Frederick and Fredericke

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Fredericke and Frederick Suhr. Images from findagrave.com.

Returning to the Harms 73rd Avenue farm, we left off in 1873 when Mary Chester bought the lower forty of the 80-acre parcel.

In September 1874, Mary lost her husband, Charles. In November, she sold her 40 acres to a German immigrant family by the name of Suhr, lending them $921 of the $1,000 purchase price.


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Image courtesy of the Eldon Harms family.

I did not recognize that name at first, but I should have: from the early days of this blog, when I was researching the Chester Cemetery, as that is the final resting place of the couple who bought these 40 acres. Back then, I was able to find very little information on them: just the 1880 Census showing Frederick and Fredericke, along with their 27-year-old son, Henry, farming somewhere in Ross Township.

Since 2009, I have discovered findagrave.com, which, through the collective effort of many people, has become a remarkable resource. From information there, I can now fill in some of the missing background, as well as post photos of the Suhrs (above) from the same source.

Frederick and Fredericke (Lichtwarle) Suhr had been married in Germany, their native land, where Frederick worked as a miller. (It was Fredericke's second marriage; her first had produced one son, Charles Schmidt, named for his father.[1]) They came to the U.S. in 1870, evidently just missing the census, and brought with them their three children: Fredrika, Henry, and Emma.[2] They lived in South Chicago at first, but, as we see from our documents above, by 1874 the family moved to Indiana.

Their children all married — most importantly, Emma, in 1887, to Conrad Bender, a man prominent enough in Porter County to rate a biographical sketch in a regional history book, whence I have gleaned some of this information.[3] The other children, Fredrika and Henry, appear to have spent much of their married lives in Illinois.

The Suhrs evidently did well enough on their farm to pay off their mortgage by 1880.

In 1882, at only 65 years of age, Fredericke Suhr died. She was buried in the Chester Cemetery, west of their farm. Frederick then sold the farm and left Indiana to spend the next 15 years in Illinois, probably with one or both of his married children there. He died in 1897, and they brought his body back to Ainsworth, to rest beside Fredericke.

Through their daughter, Emma Bender, their descendants were spread around northwest Indiana. Emma, who died in 1918, was survived by seven children: "Edward F. Bender, of Gary; Mrs. Martha Lute, of Hobart; Mrs. Ida Schenelter of Crown Point; Mrs. Bertha Malone, who lived with her mother in Hobart; Albert C. Bender and Frank J. Bender, who live on and operate the Bender farm in Portage township and Walter F. Bender, of Chesterton."[4]

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The real estate transaction we're looking at brought up two other names I recognize from past posts. The mortgage of the land in October 1874 was acknowledged before Justice of the Peace Horace Marble, whose 140-acre parcel just south of Ainsworth included the cemetery. (He was listed there, as a farmer, in the 1870 Census, but by 1880 had moved to Hobart and become a "commission merchant.")


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The Horace Marble farm as it appeared on the 1874 Plat Map. Hickory Top had not yet been renamed "Ainsworth."

The assignment of the mortgage, in December 1874, by Mary Chester to her son, Henry, involved J.P. Jesse B. Albee.

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[1] Pictorial and Biographical Record of La Porte, Porter, Lake and Starke Counties, Indiana. Chicago: Goodspeed Brothers, 1894.
[2] "Long Illness Proves Fatal to Mrs. E. Bender," Vidette-Messenger (Valparaiso), Oct. 20, 1933 (transcribed at findagrave.com).
[3] Goodspeed (1894).
[4] "Long Illness Proves Fatal," 1933.

Blue Mass

Late in the summer of 1850, there was sickness around Hobart, and people were coming to our shopkeeper (probably George Earle himself) for cures. He sold them quinine, an effective cure for malaria, discovered in the 17th century and still used today. He sold them boxes of nameless pills and bottles of nameless medicine. He also sold them the now-notorious "blue mass" pills.


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

The active ingredient of "blue mass" was mercury. People who took the pills developed mercury poisoning, which causes a number of unpleasant symptoms and may result in death. We don't know what John Phelps was intending to treat with the blue mass he bought, since it was prescribed for a range of medical problems, including syphilis, tuberculosis, constipation, toothache, parasitic infestations, and the pains of childbirth (according to Wikipedia). It actually cured nothing.

