Monthly Archives: January 2023

Lodgers or Relatives? (Part II)

Research Methods, , ,
2011 photograph of St. Jean Baptiste Church in Lynn, Massachusetts.

In a recent post I examined the curious case of young “lodger” George Stepper, who was enumerated in the 1920 census in the home of Joshua and Mary (Craven) Harron in Revere, Massachusetts. As I eventually discovered, he was their nephew, and lived with them for more than twenty years after his young widowed mother died. Further research into the Harron, Stepper, and Craven families revealed that each of these families suffered a rash of premature deaths and other adversities.

Following George Stepper’s descendants exposed another misidentified “boarder” in the 1920 census, as well as many other inaccuracies in official records. Moreover, like the Harrons and Cravens, George’s descendants experienced their own family problems, including out-of-wedlock births, infidelity, divorces, stillborn children, and early deaths.

As related in Part I, George married Miriam Frances Kelley in 1941. Miriam was born in Lynn on 10 November 1912 to Frederick Clifford Kelley (1893-1937) – who appears in various records as Frederick C., F. Clifford, or Fred – and Irene Nora Girard (1894-1968). Their marriage record shows that Fred was 21 and Irene 18 when they wed on 1 August 1912 in Hartford, Connecticut, just two months before Miriam was born; actually, it was Fred’s 19th birthday. Fred’s parents were Frederick A. W. Kelley (1866-1948) and Annie Laura Handren (1859-1954). Annie, born in St. Martins, New Brunswick, Canada, was one of eleven children, three of whom did not survive childhood. Continue reading Lodgers or Relatives? (Part II) →

Uncovering a Lesser-Known Roosevelt Legacy

American History, ,
Photo postcard sent by Philip James Roosevelt, 1915. From the collections of the Theodore Roosevelt Association, recently digitized by American Ancestors/NEHGS.

Unlike the old-world monarchies of Europe, the United States has no hereditary titles. Even so, some families have become political dynasties. We can count the Roosevelts as one such family. Along with the Adamses, Harrisons, and Bushes, the Roosevelts have produced two presidents. Indeed, in the twelve elections from 1900 to 1944, a Roosevelt appeared on eight ballots for president or vice-president. Theodore and Franklin are the most recognizable Roosevelts, but the family’s roots and branches extend from the 17th-century Dutch colony of New Amsterdam to the present day.

Despite their public image, tracing the family history has been exceedingly difficult. The early Roosevelt family left few records. Like other immigrants who came to the United States in the colonial period, the reasons they left Europe are hazy, and the jobs they took up varied. Not all Roosevelts were aldermen and wealthy tycoons, and not all Roosevelts settled in New Amsterdam. They strayed to Pennsylvania, Delaware, the Carolinas and Georgia. Continue reading Uncovering a Lesser-Known Roosevelt Legacy →

Rediscovering my Chinese Roots

Family Stories, , ,
My grandmother’s passport.

This year, January 22 marked the beginning of the Lunar New Year, a holiday that is celebrated by millions of people from many Asian cultures around the world. The lunar calendar is based on the moon’s twelve phases, so the starting date changes from year to year. Each year is represented by an animal—2023 is the Year of the Rabbit. In honor of the Lunar New Year, I decided to write about my Chinese heritage.

My maternal grandparents were originally from the Kwangtung (or Guangdong) Province in China. My grandfather emigrated to Jamaica as a young man in the 1930s. He was part of a large wave of people who migrated mainly from the southern and southeastern parts of China between 1900 and 1940. 1 He first married while living in Jamaica, but his wife and their child sadly died during childbirth. He returned to China, where he met and married my grandmother. They moved to Jamaica shortly after and remained there for the rest of their lives. Continue reading Rediscovering my Chinese Roots →

Trace Amounts

News, Royal Lines, , ,
The U.S. Men’s team at the first FIFA World Cup in 1930, the only time the United States placed in the top four

When I was watching the recent World Cup, and the various countries playing, I found myself considering genealogical connections I have found within the competing nations—to my own ancestry, to my wife’s, or to projects that I have worked on. My recent post on the Van Salee family focused on a family with connections in the present-day United States, Netherlands, and Morocco, and at the time of that post, all three nations were still in the tournament.

The two countries from which most of my ancestors derive are England and Germany, and the top three countries for my wife’s ancestry are Spain, Portugal, and Senegal (this is according to her AncestryDNA results—I suspect most of the claimed Portuguese ancestry is probably also Spanish, although I have not traced any of her ancestors to the Iberian peninsula or a specific place in Africa). All five countries, except Germany, made it to the round of sixteen of the World Cup. Continue reading Trace Amounts →

Lodgers or Relatives? (Part I)

Research Methods, ,
Revere Beach Boulevard, Revere Beach, MA; from a c. 1910 postcard.

We frequently encounter “lodgers” or “boarders” living with our ancestral relations in 20-century U.S. census records. If you’re like me, you probably don’t pay much attention to them. However, as I recently discovered twice while researching the lives and descendants of Irish immigrant Bostonians Edward J. Costello (1866-1926 [?]) and Mary Josephine Maloney (c. 1872-1943), these oft-disregarded “lodgers” or “boarders” can turn out to be your relatives after all. Both cases led to interesting discoveries, but recounting them together would far exceed the average length for posts on this site—so I offer them in two parts.

Our first case of a misidentified relative, 11-year old “lodger” George Stepper, was encountered in the January 1920 census enumeration of the household of Joshua and Mary Harron at 149 Bellingham Ave, in the coastal Beachmont neighborhood of Revere, Massachusetts.

Scan of 1920 census record showing George Stepper

Continue reading Lodgers or Relatives? (Part I) →

The Brief Life of NEHGS’ Youngest Founding Member

NEHGS Collections, , ,

Framed photograph of George E. HenshawOn my first day working at New England Historic Genealogical Society, I noticed a collection of framed ambrotype photographs of founding members of NEHGS, taken in the 1850s. While the vast majority of the men in the photographs were in their older years, one man was visibly younger than the rest—he seemed to be in his early 20s, with dark hair and a tilted bow tie. Under his image was the name George E. Henshaw. When I got home that night, still curious, I looked to see what information I could glean about this young founder. To my surprise, I found a detailed biography of George E. Henshaw’s life in Volume 5 of the Memorial Biographies of New England Historic Genealogical Society, 1853-1855. Continue reading The Brief Life of NEHGS’ Youngest Founding Member →