Friday, April 20, 2012

Four Women, Three Names and a Boujai
(WWI-Era Photo Album)

On page 22 of the album, we get an odd juxtaposition of smiling young women, and dead birds.

First, the smiling young women.

Hideen, Manteuffel (22a)
(Click on images to enlarge)
Images courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.


Handwritten description behind the first photo:
Anna Hideen
Selma " Larson
Evelyn Manntyffle
Nice, but we don't know which name applies to which young woman, and one apparently hasn't got a name. Though the photo is undated, from the fashions it looks to be from roughly the same time as the dated photos in this album, i.e., 1917-1919.

Anna Hideen was 18 years old in the 1920 Census, her sister, Selma, 16. If Selma went on to marry a Larson, I haven't found out about it yet. Their older brothers, Elmer and Eric, had already left home by then. Their mother, Christine, was widowed, but I don't know how or when.

Evelyn Manteuffel was the daughter of the shoe people, Paul and Emilie Manteuffel. I believe she was the first child of that marriage, but she had two older siblings, Clara and Elsa, from their mother's first marriage, to the Mr. Piske who started the shoe store. (I got the information about the two marriages from here.) Evelyn was 20 years old in the 1920 Census.

Now, let's see some dead birds.

Hunting in Bayou (22b)

And let's see some creative spelling as well. Handwritten on back of this photo:
Shot with 22 Rifel
May 3 – 1917
In Gruel's New Slauter House Boujai from EJE Tracks
By "Boujai," I suppose he means "bayou." I don't know where the slaughterhouse was. The "Gruel" would probably be Charles Gruel, the butcher, whose biographical sketch you can read in the Lake County Encyclopedia, if you are so inclined.

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