Caught by Myself (WWI-Era Photo Album)

"Myself" was a hunter as well as a motorcyclist. A meticulous speller, "Myself" was not. The handwritten note behind our next photograph reads (spelling and punctuation unchanged):

Wood Chuck
Caught by Myself
J. Gruels Woods
North of Deep River & Anisworth
June 1918[?]

(Question mark added because the date is not perfectly legible.) Here is the photo:


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Images courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

I believe that's "Myself" holding the woodchuck. "J. Gruel," of course, was John Gruel, whose farm and woods covered the area that is now River Pointe Country Club.

On the same page, we get a close-up of the woodchuck, posed on the tree trunk.

A Little Karaoke

Let's hear some new takes on a few oldies — first, we have Lee & Rhodes crooning that 1978 Peaches & Herb ballad, "Reunited." Next, it's 1980's "Funky Town," as Amelia and May Blachly make a move to a town that's right for them. And then let's see what George Sauter can do with that little 1923 ditty, "Yes! We Have No Bananas."


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From the Hobart News of March 20, 1919.

Last but not least, Fred Rose, Jr. takes us back to 1969 and The Who's "I'm Free."


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From the Hobart News of March 20, 1919.

Myself Again (WWI-Era Photo Album)

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Images courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

Handwritten description behind this photograph:

Myself June 1918
on F. Fetterer's Motor Cycle

This portrait is a little better than the first one … just a little.

If you look in the center of the background, there's a pretty substantial building there, but I don't recognize it.

On the page below that photo, an image of a battleship (I think) cut from an unused postcard:

"German Teacher"! How Dare You?!

In February 1919, in reporting on Albert Wolkenhauer's recovery from the Spanish influenza, the Gazette referred to him as the "German teacher."

Prof. Wolkenhauer shot back with a long letter of protest. By that offhanded remark, he said, had been "gravely offended, held up to ridicule by the public," and implicitly called "an alien enemy."

In its March 14 edition, the Gazette's editor apologized and assured his readers that he had intended to cast no aspersions on the Professor's character or patriotism. He had simply used a long-accepted description. For many years people in Hobart had referred to the Trinity Lutheran school as the "German school" and any teacher there as a "German teacher." Such descriptions had only recently become offensive, and old habits were hard to break. But he would try, in the future, to remember to refer to the school as the "Lutheran school."

The Gazette did not print Prof. Wolkenhauer's letter because it "would not be of interest to the general public" — by that, I'm guessing the letter was pretty strongly worded. But by the next week, the Professor had cooled off a little, and taken the time to write a reasoned defense of the "Lutheran school," which the Gazette did print. In that article we get a better idea of why the Professor had reacted so strongly. He mentions that lately Lutheran institutions had suffered "vicious attacks in many quarters," both local and general — and while I expect many unpleasant things were said about German Lutherans when the "anti-German bill" was being considered, I do not think that the "vicious attacks" were anything but verbal. Not lately, anyway. During the previous autumn's patriotic hysteria, it was a different story. As we already know, several cars outside the Hobart's German Lutheran church had been vandalized, but now we learn that the Trinity school building itself (the old church building on Center Street) had also been defaced.


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Sources:
♦ "Communicated." Hobart Gazette 21 Mar. 1919.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 14 Mar. 1919.

Ballantyne Brothers (WWI-Era Photo Album)

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Images courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

In front of the same house we've just seen, two daring young men doing stunts on motorcycles. The handwritten notes behind the photo reads:

Ballantyne Bros.
Spring – 1918

Looking at the family of James and Tillie Ballantyne in the 1910 Census, I'm guessing these two are Elmer and Milton, who would have been about 21 and 17, respectively, in 1918.

Below this photo on page 49 of the album, we encounter a blank space where there was probably once a photograph, and below it this caption:



"Bally" is a likely nickname for a Ballantyne. "Brick" is a likely nickname for any man living in Hobart.

Plans for Fun

One place to dance was better than none, but plans for even more such places were underway in March 1919, according to the News:

The Hobart House as a hotel is probably a thing of the past. Repairs are to be made as desired, and the place will be rented by the room or suite of rooms. It is being planned to make the upper floor into a dance hall, as it was used for this purpose some forty or fifty years ago.

A week later, the Gazette added that a new hardwood floor was being laid in the proposed third-story dance hall.

At the same time, Benjamin W. Strattan wrote from Florida, where, I gather, he was vacationing, to announce that when he got back to Hobart he intended to re-open his "Opera House." Once his planned renovations were completed, the Strattan building would be available to rent at "moderate prices."


Sources:
♦ "Local and Personal." Hobart News 13 Mar. 1919.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 21 Mar. 1919.