In researching blue mass, I learned that historical evidence seems to indicate that Abraham Lincoln took such pills and suffered neurological symptoms as a result; but he eventually recognized that the pills were causing problems and stopped taking them. You can download an interesting article about Lincoln and his blue pills here.

Finally, I am curious about that purchase by J.B. Albee on September 4: "1 bottle of pain extractor." This is the first I've ever heard of the term "pain extractor." Looking around on the internet, I find numerous advertisements dating to the latter half of the 19th century for Dalley's Magical Pain Extractor, but no information about what its ingredients might have been.

Who Built the Bridge on the Tumbling Dam?

These guys did.


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

Construction was going on, apparently, in January 1849 — cold working conditions! I assume this is the tumbling dam at George Earle's grist mill in Hobart.

"Cady" might be Cady Preston, a 33-year-old Hobart resident who came from New York via Michigan, per the 1850 Census. He must have been good friends with the ledger-keeper to be on a first-name basis. (Another possibility is Samuel Cady, but thus far I've found him in the ledgers only up to 1840, and only in the 1840 Census.)

George Cregg (or Craig) has been showing up in the ledgers but I can't identify him in a census.

Mr. Bush's initials may have been O.E., per another entry in the ledger, but otherwise he is a mystery to me.

We've already met Jesse Albee.

"F. Eastling" was probably Ferdinand Eastling, one of five children in the family headed by Luther and Maria Eastling. (Judging by the ages of the older children, I'd say Maria was Luther's second wife.) They farmed the southeast quarter of Section 33, on the west side of County Line Road where it meets State Road 130 (Early Land Sales, Lake County), so when the Pittsburgh, Ft. Wayne & Chicago Railroad came through circa 1858, it cut through their land.

"S. Sigler" may have been either Samuel Sr. or Samuel Jr.

Per the 1850 Census, the Carothers family had a John Sr. and a John Jr. In January 1849, John Jr. was only 12 years old, so I'm inclined to think this entry is for John Sr. He was born in New York circa 1805, died in Hobart in 1864, and is buried in the Old Settlers Cemetery. (Also listed there are a George Carothers — probably John's son — and a Charles, whom I can't identify; they were both Civil War veterans.) John Carothers owned much of the southwest quarter of Section 30, so Old Ridge Road, as it moves from N. Lake Park Avenue to Wisconsin Street, crossed his land (Early Land Sales, Lake County).

The Vanishing Albees

Jesse B. Albee was Hobart's second postmaster, appointed in 1854 to succeed George Earle.[1] A few years later he was elected Hobart Township Trustee; this page from the trustees' ledger records the beginning of his term in April 1859:


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.


In the same book we find Jesse serving as a "school director," and "buylden" a new schoolhouse for the township. Elsewhere the book notes his services as a justice of the peace in 1873, giving him the customary title, "Squire":


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.


I do not know how long he held the office of J.P. — at least until November 12, 1879, according to the 1874 Secretary of State's annual report.

In a book published in 1884, W.H. Rifenburg mentions Jesse as a member of the committee charged with overseeing the construction of the Unitarian church building.

All of this shows that Jesse B. Albee was a prominent figure in Hobart's early history.

And yet, as I noted in the post about his son's death, if he and any family members have their final resting place locally, exactly where is a mystery to me.

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The census records all agree that Jesse was born in Vermont circa 1815. Local historians cautiously say: "It would appear that Albee came to Hobart from Ohio sometime between 1843 and 1848"[2] without noting a source for that information. In my indexing work, I have encountered him conducting business locally as early as August 1846:


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.


In the 1850 Census, Jesse shows up with his wife, Sarah (Hendershot),[3] whom he had married in Ohio in 1841,[4] and their two sons, Americus and Alonzo.

In 1851, Jesse bought the whole northwest quarter of Section 21, Twp. 36 N., Range 7 W. — 160 acres southeast of Lake Station on the county line (U.S. General Land Office Records, 1776-2015).

