The Old Abel Homestead

It's May 1923 and the end of an era: the farm owned for forty years by the Abel family of Hobart has been sold.


(Click on image to enlarge)
Hobart News, May 10, 1923.

The Gazette mentioned that the farm had been exchanged for a three-story flat building in Gary.

In the 1920 Census, Dan (yet another Abel carpenter, then 29 years old) and Tillie (24) were living with their mother, Caroline, on Cleveland Avenue. A 17-year-old granddaughter, Elizabeth Abel, was in the household as well — I don't know whose daughter she was. In 1921 Caroline died; Dan and Tillie moved back to the old farm, apparently; and the granddaughter went God knows where.

Here is the Abel farm as it appeared on the 1908 Plat Map:


(Click on image to enlarge)

This suggests that the house on the southwest corner of the intersection of Eighth Street and S. Lake Park Avenue, which was built in 1895 per the county records, could be the old Abel house. We know the Abel house was standing by 1898, when it was photographed for the Gazette's Souvenir Edition:


(Click on image to enlarge)
Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society, Hobart, Indiana.

This photo doesn't resemble the house on the corner; however, Frank Abel made "extensive improvements" to the house in 1903,[1] and later owners may have made further changes.

By the end of the month, Dan and Tillie Abel were moving out of the old place for good.


(Click on image to enlarge)
Hobart News, May 31, 1922.

♦    ♦    ♦
The Stephen Dolato who bought the Abel land was a 50-year-old Polish immigrant (1920 Census). In partnership with his son, Frank,[2] he worked as a real-estate broker. Here they are listed in a 1922 Gary directory:


(Click on image to enlarge)

I expect Stephen bought the land for commercial purposes only, since he remained a resident of Gary (1930 Census).

_____________
[1] "Local Drifts," Hobart Gazette, Feb. 27, 1903.
[2] It appears he had at least one other son, Stephen Jr. (Indiana Death Certificates).