Myself (WWI-Era Photo Album)

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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

Getting back to the little photo album I was crowing about a while ago — I have gone through the whole thing, scanning the photos and searching for descriptions hidden behind them, with considerable success. In a few cases, however, I couldn't get to the description because the slip of paper had been glued in too well, or there was writing on the back of the photo, but again, so much glue I couldn't lift the photo to read it. In a depressing number of cases, there was nothing to be found.

I've already posted one of the images from this album in this blog, of the Sauter/Wollenberg saloon building, and a couple more (of the Nickel Plate depot) in the Downtown Hobart blog.

The photo above is the last one in the album, and shows the album's owner, identity unknown. I certainly can't hope that anyone would recognize him from this picture. Behind the photo was a slip of paper with this description:

Myself
Spring – 1918
F. Fetterer's motorcycle

"F. Fetterer" would be Franklin Fetterer — Jr., I suppose, since Franklin Sr. was then about 44 years of age and an established attorney, too old and dignified, one would think, to be messing around with motorcycles. Franklin Jr. was about 18.

Nice house in the background; too bad I don't know whose or where.

Looks like there's something in the road — a little white dog?

Lights on the Ainsworth Road

One of the matters up for discussion at Hobart's town board meeting on March 10, 1919, was a petition from residents along the Ainsworth road, i.e., State Road 51 between Hobart and Ainsworth. The petition was signed, according to the News, by "S.R. Collver, Chas. Sapper, Dave Vinegar, Harvey Auton, David Cox, M.H. Smith, H.W. Bracken, W.G. Bracken, J.C. Kellen, Jos. Hudson, H.L. Ryan, Robert Reichert, V. Miscevich, Mike Drakulich, and George Hayward." They were asking for four electric lights to be installed on the part of the Ainsworth road described as lying "between the Sapper corner and the Peddicord farm." I suppose the Sapper corner is about where S.R. 51 turns south from 10th Street. The 1926 Plat Book doesn't show enough detail in that area to be helpful, so let us turn to the 1939 Plat Book, in which some holdings may have grown, shrunk or changed hands, but we can see some names that correspond to the 1919 report.


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This excerpt from the 1939 Plat Book shows, at the top, 10th Street intersecting with Lake Park Avenue, aka S.R. 51, formerly known as the Ainsworth road.

The town board accepted the petition and instructed the superintendent of Hobart's power plant, Robert Wheaton, to draw up an estimate of the project's cost.

He did so within two weeks, and at the March 24 meeting, the town board faced the question whether they ought to spend $76.32 on lights for the Ainsworth road. After due consideration, they ordered that the lights be installed.


Sources:
♦ "Town Board Doings." Hobart Gazette 14 Mar. 1919; 28 Mar. 1919.
♦ "Town Board Doings." Hobart News 13 Mar. 1919.

A Window Frog and an Update

As I was letting Maya out in the back yard last night, I found this guy on the window of my storm door.


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I've seen these climbing frogs from time to time, on the windows or the siding of my house. I don't know what kind they are, but I'm going to find out.

♦    ♦    ♦
More pertinently, we have a possible ID on the mystery photo from Louise Sapper Schavey DeWell's attic.

Fannie Nash Werner

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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

This is Fannie Nash Werner, who sang at the funeral of Samuel Quinlan. The caption under the original at the museum describes her: "Teacher who, with the Woman's Reading Club, spearheaded the campaign to get this building [now the museum] as a library."

The photo is undated. What little I can see of her dress suggests the 1880s to me. Fannie was born around 1869, so this could be the late 1880s. In 1895 she married Fred H. Werner, who later became a dentist.

The photo below, also undated, looks a little earlier. The three young women seem to be dressed up for some event.


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

The Death of Samuel Quinlan

On the ides of March, 1919, a little family part alighted from a Nickel Plate train in Hobart: Jessie Bullock Quinlan and her two teenaged children, Vera and Lester. Jessie had come home, but it was not a happy homecoming, for the same train carried the coffin of her husband, Samuel.

Samuel had been troubled with heart problems for several years, and in the past month had gone through some "bad spells," so his death may not have been a surprise to those closest to him. Still, it was untimely — he died a week short of his 52nd birthday.

He had been born on March 17, 1867, in Wheeler, Indiana, to Michael and Eliza Quinlan. Samuel spent his early childhood in the area, and although, in the late 1870s, the family moved to Oklahoma, he evidently maintained ties in the Hobart area. Jessie Bullock went out west to become Mrs. Quinlan on July 30, 1899. They spent most of their married life in Oklahoma.

