A Natural-Born Water-Witcher

This newspaper article from 1968 told me something I didn't know about Charles Fasel.


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Hobart Gazette, 7 Mar. 1968.


Charles was one of the many children of Henry and Mary Ann (Springman) Fasel. We met him, briefly, in 1918 when his first wife, Cora Goodrich, died of the Spanish influenza. Charles married again about three years later, to Elsie Volland. Together they had half a dozen children; he already had four from his first marriage.

A year after he was featured in the Gazette, Charles died.


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"Obituaries," Vidette-Messenger (Valparaiso, Ind.), 10 Apr. 1969.

He is buried, with both of his wives, in the Merrillville Cemetery.

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I had an uncle who swore by dowsing (he objected to words like "witching" or "divining"). If I recall correctly, he dowsed for gold in Alaska. He was adventurous, but he wasn't rich.

The scientific consensus based on controlled experiments is that dowsing works as well as random chance. Wikipedia overview here; another article here; and one on wells and aquifers here.

Hazelnut Blossom and Catkins

Here is my attempt to photograph the itsy-bitsy, teenie-weenie "female" blossom of the Hazelnut. Fingers for scale.


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And, on the same tree, some "male" catkins:



These early-blooming trees are designed for pollination by the wind, rather than the living pollinators we are all trying to save. For more information (and pictures) from someone who knows more about the subject than I do, go here.


Last year, my Hazelnut trees were successfully pollinated and started growing nuts. Around mid-September, I went out to check on their progress and found that every last nut had been stripped off the trees by some critter(s) — four-legged, two-winged; I don't know. The same thing will probably happen this year.

Shilo in the 1970s

If not for three things, Ainsworth Road would be just another shoulder-less, litter-strewn, two-lane country road where people routinely drive like maniacs. If not for three things.

One is invisible. That is Ainsworth Road's past — the centuries when it wound its way through a different world.

Another is the parkland — Big Maple Lake Park, Deep River County Park, their woods and waters, and the variety of life that inhabits them.

The third is, I think, the most visible and popular. That is Shilo Ranch. And I say "most popular" not because so many people own or ride horses, but because all sorts of people who happen to be driving along Ainsworth or Grand Boulevard admire the horses and want to communicate with them.

I live across the street, so I see this all the time. People driving by slow down and look out their car windows at the horses. They open their windows to let their dogs bark at the horses. They honk their horns at the horses. They pull over onto the soft, grassy ground, get out of their cars, and go up to the fence to visit the horses. They take photos and videos of the horses. Sometimes after these visits, the ground by the fence is strewn with carrots or apples. People just love those horses.

So, in honor of this jewel set on a band of shoulder-less, litter-strewn, two-lane country road, here are some newspaper articles from the early days of Shilo Ranch.


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Hobart Gazette, 2 Sept. 1971.
You can just barely see, in the top left photo, that the sign out front reads: "Pavel Arabians." I don't know exactly when they started using "Shilo," but it was sometime before the summer of 1973, as we will see below.


Hobart Gazette, 7 June 1973.


Hobart Gazette, 12 July 1973.


Hobart Gazette, 19 Feb. 1975.

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I've read ahead in the microfilm, so I know that Shilo was sold at auction in June 1988. The article I read attributed its financial problems to trouble in the oil industry — those oil people couldn't afford Arabian horses anymore. Shilo continued its operations, but without its founder.

Here is Wayne Pavel's senior photo, from Hobart High School's Memories yearbook of 1956 …


Image from Ancestry.com.

… and his obituary, from 2004:


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"Obituaries/News," Daily Journal (Johnson Co., Ind.), 10 Feb. 2004.

Vance Calvert and His Amateur Radio Jargon

Here's what Vance Calvert of Hobart was up to in the early days of 1922.


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Vance is giving the details of the radio equipment he was using to talk to John Martin in Ohio, I gather, but those details are beyond me and I'm too lazy to research this topic.

We can deduce that Vance did this radio stuff often enough to warrant the expense of having his own postcards printed with his call letters and location, for memorializing the contacts he made with other radio operators.

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I am not too lazy to do a little research into Vance Calvert. His connection to Hobart appears to date mostly to the 1910s and 1920s, although his parents[1] remained there after he had moved on.

My research has also turned up a news story that may or may not involve him (probably not), but it involves murder with sides of adultery and bootleg liquor, so of course I'm going to tell you about it.

