Automobile Humor (1924) and the Old Abel Place

(Click on image to enlarge)
Hobart News, 31 Jan. 1924.

And I'm sure some people clipped it out and put it on their windshield, and the next time they were out driving, they kept glancing over smugly at their passengers just waiting for them (the passengers) to say something.

This prompted me to investigate the origin of the term "backseat driver." One source found it as early as 1891 in the U.S. The phenomenon had to exist before the automobile; it's just human nature; but I haven't been able to find information about what people called it.

♦    ♦    ♦
A social column in the same issue of the Hobart News contained an update on the ownership of the old Abel homestead:

A deal was recently completed whereby the former Abel property, together with a couple of Gary properties, was transferred by the late owner, Steve Dolato of this city, in exchange for a farm of 320 acres located about 8 miles north of Renssalaer, Ind. owned by Michael Jungles, consideration $44,800. The Dolato family, who have resided here for the past seven months, will move the first of the week to Gary, where they have purchased a home at Eighth and Georgia streets and the Jungles family will remove to their new residence, the old Abel homestead, as soon as it is vacated by Mr. Dolato and family.

The new owners' name was actually spelled Jungels. Michael and Josephine (Gerlach) Jungels were both Illinois natives who had married in 1884. After many years of farming in Jasper County, Indiana, they were approaching retirement age and chose the old Abel place, which still had over 10 acres attached to it. A later Hobart News social column (4 Apr. 1924) mentions a couple of their married daughters' surnames …

Mrs. Michael Jungles came Sunday to the old Abel homestead, which she and Mr. Jungles purchased about the first of the year to be occupied by them as a future home. Mr. and Mrs. Otto Ritter of this city, her son-in-law and daughter, motored to Renssalaer for the purpose of bringing Mrs. Jungles back with them to Hobart. Mr. Jungles will join his wife later. Another daughter and her husband, Mr. and Mrs. Peer, have resided at the former Abel home since the first of March.

Elizabeth Jungels had married Volney Peer in 1907, and Anna Jungels and Otto Ritter were married in 1916, all in Jasper County; but with this move they and the elder Jungelses would become Hobart residents for decades. It is Elizabeth's name that shows up as the owner of the property on the 1926 Plat Map:


(Click on image to enlarge)

Let us skip ahead to the end of Michael's and Josephine's residence — they departed Hobart, and this world, within three weeks of each other in March 1952.


(Click on image to enlarge)
Vidette-Messenger (Valparaiso, Ind.), 3 Mar. 1952


(Click on image to enlarge)
Vidette-Messenger (Valparaiso, Ind.), 21 Mar. 1952

Elizabeth Peer and Anna Ritter remained Hobart residents to the end of their lives as well. Anna died in 1969, and Elizabeth — who still occupied the old homestead — in 1980.

A Bruebach Family Portrait

I received this photo from a Bruebach descendant, who tells me that it shows a family group on the Bruebach farm circa 1912.


(Click on images to enlarge)
Photos courtesy of Marilyn Duran.

The extended and in-law Bruebach family at this time included an Abel as well as Manteuffels,[1] and probably other family names that I don't know about.

If this is the Bruebach farm, that must be the farmhouse in the background, and a very nice farmhouse it is. I can't match it up to anything still standing today; more's the pity.[2]

Only four people in this photo are identified, and here Marilyn has pulled them out to form their own little family group:



Clockwise from the top: Frank Abel, Jr. (b. 1880); his wife, Johanna (Bruebach, b. 1882); their son, Lester (b. 1911); and their daughter, Audis (b. 1907).

What strikes me is how unhappy both Frank and Audis look. Maybe they just didn't like having their picture taken; but then again, they might not have felt entirely comfortable among the Bruebachs. Unfortunately, Frank and Johanna's marriage was troubled. Later in the 1910s, their private drama would become public as the social columns of the local newspapers reported separations, reconciliations, and Johanna's filing of a divorce suit. Frank's death certificate (January 1919) describes him as divorced.