Samuel described himself in 1900 as a "merchant" — he had a part interest in a country store. By 1910, he was the Woods County recorder of deeds, an office he held for four years. At the time of his death, he was president of the school board of Alva, Oklahoma. "He had been an active personage in the development of his town and county," said the Gazette. "He was a man highly respected by all who knew him."

Besides Jessie and the children, Samuel was survived by six brothers and a sister — one brother being a Catholic priest at Fort Wayne, which makes it a little surprising that Samuel's funeral was held in the Unitarian Church. It took place on Sunday, March 16, under the direction of the local Masons (Sam had been a member of the Alva, Oklahoma Masons). Fannie (Mrs. Fred) Werner sang.

The ground in Crown Hill Cemetery being too waterlogged from recent heavy rains to allow for digging, Sam's coffin was placed temporarily in the Smith vault, until it could find its final resting place.


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Sources:
♦ 1900 Census.
♦ 1910 Census.
♦ "Deaths for the Week." Hobart Gazette 14 Mar. 1919.
♦ "Funeral of Samuel Quinlan Held at Unitarian Church Sunday." Hobart News 20 Mar. 1919.
♦ "Samuel Quinlan Passes Away at Alva, Oklahoma." Hobart News 13 Mar. 1919.

Dwight Mackey, 1899 (Random Old Photo)

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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

Thanks to handwritten notes on the back of this photograph, we know it is Dwight Mackey in 1899. And I do means thanks, as I would never have recognized him without that help.

Dwight was born in June 1884, so he's about 14 or 15 in this photo.

He Couldn't Go Home Again

Charles Maybaum might return to the farmhouse south of Ainsworth where he had spent practically all his life, but he could never go home again, for his mother was gone.

Caroline Wagner Maybaum died on the morning of Friday, March 7, 1919, after some eight weeks' illness. She was 77 years old, the mother of 10 children, grandmother of 15 and great-grandmother of eight. She had come from Germany with her husband, Charles, in 1871. By 1891 they were settled on the Ainsworth farm, and there she spent the rest of her life.

Beyond that I know little about her. With so many children to raise, a farm household to run, and then grandchildren and great-grandchildren to help out with, she was no doubt a busy woman, but she spent her time quietly so far as the newspapers are concerned.

And now she sleeps in Crown Hill Cemetery beside her husband, who preceded her in death.

Their eldest son, August, was appointed executor of the estate. Roscoe Peddicord acted as his attorney.

♦    ♦    ♦
In looking over my notes on the Maybaums, I realize that I was not fair in describing Charles Jr. as "unadventurous." There are other ways of being adventurous besides moving out of your parents' house and marrying.

For example: a Charles Maybaum was elected Ross Township road supervisor in November 1902 — but I suppose that may have been Charles Sr.; the report did not specify. It was definitely Charles Jr. who was elected road supervisor in 1907. In 1911 he ran for re-election; this time he lost to Lee Hunter. He filed a petition to get on the ballot in 1914, but I don't know what happened in that election.

Charles Jr. was something of an inventor. In January 1903, the Gazette reported: "Chas. Maybaum, Jr., near Ainsworth has invented an attachment to a thrashing machine, which he thinks of having patented. He also has another invention which promises to remunerate him handsomely." A month later he was seeking capital investors:


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If anything came of these plans, I haven't heard about it, but the point is that he made the venture.

In the autumn of 1903 Charles Jr. left for Mississippi with two other Ainsworth men, Ed Mankey and Mike Foreman, "on a prospecting tour." A month later Charles Jr. was back with a new scheme: "I have returned from Mississippi and would be pleased to talk to anyone who wishes to know more about Mississippi farm land and a home for himself, or cheap rates he can get."

In 1908 Charles Jr. had a five-room house built, apparently as a rental property. I don't know for certain where it was — or perhaps he had two such houses, for he once refers to such a house in Ainsworth, and then again he offers for rent a five-room house on Water Street. In July 1918, he sold the Water Street house to William Thiede.

That is the summary of his public activities thus far. You can see why I want to retract the "unadventurous."


Sources:
♦ "Additional Local News." Hobart Gazette 16 Oct. 1914; 23 Apr. 1915; 26 July 1918.
♦ "Ainsworth." Hobart News 21 Dec. 1911.
♦ "Are You Interested?" Hobart Gazette 13 Feb. 1903.
♦ "Deaths for the Week." Hobart Gazette 14 Mar. 1919.
♦ "General News Items." Hobart Gazette 16 Jan. 1903; 20 Nov. 1903; 20 Dec. 1907.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 20 Nov. 1908; 8 Dec. 1911; 30 Mar. 1917.
♦ "Mrs. Caroline Maybaum." Hobart News 13 Mar. 1919.
♦ "Notice of Administration." Hobart News 20 Mar. 1919.
♦ "Republicans Victorious." Hobart Gazette 7 Nov. 1902.
♦ "Road Supervisors Elected." Hobart Gazette 22 Dec. 1911.