Vance Robert Calvert was born in Michigan City on May 28, 1898 (WWII Draft Cards). His parents had moved to Chicago at the time of the 1900 Census, then back to Michigan City (1910 Census). By 1916 it appears that the family was in Hobart:


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Porter County Vidette (Valparaiso, Ind.), 13 Sept. 1916.

In April 1917, just after the U.S. entered the Great War, Vance joined the military:


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Lake County Times (Hammond, Ind.), 13 Apr. 1917.

A week later, Vance's name appeared again on the "Roll of Honor" but "infantry" had been changed to "signal corps"[2] — that may be where he got to know so much about radios.

When we look for him in the 1920 Census, we must go to an army camp in Texas. I believe this is our guy:


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Image from Ancestry.com.

I cannot find any record of the marriage, in Texas or anywhere else, but that wouldn't be the first time a marriage failed to show up on Ancestry.com decades after it happened.

Vance was back in Hobart by 1921, when we find him mentioned among some Hobart "boys" in the national guard going off to Louisville, Kentucky. And our postcard above places him in Hobart in 1922. In 1926 we find him and Dora living in San Antonio, Texas, per a city directory, which gives his occupation as serviceman for the International Radio Co.[3]

Now we come to 1927 and things get weird because according to someone on findagrave.com (as well as a couple of family trees on Ancestry.com), Vance's wife was Donna May McGuffin Calvert, who was murdered in Amarillo, Texas, on January 1, 1927. Here is the earliest story about the murder, appearing under a headline splashed across the full width of front page, "Woman Killed and Husband Dying in Hotel Shooting":


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Amarillo Daily News, 01 Jan. 1927.

Attentive readers will notice that the name of the victim's husband is given as Fred, and Fred it remains as the story develops in the newspapers. (I have tried and failed to identify this Fred Calvert in the online records.)

Two days later, another article tells us that Fred survived his wounds, while there seems to have been some confusion about whether he was, in fact, Donna May's husband.[4]

Here are two articles that summarize the testimony at the trial of the man who shot Donna May.


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Amarillo Daily News, 16 Mar. 1927.


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Amarillo Daily News, 16 Mar. 1927.

Aside from the fact that the possible husband in this case was named Fred, why do I think our Vance did not lose his wife in 1927? — because when we catch up with him in the 1930 Census, in Gary, Indiana, this is what we find:


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Image from Ancestry.com.

Vance's wife is Nora, which is a reasonable mistake for Dora, and again, I can find no record of his marrying a Nora. This Nora, like the Dora of 1920, was born in Texas. Nora's current age is very nearly what it would be if she were Dora, although her age at first marriage is wrong; and both their mothers were born in Texas, while there's a discrepancy in the paternal birthplaces. The differences, I think, can be chalked up to Dora/Nora fudging her age, or maybe the enumerator being no better at recording ages than names.

That's my hypothesis. Dora = Nora. Dora ≠ Donna May. Is that reasonable? Am I missing something?

Anyway, within a few years, the marriage between Vance and Dora/Nora dissolved, though whether by death or divorce I cannot say. In July 1934 Vance married Bernice Wesenberg, in Chicago.[5] The couple continued living in Chicago through the next two censuses, with three children by 1950. Bernice died in 1958.

Vance was living with a married daughter in Delaware when he died in 1975. No mention is made of his first marriage.


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"Obituaries," Evening Journal (Wilmington, Del.), 2 June 1975.

I don't attribute any significance to the fact that his youngest daughter was named Donna!

Vance is buried in the same cemetery as his wife and mother.

As for Dora/Nora, I have no idea what became of her.

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[1] His father was Leon Calvert, who at various times ran a tinsmith business and a hardware store in Hobart. From what I've found so far it seems that Leon remarried in 1930, while Vance's mother (Addie) was still living.
[2] Lake County Times (Hammond, Ind.), 20 Apr. 1917.
[3] San Antonio City Directory 1926 (John F. Worley Directory Co.), from Ancestry.com. U.S., City Directories, 1822-1995 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.
[4] "Parks Hearing Tuesday," Amarillo Globe, 3 Jan. 1927.
[5] Presbyterian Historical Society; Philadelphia, PA, USA; US, Presbyterian Church Records, 1701-1907; Accession Number: 96 0522b 49e. Via Ancestry.com. U.S., Presbyterian Church Records, 1701-1970 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2016.