By then Johanna had taken the children and moved to Chicago. Marking the anniversaries of Frank's death through 1922, the local newspapers carried notices like this one:


Hobart News, January 22, 1920.


_______________
[1] Elise Manteuffel married George Bruebach, Sr., in 1887 in Chicago (Cook County, Illinois, Marriages Index), thus beginning what would become the Bruebach family of Hobart.
[2] Assuming some remodeling, it looks a bit like 10 N. Hobart Road, which was built in 1899 per the county records and is not on the former Bruebach property.

Frank Abel, Sr. and the Deep River Church

Frank Abel, Sr. (whose home I was discussing in my last post) had his portrait printed in the Gazette 1898 Souvenir Edition …


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

… along with a very short bio:


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

He was indeed active as a carpenter, and the newspapers often mentioned that he was building a barn or house or whatever for someone — most of which buildings I haven't been able to identify. One exception is the "new Deepriver church" that he built in 1904; while it didn't really register with me the first time I came across that information, what was the "new Deepriver church" is now the Deep River County Park Visitor Center and Gift Shop.


(Click on image to enlarge)

Construction began in late July 1904[1] and continued through August at least. The church was finished, presumably, by late September, when the Gazette announced its dedication ceremony scheduled for October 2, 1904.[2]


_______________
[1] "General News Items," Hobart Gazette, July 29, 1904.
[2] "Church Dedication," Hobart Gazette, Sept. 30, 1904.

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).

That Other Michael Foreman

Speaking of (apparently) unrelated local people with the same names, this "Michael Foreman" living "near Hobart" was not the Michael Foreman of Ainsworth.


(Click on image to enlarge)
"Local Drifts," Hobart Gazette, May 4, 1923.

Ainsworth's Michael Foreman was born in the U.S., and known as "Mike" mainly in newspaper items. In one census only (1900) he gives his name as Michael; all others record him as Helmuth.

The Porter County Michael's middle name was Helmuth, according to one source — his listing on findagrave.com — but I can't confirm that with any other source.

I myself got them confused at least once, when I noted down this item from the "Local Drifts" of the Hobart Gazette of October 30, 1908: "The Blake farm has been sold to Mike Foreman who lives on one of the Wolf farms." Now that sounds like the Porter County Mike Foreman.

I don't expect to trouble myself any further about the Porter County Mike Foreman.

Other items I have marked on the page above include a fire at the Mohl house — more commonly spelled Moehl. Back in 1921 when the Moehl houses were the subject of a legal dispute, they were described as being on Second Street, and I believe they were west of East Street. The Haxton creamery, as I understand it, is still standing on the east side of New Street, north of Third. So I'm a bit confused by the use of "adjoining" in this description. [Update: I was wrong about the former Haxton creamery's location; it stands on the east side of the alley between East and Center Streets, so the description in the newspaper item makes sense.]

The Mrs. Abel whose hospitalization is mentioned below that item was born Johanna Bruebach. She was the sister of Liza Bruebach and the widow of Frank Abel, Jr.[1]

♦    ♦    ♦
In the following week's Gazette, Helmuth "Mike" Foreman of Ainsworth had published this tribute to his late wife.


(Click on image to enlarge)
Hobart Gazette, May 11, 1923.


_______________
[1] His death certificate from 1919 gives his marital status as divorced (Indiana Death Certificates).

Caroline Abel and Her Carpenters

(Click on image to enlarge)
From the Hobart Gazette 1 Apr. 1921.

Aside from being an early settler, Caroline (Feiler) Abel was the wife and mother of carpenters who were responsible for a lot of building in the vicinity of Ainsworth; my notes are full of "Contractor Abel" and "F. Abel" shipping lumber to Ainsworth and putting up this house and that barn in the surrounding area. Problem is, I'm not sure exactly which Abel is being referred to, since all these references are after the 1900 census, in which both Frank Abel, Sr. and his son, Frank, Jr., described themselves as carpenters. In 1910 they both described themselves as contractors doing carpentry work (Frank Jr. being married with his own household), and 16-year-old Edward Abel also called himself a carpenter.