Another Attempt at Scenic Beauty (Random Old Photo)

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Once again a photographer and a printer try and fail to convey Hobart's scenic beauty via postcard. I can't tell where along Lake George this scene was shot. If the card has any redeeming value, it's that it was sent by Eva Odell, daughter of Edwin Odell, the jeweler, and his wife Elizabeth.

No year is legible on the postmark, but the card has the undivided-back style that was in use from 1901 to 1907. Eva was born circa 1890.

General Teaming and Great Love

I don't know whether Ross Graham was still in business with James Chester by 1919, but we're following him anyway — he did grow up on a farm south of Ainsworth.

Early in March, Ross bought out the teaming business of Ray Halstead (yet another former Ross Township farm boy). Ray kept one of his teams, expecting to use it the next summer for some teaming work; beyond that, he planned to move onto his father's farm south of Hobart and northwest of Ainsworth.


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The Halsted and Graham farms as they appeared on the 1908 Plat Map.

Ross meant to continue operating his livery business (which I have the impression that James Chester was no longer involved in, if he ever really was). The issue of the News that announced the sale also carried a little ad for Ross's new business. Plus I thought you'd like to see what's coming up at the Gem Theater.


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The Great Love was a wartime drama, now presumed lost.


Sources:
♦ Advertisement. Hobart News 6 Mar. 1919.
♦ "R.W. Graham Buys Dray Business from Ray Halstead, Monday." Hobart News 6 Mar. 1919.

Dolly Royal (Random Old Photo)

Here is Dolly Royal, a three-year-old mare who is a fast trotter and safe to drive.


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The postcard is one of those types that's difficult to reproduce because the dark areas are highly reflective. Above is the photographed version. Here is the scanned version.

What I really want to know is whether the guy holding her bridle is Benjamin W. Strattan himself. Compare this image. I'd say there is a resemblance, especially in that distinctive jaw line. And the two men have highly similar tastes in fashion, with those striped coats and brimmed caps.

This postcard is undated, but the "Artura" stamp box on the verso is of a style that (according to some casual internet research) was used from 1908 to 1924.



B.W. Strattan died in 1921. The man in this postcard image looks somewhat younger than the B.W. in the image I posted earlier and linked to above, but he still looks well into or past middle age — you can see signs of aging about his neck and jaw. In 1908 B.W. would have been about 73 years old.

Short answer: I don't know.

(The original postcard can now be seen at the Hobart museum.)

Car Wreck Report

So who's been crashing into whom lately?

Our first crash actually didn't happen lately; it happened in July 1917, but the resulting lawsuit waited until January 1919 to get decided. The two parties were John Busselburg, who farmed his own land in northern Winfield Township, and John Szikora,* who the previous summer had rented from Alex Boyd 160 acres of excellent farmland just east of Merrillville.

The accident happened on "the Jenkins road." I have no clue where that might be. Evidently it ran east and west, because John S. was turning onto it from an intersecting road that ran north and south. John B. was just then passing through the intersection. The Szikora auto "sideswiped" the Busselburg car, which ran off into a ditch and was damaged.

John B. sued John S. A year and a half went by. Then the case came up for hearing in the circuit court late in January 1919. The trial took two days. On the morning of the third came the decision: John S. had to pay $100 in damages to John B.

♦    ♦    ♦
The next case, by comparison, was tried and decided with lightning speed.

On January 11, 1919, Ainsworth's own Charles Goldman was driving his car at 17th and Washington Streets in Gary when he was "run into," according to the Gazette, by a Goodman department store vehicle driven or owned (so far as I can tell) by one William B. Sharr. The Sharr/Goodman side first had Charles "arrested for assault and battery upon a public street," but dropped that case. Instead, Mr. Sharr filed a lawsuit seeking $200 in damages from Charles, who counterfiled for $34 in damages.

Perhaps because it was venued to Ross Township and heard by Hobart's Justice of the Peace Paul Emery, the case waited only two months. On March 4 Justice Emery decided: neither party got any damages, but Mr. Sharr had to pay the court costs.

_____________________
*Both surnames have numerous spellings; in each case I am just picking one and sticking with it for the sake of consistency.


Sources:
♦ "Chas. Goldman Wins Damage Suit in Justice Emery's Court Tuesday." Hobart News 6 Mar. 1919.
♦ "From Round About." Hobart News 30 Jan. 1919.
♦ "Goldman Wins Damage Suit." Hobart Gazette 7 Mar. 1919.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 30 Aug. 1918.