When Sarah Albee died is unknown — 1858 or later, it would seem, since the 1860 Census lists no wife in the household, but there is a two-year-old Jesse Junior. There is also a 25-year-old "domestic," Mary Hoff.

On January 29, 1861, Jesse (senior) married Emily Wilcox; on July 15, 1861, Mary Ann Pierce; and on May 25, 1864, Caroline (Spencer) Carpenter (Indiana Marriage Collection).[5]

In the 1870 Census, Jesse and Caroline are living near Lake Station with the two younger sons from his first marriage; the eight-year-old son from her previous marriage, James Carpenter; and the two sons they had together: four-year-old Clarence and an unnamed two-month-old boy.

The 1874 Plat Map shows Jesse owning nearly 160 acres in the next section north of his 1851 purchase (which by then was in other hands). Here I have marked his 1874 parcel on an image from the 1950 Plat Book so we can better see where it lay with respect to present-day streets:


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Then comes the 1880 Census — and no Albees. That is to say, I can't find them in the census on Ancestry.com under any reasonable spelling of their name, not in Hobart Township or anywhere else. It's possible they were not counted, or the enumerator got their surname completely wrong — but I've also searched on their first names only, with no luck.[6]

And yet it seems that they had not left Hobart. Ballantyne and Adams state: "In the Hobart Township School enumeration for 1885 Jesse Albee is listed as having a son of school age (between 6 and 12)" and "Jesse Albee died in Hobart in 1886." I wish they'd given their source for that second item. I can't find anything to confirm it.

The year after Jesse's death, Caroline married Henry James in Lake County (Indiana Marriage Collection, the marriage being recorded under her middle name, Amelia). She died in 1903 (Indiana Death Certificates) and is buried in Hobart Cemetery — at least we've found one of them!


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[1] Dorothy Ballantyne and Robert Adams, Along the Route: A History of Hobart, Indiana, Post Offices and Postmasters, Hobart: The Hobart Historical Society, Inc. (1979, rev. 1992).
[2] Ibid., p. 12.
[3] Ballantyne and Roberts (p. 12) describe Sarah as a four-year-old daughter, but the image of the 1850 census on Ancestry.com clearly shows her age as 24, which, together with the Ohio marriage record, leads me to believe that she was Jesse's wife.
[4] Ancestry.com. Ohio, County Marriage Records, 1774-1993 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2016. Original data: Marriage Records. Ohio Marriages. Various Ohio County Courthouses.
[5] Caroline's maiden name was Spencer, per Ballantyne and Adams (p. 12), who add that she was the widow of James Carpenter, a Civil War casualty, and mother of James Carpenter Jr. — whose name I have often encountered in my reading; he sat on Hobart's town council and otherwise made a prominent citizen of himself in the early 20th century.
[6] If I had the time, I would just read through all of the Hobart Township 1880 census in search of something that could pass for the Albee family.

Death of a Sunday Scholar

While indexing the Union Sunday School record book from the 1870s, I came across this draft of a resolution memorializing the late Clarence Spencer Albee.


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.


That these people, so sadly familiar with the loss of children, should mention that Clarence was taken by "death in one of its most terrible forms" really makes me wonder what happened to the poor boy.

One might expect a fair copy of this undated draft to appear in the Sunday School minutes, giving us a rough date for Clarence's death, but so far I have not been able to find it.

Naturally, I set about trying to find out where he is buried … and got nowhere. Neither the NWIGS books of Hobart Township and Ross Township cemetery readings, nor findagrave.com record him. I believe he died in 1878, since the pages immediately before and after this resolution record events in 1878. The death records on Ancestry.com do not go back that far. Nor was there any newspaper in Hobart then that survives today. A search on two historical-newspaper sites[1] doesn't turn up anything. I expect I shall have to start scrolling through various other local microfilm someday, when I have time.

Clarence was born circa 1866 (1870 Census) to Jesse B. Albee and his fourth wife, Caroline (Spencer) Carpenter. Among his wives, Jesse had several offspring. But their final resting places, like Clarence's, are a mystery to me — and so is Jesse's, which is surprising given how prominent a figure he was locally in the mid-19th century.

I shall have to post a bit more about the Albee family in the future.

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[1] Newspaperarchive.com and Newspapers.com.