Let's just take a look at what we can attribute to one or more of the Abels:

• Nov. 1901: "Walter Blachely [Blachly] will build an addition to his barn on the Mid Harper farm. Frank Abel sold him a carload of lumber with which to do the work."
• March 1902: "On Wednesday Contractor Abel began building a house for John Miller at Ainsworth, having the contract for the labor and the furnishing of lumber."
• April 1902: "Contractor Abel … has just shipped a carload of lumber to Ainsworth for C. Hill for repairs on a house and several outbuildings, which he will shortly build."
• May 1902: "Contractor Abel received another carload of lumber this week for his contracts. He is building an addition to the house of Wm. Foreman, south of Ainsworth."
• May 1902: "Contractor Abel has just shipped two carloads of lumber to Ainsworth to be used in a large barn that he will build for Frank Bayor…."
• June 1902: "Contractor Abel this week finished Fred Miller's new house at Ainsworth."
• September 1902: "An old-fashioned barn raising was held at John Gruel's yesterday and both of his new barns were raised. Quite a number from town attended. Contractor Abel is doing the carpenter work."
• May 1903: "Contractor Abel has had three cars of lumber shipped to Ainsworth, to be used in the construction of a new barn for Howard Smith who lives south of Deepriver."
• August 1904: "Contractor Abel is building the new Deepriver church."
• June 1906: "A week ago Contractor Abel began building a big barn for Chas. Sievert who lives southwest of town. The building will be 34 by 84 feet, with 20-foot posts."
• September 1906: "Contractor Abel has begun the erection of a new barn, 32 by 48 feet and 18 feet high, on the Mike Ormond farm southeast of Hobart. The dwelling is also to be raised about eighteen inches and a new addition built thereto."
• October 1909: "Contractor Abel who is building a new barn on the Kramer farm south of town hopes to have the structure completed within a few days."
• March 1911: "Abel & Sons have been doing a lot of repair work on the Chas. Chester farm near Ainsworth and are now doing work for Ed Batterman."

… and those are just the projects I happened to make note of over the years.

Frank Sr. died in 1915; Edward died in 1918; and Frank Jr. died in 1919 of tuberculosis.

♦    ♦    ♦
Just look at all those Ross Township names in the "Notice of Road Petition" on the Gazette page above. Many acquaintances, some farmers, some Ainsworth businessmen such as Gust Lindborg and Charles Goldman, and even William Wollenberg, who I suppose still owned the saloon building in Ross Township though he lived in Chicago.

I suppose the road in question is E. 101st Avenue.


Sources:
♦ 1880 Census.
♦ 1900 Census.
♦ 1910 Census.
♦ "Early Settler Passes Away." Hobart Gazette 1 Apr. 1921.
♦ "General News Items." Hobart Gazette 8 Nov. 1901; 21 Mar. 1902; 4 Apr. 1902; 2 May 1902; 23 May 1902; 15 May 1903; 26 Aug. 1904; 8 June 1906; 21 Sept. 1906.
♦ "Hobart." Hammond Lake County Times 22 Jan. 1919.
♦ Indiana WPA Death Records Index.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 27 June 1902; 19 Sept. 1902; 29 Oct. 1909; 10 Mar. 1911.

Peacetime Casualties

The war was over, but soldiers were still dying.

The News of December 12 carried this brief story:

Word was received Monday that Clarence McDonald, son of Mrs. Otis Guernsey,* residing south of Deep River, had died of wounds received in action in France. Last week they received a message stating he had been seriously wounded. He went to France in June of this year.