Early Attempt at Scenic Beauty (Random Old Photo)

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I bought this postcard because, hey, it's Hobart, and it was cheap. This murky, unfocused shot of some unspecified spot along Lake George(?) is not exactly beautiful and not at all informative. I like it anyway, just because when I look at it I get the feeling that I'm peeking through a dusty little window into Hobart's past.

Then I go look up Hattie Schumacher in the census records, and find that she was — well, if not precisely an Ainsworth person, at least a Ross Township person. The 1900 Census shows her, at the age of 19, living with her parents, Fred and Selma, and her 10-year-old brother Frank. Fred described himself as a farmer. According to the 1908 Plat Map, his farm was small, about 25 acres (the 1926 Plat Book says 23):


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Per the Indiana Marriage Collection, in 1909 Hattie married William Schavey. In the 1910 Census, she and William were living on brother Frank's farm in Hobart Township.

I have almost nothing about the Schumachers in the notes from my newspaper reading. Either they've been a quiet family, or I've ignored them. (I can't establish any relation between them and Augusta Sauter Fiester, née Schumacher.)

The postcard is postmarked 1908 (or possibly 1906; could be either, from the style of the card).


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Late Winter Moving

If farmers wanted to move, the best time to do it was winter — after the autumn harvest, before the spring planting. The late winter of 1919 saw a lot of our acquaintances moving around. I am going to try to keep track of them.

I have not known exactly where Lovisa Chester Nelson was living during nearly three years since she quit farming, but January 1919 finds her and Ruth Miller, after a visit with the Raschkas in Hobart, returning "to their homes at Ainsworth."

We know that her daughter, Myrtle, and son-in-law, Ernest Sitzenstock, Jr., just bought the former home of Ulric Blickensderfer in Ainsworth, where Ernest was working for Uncle William Raschka (managing hay and grain shipments on the Grand Trunk Railroad, probably). This was their second house in Ainsworth, for they had already built their own bungalow. However, on February 27 they left Ainsworth to move onto "the Henning farm near [Ernest's] father's place in Ross township," with the intent to operate it themselves.

The 1908 Plat Map shows several Henning farms in the vicinity of the Sitzenstock farm:


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The Henning* farm had recently been occupied by Myrtle's brother, Owen Nelson, and his wife, Caroline — in fact, they had moved there only the previous autumn. But those young Nelsons were now moving onto "the Hoffman farm," described as east of Hobart, which they planned to operate on shares for Louise Schavey, recently widowed by the Spanish influenza. I don't know for sure where the Hoffman farm was, but we do find a couple of Hoffman parcels in the 1926 Plat Book:


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Next we hear that Lovisa Nelson bought "the house and acre lot in Ainsworth" from her daughter and son-in-law, Myrtle and Ernest. That description sounds like the Blickensderfer place, but then again I don't know how much land the Sitzenstocks' new bungalow sat on.

All right, that's enough, my head is spinning.

__________________________
*Recall that Glen Nelson married Elsie Henning in 1915.


Sources:
♦ "Additional Local News." Hobart Gazette 28 Feb. 1919; 7 Mar. 1919.
♦ "Local and Personal." Hobart News 30 Jan. 1919.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 7 Mar. 1919.

Foresters on Parade, Part 2 (Random Old Photo)

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The middle image of the three: girls in white dresses with handfuls of flowers, following the Hobart Juvenile Band and leading Court Hobart.

In the time it took for the band to march past, Mr. Haase somehow raised his camera well above standing level. Maybe he climbed up on the viewing stand? Or had a very tall tripod?

Like the others, this postcard is unused.

A New Guardian for Daisy's Daughters

Toward the latter part of January 1919, Mrs. John A. McDaniel (Henry Chester's widow) came down from Chicago to attend "to some business affairs." The Gazette did not mention the nature of her business, but it may have involved guardianship of her Scroggins granddaughters. She had been in Hobart the previous October on just such business.

The next month, the Gazette noted:

Last Friday [Feb. 28] the judge of the Lake circuit court appointed Chas. Chester as guardian for the two Scroggins children, daughters of [E.D.] Scroggins of this city. The girls, who are aged about 9 and 11 years, are living with their grandmother, Mrs. J.A. McDaniel, in Chicago. They have quite a little estate left them by their mother.

That inheritance was, of course, their mother's share of the estate of her father, Henry Chester.

