dean of the College of Sciences and Arts at Washington State University, died Sept. 19 at his Princeton, N.J. home of cancer.

He was born in Harvey, Ill. He recieved his bachelor's degree from the university of Illinois in 1922, a master's degree from Harvard in 1923 and a doctorate from the University of Chicago in 1929. His specialty was old French.

He married Edna Sackett in 1923. 

In 1930 the couple came to Pullman, were they remained for 46 years. He became full professor at Washington State College, now WSU, in 1947, and later that year became chairman of the Division of Humanities. 

He was named dean of the College of Sciences at Arts in 1953, a position he held until his retirement in 1964. She died in 1982.

After his retirement he studied the history of the Northwest, in particular the early French Canadian explorers.

In 1972, the oldest building on the WSU campus, which had been declared a National Historical Landmark, was renamed Thompson Hall.

He and his wife moved to Princeton in 1976 to be near their daughter. 

He was a member of Phi Beta Kappa, the Sons of the American Revolution, the Modern Language Association, the Medieval Academy of American and other professional organizations. 

He was a life  member of the NAACP and a patron of the Princeton NAACP Legal Defense Fund. He enjoy playing piano and traveling in Europe and the Northwest. 

I can only imagine... since both is brothers were such fascinating, brave, intelligent men, that Orlando was cut from the same cloth. 

I did find a school photo of him on DeadFred.com from 1917, but I don't know what he was majoring in. 

Orlando Stephen Thompson is #3.  Class of 1917.

As I mentioned at the beginning, I know that Orlando married Polly Anna "Annie" Randall in 1916 and that they had a daughter Doris Jean in 1919. I also know that Doris married a James Douglas Youd... and that they had 3 children (at least that I could find) together. Doris died in 1998. I assume her children are still alive, but nobody that I reached out to with the photo of Orlando has replied yet. :(

This photo was purchased from Covered Wagon Antique Mall in Mesa, Arizona