Just above that story appeared a fuller report on the death of Edward Abel, 26 years old, who had died in France on November 24 of bronchial pneumonia. The next day's Gazette described Edward's military service:

When Co. F was organized at Gary, he became a member, and in June, 1916, he went with the company to the Mexican border. There he had charge of the construction of army shacks, and after the company was mustered out of the U.S. service, in March, 1917, and again became a state organization, he returned home, but soon war broke out, and again he joined the company that was sent to Camp Shelby. Here he remained until about last October, when most of the remaining members of Co. F were sent overseas. From a letter received later, he arrived in France Nov. 5, or six days before peace was signed.

On December 18 Fremont and Carrie Price received a report that their son James had died — a sketchy, unofficial report, if we are to go by what appeared in the newspaper about it. The Prices were surely stunned and confused; James himself had recently written to them that he was fully recovered from his wound.

___________________________
*Minnie Jones Guernsey, and I can't account for the difference in surnames.


Sources:
♦ "Another Hobart Boy Dies in France." Hobart Gazette 13 Dec. 1918.
♦ "Clarence McDonald of Ross Twp. Dies of Wounds Received in Action." Hobart News 12 Dec. 1918.
♦ "Edward Abel Dies of Pneumonia November 24 in France." Hobart News 12 Dec. 1918.
♦ "Local and Personal." Hobart News 19 Dec. 1918.

Our Musical Postmaster

(Click on image to enlarge)
Advertisement from the Hobart Gazette of May 13, 1904.

Hugh Dotzer came to the United States from Germany in 1881 or 1882 at about 20 years of age. In 1888 he married Eva Peck in Porter County, Indiana. By 1900 they were living in Union Township, Porter County, and had three children: Matilda, 11; John, 6; and Valeska, 2. Hugh called himself a farmer, but out among the cows and the corn he worked with the soul of a musician.

Sometime between 1900 and 1904 he began selling Adam Schaaf pianos. I do not know precisely when he moved to Ainsworth, or if there were intervening residences between Union Township and Ainsworth — the family's later history showed a tendency to move around.

On January 28, 1904, Hugh was appointed postmaster of Ainsworth, succeeding Frank Coyle, who had resigned.

The appointment apparently caused some disruption to Hugh: a month later, he announced: "Having taken charge of the Post Office at Ainsworth, I will be selling stock of Adam Schaaf pianos and organs at cost, warranted ten years. This offer good for a few days only."

He may have sold them at cost for only a few days, but he continued selling them at a profit for the remainder of his stay in Ainsworth. He ran ads like the one pictured above regularly throughout 1904 and early 1905.

In May 1904, when the people of Ainsworth organized a Sunday school, Hugh served as organist. That same month he began advertising to give piano and organ lessons every Friday to students in Ainsworth and Hobart.

Hugh's tenure as postmaster was brief. By late May he asked to be released from his duties "for the good of the service" because, as far as I can tell, the quarters he occupied did not offer suitable space for a post office. He recommended William Raschka to replace him, and William was appointed postmaster on May 24, 1904.

Hugh's living space must have been small, or else overrun with pianos and organs. The Grand Trunk's Ainsworth agent, P.H. Swain, and his wife lived for a time with the Dotzers. In September, Swain announced that because the "Dotzer house [was] too small" he and his pregnant wife were going to move to the "Chester house." If he meant they were going to live with Henry Chester, the crowding chez Dotzer must have been terrible indeed to make a man willing to run such a risk.

When the Ainsworth baseball team gave a dance at Ed Sauter's hall in June, Hugh was among the musicians.

At the late-summer Lake County fair, Hugh had the largest musical display — four Adam Schaaf pianos, an organ and over a thousand pieces of sheet music — beating even the Lion Store and the Kimball Co. He had to cancel his usual Friday lessons that week so he could supervise his fair display. In September, he reported that he had sold pianos to Frank Abel, a Hobart builder; Sedley's James Hardesty; and Frank Graves, who lived near Valpo.