♦    ♦    ♦
Smallpox had recently "invaded" Crown Point and Merrillville, but the young people of Hobart were not troubled about that. Their concern, according to the Gazette, was that they had no place to dance. The Strattan hall was being used for storage; the Black hall (location unknown) was just too small for a proper dance; and the Odd Fellows weren't renting out their hall at the moment, as they were about to begin remodeling. "Can you blame the young people for feeling bad?" asked the Gazette. "They like to dance and want to dance, but where can they? Only by going out of town, and that is very undesirable. Who will build a dance hall?"

The next week's Gazette amended that report at the protest of Simeon Bullock, an Odd Fellow. Their hall, he said, was indeed available and could be rented whenever it was not in use by the Odd Fellows, or otherwise previously engaged. So, after all, the young people of Hobart did have somewhere to dance, and to spread smallpox.


Sources:
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 11 Oct. 1918; 24 Jan. 1919; 7 Mar. 1919.
♦ "No Place in Town to Dance." Hobart Gazette 7 Mar. 1919.
♦ "Will Rent Hall For Dances." Hobart Gazette 14 Mar. 1919.

Foresters on Parade, Part 1 (Random Old Photo)

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"Hobart Juvenile Band Leading I.O.F. of A. Parade May-30-1909," says the caption. Mr. Haase was standing just south of the intersection of Main and Front Streets in Hobart. His camera caught the beginning of the parade, and behind it, the old frame St. Bridget Church. The postcard was never mailed.

If this image rings a bell with you, it's because we've seen another part of this parade before. When I put up that earlier post, I did not know Mr. Haase had taken at least two other photos of this parade, both of which I now have. Today's was the first in the series of three; the 9/19/10 post showed the third. The second is yet to come.

English Only!

Be it enacted by the general assembly of the State of Indiana, That all subjects and branches taught in the elementary schools of the State of Indiana … shall be taught in the English language only …: Provided, That the German language shall not be taught in any of the elementary schools of this state.

The war was over, the enemy vanquished, and no imminent danger drove the government of Indiana to protect its young citizens from the German language when the "McCray anti-German bill," quoted above, was passed by the Indiana legislature on February 25, 1919, and immediately signed by the governor.

The bill applied to all Indiana elementary schools, which included public, private and parochial schools, and any schools connected with "benevolent or correctional institutions." A lingering bitterness over the war no doubt inspired its focus on the German language, but its general requirement that all instruction be in English likely could be attributed to the "100% Americanism" ethos that had arisen, as I've mentioned, with the new wave of immigration from southern and eastern Europe, that had been nourished by government propaganda and popular sentiment during the war, and that would in turn feed the Klan movement of the 1920s.

The new English-only law provided that violators were subject to a fine between $25 and $100 and/or up to six months' imprisonment in the county jail, and each day the law was violated constituted a separate offense.

So far as I can tell the law did not affect high schools or colleges.

♦    ♦    ♦
Meanwhile, Fred Rose, Jr. (the son of a German immigrant) came home on leave from Camp Custer. He said he expected to be discharged from the army "very shortly." He had been expecting to be discharged very shortly for a couple of months now.


Sources:
♦ "German Language Barred From Indiana Schools." Hobart Gazette 28 Feb. 1919.
♦ "Legislature Restricts the Teaching of German." Hobart News 27 Feb. 1919.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 28 Feb. 1919.
♦ Roach, William A. Laws of the State of Indiana Passed at the Seventy-First Regular Session of the General Assembly Begun on the Ninth Day of January, A.D. 1919. Indianapolis: Wm. B. Burford, Contractor for State Printing and Binding, 1919. http://books.google.com/books?id=8V84AAAAIAAJ&lpg=PA869&ots=xw7Pj3sYa3

Hobart High School from the West(Random Old Photo)

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Another recent purchase. I don't recall having seen this particular view of the high school before.

Unfortunately, no legible date on the verso.



We do find a Mrs. Ruth Hauk in Richmond, Indiana, in the 1930 Census. She had been married seven years earlier. So if that's our "Stuff," we can date the postcard to 1923 or later.

Restless George Settles Down

The first hint that George Sauter had plans for settling down came in mid-February 1919, when the Gazette reported that he had bought "the Epps house and lot on Third street."

The owners had been his sister Lizzie and her second husband, Alfred Epps, now living in Grand Rapids, Michigan. The News described the house's location as "the corner of Third and New Street," but did not say which corner. (The Gazette added that the house had been occupied by the Messick family, which probably included the budding artist, Dalia.)

At the time, George was still managing the grocery department at the Tittle Bros. store on Broadway in Gary. That soon changed: not two weeks after he bought the house, he also bought the Carstensen-Anders market in Hobart. (Around the same time, George's former business partner, Armin Mackeldey, sold the market they had once operated together to H.J. and W.B. Anderson.)

Announcements of George's most recent purchase noted that he expected to take over the market's management on March 10. Why he did not do so immediately became clear with the first newspapers of March. On Wednesday, March 5, George married Mabel Johnson.

Mabel was the daughter of John and Clara Johnson of Hobart. She was 24 years old and had been earning wages for several years at various Hobart businesses — among them the Sauter & Mackeldey market, where she had worked as bookkeeper.

The wedding, held in Mabel's home on Center Street, was small and quiet. Only close relatives attended. The fact that George was described by both papers as the son of Mrs. John Fiester, with no mention of Edward Sauter, Sr., suggests that Edward did not come to town for his eldest son's wedding.

After the ceremony, the party sat down to a three-course dinner, and then the newlyweds left for Grand Rapids. They would spend much of their honeymoon visiting Lizzie and Alfred Epps — a short honeymoon, for George was due back at his new business on Monday. Though it seems he was ready, at the age of 28, to give up his wandering, he wasn't ready to give up his workaholic ways.

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I believe the Carstensen-Anders market was already in the location where George ended up operating his store. It had originally been in the Roper/ATS building, for the Carstensens had bought out James Roper's market around 1904. After Conrad Carstensen died in 1911, his widow ran the market herself. When the American Trust and Savings Bank moved into the Roper building in 1912, Emma Carstensen had the market's new home built at 413 Main. In 1915 she remarried, and lived in the flat over the market with her new husband, Emerson Anders. They intended to continue living their after George Sauter took possession of the store.

I may never know for certain, but now I suspect that Mabel Johnson was one of the young women in the photo with Fred Rose, Jr. and George Sauter in uniform — probably the one second from the right.


Sources:
♦ 1910 Census.
♦ "A. Mackeldey Sells Out." Hobart Gazette 28 Feb. 1919.
♦ Christianson, Elin B. Hobart's Historic Buildings. Hobart: Hobart Historical Society, 2002.
♦ Cook County, Illinois, Marriages Index.
♦ "George Sauter Buys A. Carstensen-Anders Store." Hobart News 27 Feb. 1919.
♦ Indiana WPA Death Records Index.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 14 Feb. 1919.
♦ "Sauter-Johnson Marriage." Hobart Gazette 7 Mar. 1919.
♦ "Sauter-Johnson." Hobart News 6 Mar. 1919.
♦ "The Carstensen Market Sold." Hobart Gazette 28 Feb. 1919.

Third and Main circa 1908 (Random Old Photo)

I recently bought a non-colorized version of a scene I've previously used for the Downtown Hobart blog. Again, I think the non-colorized view gives you a little more detail, but unfortunately it's very difficult to get a good digital image of it, because of the way it was printed — the dark areas reflect light too much. I had to take it outside and photograph it at a slight angle to get a half-decent image. Best way to see this is to go to the Hobart museum (I've given it to the museum) with a magnifying glass.


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I wish the Roper/ATS building still had that horned bovine head on its corner. I wonder if that was there in honor of the meat market in the building.

The verso has a sad message.



But Emma Schafer (or Schaper?) may have pulled through after all; I can't find a record of her death in 1908.

"They Have Had All the War They Want"

Our Liberty Bond volunteer finally had her son safe at home again. And so sick had that young man been of war and of France that he even passed up a chance to see Paree.


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The "Local and Personal" column of the Hobart News of February 20, 1919.

Downtown Hobart, Bird's-eye View, ca. 1908

Another recent purchase.


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August Haase was up in the loft of the Strattan House at Main and Third, pointing his camera northeast. The postcard is postmarked 1908.

You can read some of the business signs on Main Street. The front window of the Roper building is lettered with "Peoples Meat Market," and below that, "James Roper." The next building north is Fred Francen's* saloon. North of that, Axel Strom's tailor shop.

Out back of the buildings north of the tailor shop, you can see somebody's shirts hanging on a clothesline. And what an assortment of sheds and barns back there!

Moving north and out on the sidewalk — I'd like to know who that guy is and what he's doing with that pole.

And since we've been talking about the Augustus Wood house, there it is in the background. Also the Stocker house. Here, I've marked them:


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Even further beyond, the cemetery, and the Pennsy crossing on Front Street. And the roofs of houses on Michigan Avenue, and the steeple of the Methodist Church.

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*I've also seen it spelled Franzen.

The Woodchucks of Spring

Image credit: free-extras.com

How do you know if spring is coming early? — What signs do you trust? Maybe you see a robin in January. If you're John Dorman, you see woodchucks out and about in mid-February. And if you're John Dorman, you tell everyone about it, and what is more, they listen.