That same month, he also announced that he had purchased ten acres in Crown Point and intended to move there in March 1905.

His musical business went on as he made improvements to his Crown Point property. In October he furnished the new Deep River church with an organ; in November he made a trip to Hammond to sell pianos; in December, Christ Heck bought a piano and Miss Martha Heck became one of Hugh's pupils.

On New Year's Day 1905, the Dotzer family hosted a large dinner, the guests including the Morgan Blachly family, Mr. and Mrs. J. Watts and the Frank Graves family. In the evening Mr. and Mrs. Fred Harney and the whole Michael Foreman family visited the Dotzers.

Hugh assured his students that he would continue to teach them after his move to Crown Point. He planned a class recital to take place on February 18.

In January 1905, a "Notice of Commendation" appeared in the Hobart Gazette, placed by some of Hugh's students or their parents:

We, the undersigned patrons of Mr. H. Dotzer, hereby express our esteem and regard for him as a teacher. We are sorry to see him move away from our midst, yet are glad to know that he will continue as our teacher, and heartily recommend him to all.

Elsie Piske, May Abel, Mrs. D. Owens, Ella Jonas, W. Wilson, Dr. Morton, C. Heck, S. Lightner, C. Schnabel, M. Blachly, W. Raschka, M. Wagoner, John Gruel, Miss T. Triebess, John Springman, H. Carey, Clara Sauter, Etta Mander, H. Stevens.

Early in the afternoon on Saturday, February 18, two sleighloads of pianists and spectators drove from Ainsworth to the spacious home of Mr. and Mrs. Seward Lightner in Hobart, where the recital began at 2:00 p.m. It was well attended, with about 20 student performers from Hobart and Ainsworth, and an audience of their family and friends; fortunately Alwin Wild, a Hobart undertaker, had furnished additional chairs.

March came and Hugh went to Crown Point, suspending lessons for three weeks while he got settled.

Whether he resumed them, and for how long, I do not know. In May of 1907 the Gazette mentioned, rather off-handedly, that Hugh had moved to Danville, Illinois. November of 1907 found him in Fort Wayne, Indiana, offering piano and organ lessons as well as the tuning and repairing of instruments.

After that we lose sight of him. It seems he stayed in Fort Wayne; he died there in March 1918. The 1920 census reports the widowed Eva Dotzer working as a live-in servant in a Fort Wayne home.

Sources:
♦ 1900 Census.
♦ 1910 Census.
♦ 1920 Census.
♦ "Ainsworth Pick-Ups." Hobart Gazette 9 Sept. 1904; 23 Sept. 1904; 30 Sept. 1904; 7 Oct. 1904; 21 Oct. 1904; 4 Nov. 1904; 25 Nov. 1904; 23 Dec. 1904; 6 Jan. 1905; 13 Jan. 1905; 27 Jan. 1905; 17 Feb. 1905; 24 Feb. 1905.
♦ Ballantyne, Dorothy and Robert Adams. Along the Route: A History of Hobart, Indiana, Post Offices and Postmasters. Hobart: The Hobart Historical Society, Inc., 1992.
♦ Dotzer, Hugh. Advertisement. Fort Wayne Journal-Gazette 24 Nov. 1907.
♦ Dotzer, Hugh. Advertisement. Hobart Gazette 13 May 1904.
♦ "General News Items." Hobart Gazette 26 Feb. 1904; 27 May 1904; 3 June 1904; 10 June 1904; 26 Aug. 1904; 9 Sept. 1904; 9 Dec. 1904; 10 May 1907.
♦ Indiana Marriage Collection.
♦ Indiana WPA Death Records Index.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 5 Feb. 1904; 10 Mar. 1905.
♦ "Notice of Commendation." Hobart Gazette 6 Jan. 1905.
♦ "Sunday School Organized at Ainsworth." Hobart Gazette 20 May 1904.