The Hobart News broke the story on February 20, 1919, the day following the sighting.



Details in the next day's Gazette differed slightly, as that paper reported only one woodchuck spotted by Mr. Dorman, and described the animal's action as "sunning itself" rather than "cavorting," although the two are not, I suppose, incompatible.

The Gazette also stated, "The bluebird has been with us off and on for several weeks," but did not reveal the source of that allegation.

The issue of shadows was not addressed, or even raised.


Image credit: Wikimedia Commons


Sources:
♦ "Local and Personal." Hobart News 20 Feb. 1919.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 21 Feb. 1919.

Dear Aunt Lizzie (Random Old Photo)

The M.E. Church and parsonage in Hobart, from a postcard postmarked 1914.


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I know, I know: we've seen this before. So why did I buy it? I don't know. But, turns out, it's part of the Elizabeth Lahayne collection. Here's the verso:



I don't know who Alvina was; I can't find her in either John's or Dora's family, but there was at least one other Lahayne sibling, and then in-laws as well, and people were pretty loose with the terms "aunt" and "uncle" in those days.

The postmark is Wheeler, as it was on Dora's postcard, so maybe Alvina was staying with Dora. And asking Aunt Lizzie to meet her at the Valparaiso Nickel Plate depot at 10 o'clock, and if she "haint" on that train she'll be on the 4 o'clock for sure.

I see that Alvina has picked up the family habit of using incorrect English to be playful. That is, I think it's just playfulness.

What Amelia Goldman Has Been Up To

This advertisement for the Goldmans' store appeared in the Hobart Gazette of Feb. 14, 1919.

Amelia Goldman probably spent considerable time working beside her husband in the Ainsworth department store. But she also belonged to the Hobart chapter of the Order of the Eastern Star, and at the end of January was installed as an officer.


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From the Hobart Gazette of Feb. 7, 1919.

Whatever the duties of an "Esther" may have been, they did not keep Amelia from extensive travel. The "Local Drifts" column of the February 28 Gazette reported: "Mrs. Chas. Goldman of Ainsworth is in New York City for a few weeks, joining business with pleasure. Before returning home, she will visit Washington, D.C., and other leading cities of the east and southeast."

Hobart Then and Now: Augustus Wood House/St. Bridget Church

Circa 1911 and 2012.



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Yes, by 1911 it was the Catholic parsonage, but it started out as the home of Augustus and Jessie Wood and family.*

I just recently bought this colorized version of a postcard I had already put up on the Downtown Hobart blog.

Here is an 1882 biographical sketch of the Wood family from Porter and Lake Counties (Goodspeed/Blanchard):

AUGUSTUS WOOD, son of John and Hannah E. (Pattee) Wood, was born in Danvers, Mass., in 1828, and in 1836 came with his parents to Lake County. At the age of twenty-one, he engaged in clerking at Crown Point and Michigan City; in 1855, he entered in business at Wood's Mill, carrying a stock of general merchandise until 1880, when he moved to Hobart, built a store, and resumed his trade in dry goods, notions, groceries, crockery, etc. He is a Knight Templar and belongs to the Valparaiso Commandery; he was married at Michigan City, in 1852, to Jessie M. Brown, a native of Cincinnati. They have three children living — Carrie M. Ryan, of Valparaiso; Abbie M. Bullock, of Hobart, and John J. Wood, now associated in business with his father.

Jessie Brown Wood, incidentally, was born in 1833, per the 1900 Census.

The photograph below comes from the Hobart Historical Society museum.


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

Handwritten notes on the back: "Augustus Wood house/Earle's Retreat/now St. Bridget church site/Photo guess approx 1890/From E. Reinerth [sp? the name is hard to read]."

I don't know what those big curving things are — maybe the jawbones of a whale??

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Here is the verso of the 1911 postcard:


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So nice of Dora to spell out her relationship to Elizabeth for us!

The 1910 Census shows 22-year-old Elizabeth La Hayn living on Washington Street in Valpo, with her married brother, John, his wife and two young daughters. Elizabeth was employed in a laundry, which must have been miserable work.

Dora was her older sister. The 1900 Census shows John, Dora, Hattie (another sister) and Elizabeth living with their grandmother; John, the eldest, was only 19 — were they orphaned so young?

In 1902 Dora married Edward Jentzen (Indiana Marriage Collection). By 1910 they had two small children and were farming rented land in Porter County.

My impression is that "How you was?" and "We looked for youse" are just Dora's way of being playful.

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*Augustus and Jesse Wood's daughter, Abbie, married Simeon Bullock, brother of Gilbert Bullock → Ainsworth connection!