Fowl Fraud

I don't know why I thought this story about a poultry-related scam was worth printing out … but print it out I did, and I'm not going to let 15 cents go to waste.


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Hobart Gazette, Aug. 3, 1923.

Maybe I printed it out for the sake of the next story down, about Hobart travelers to Valparaiso being advised to take the Ainsworth route rather than the Yellowstone Trail, which was undergoing repairs.

The story in the middle column about the Gary hospital has so many familiar names that I can't talk about them all, but the one that jumps out at me is "W. Wagoner" — this reminds me that while reading the March 28, 1913 Gazette on microfilm recently (looking for other stuff), I came across the mention of Wilmont Wagoner, which in turn reminded me of that mysterious W.N. Wagoner who briefly operated the Ainsworth saloon and whose first name has eluded me. Well, now I have a theory: "W.N." = Wilmont Nelson. Can't prove it, of course, but who cares? Here's Wilmont Nelson Wagoner's death notice from 1938:


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Hammond Times, Sept. 11, 1938.

That story about the giant still at McCool is pretty interesting, too.


But getting back to the 1923 newspaper — over in the next column, George Hagerty's obituary reminds me that I've been seeing that name (Hagerty) here and there without really knowing who those people were. I think the son Albert is the one who lost his young wife to the Spanish influenza in January 1919. I wonder if this family has a connection to the George Haggerty/Hegerty who worked in the Reuben Bridle household in 1910 and attended Reuben's funeral in 1922? — but the age of that George in 1910 (24) doesn't match up to George Hagerty's son mentioned in the obituary, who was born in 1902 per the 1910 Census (which shows George Sr. living and working on his own farm).

Below that, Albert Orcutt's father has died.

Minnie Harms and John Berndt

To complement yesterday's post, let's look at the wedding photos of Minnie Harms and John Berndt.


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Photographs courtesy of Eldon Harms.

The Hobart Gazette of April 23, 1909, gave some details about that gorgeous dress of hers.



They were photographed by August Haase. A second photo included the flower girls, Dorothy Leiger and Minnie Bassauer (notes on the back of the original suggest that Minnie may be on the left and Dorothy on the right, but it's not clear).

Ford v. Cement Truck

Apparently, if you were bored in Hobart, you could go hang around the Nickel Plate Garage and wait for something to happen. Just one day after the barber-v.-barber grudge match, a cement truck showed what it could do to a Ford car out in front of the Nickel Plate Garage. The Ford belonged to our friend Roland Dolphus Sizelove.


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"Local and Personal," Hobart News 11 Aug. 1921.

In news of other acquaintances — yet another relative for the mysterious Mary Kipp. "Mrs. Wm. Halsted" may have been W.O.'s widow, Barbara; that was how the Gazette of August 12 identified a woman beginning a new house on Garfield Street, though there could have been two such women.

And Vera Quinlan had a job in Gary. From the next day's Gazette, we learn that her brother, Lester, who was then about 16 or 17, had joined the National Guard:


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"Local Drifts," Hobart Gazette 12 Aug. 1921.

… and yes, Mrs. Gottfried Mayer was Oscar's sister-in-law.

Pigs and Cows, and People I Just Can't Find

The Nolte Bros., "Hen" and "Lou," are selling Duroc Jersey pigs; Herman Harms took his teen-aged nephew, Lester, to a sale of Holsteins; Mary Yager* hosts a former pastor … and someone I've never heard of and can't find in any records dies an untimely death.


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I've looked in my blog and my notes, and can't find any previous mention of this John Bromberg. I've looked for him without success in the census and death records. I've looked in the NWIGS's all-name listing for Deer Creek Cemetery in Lake County — he's not listed.

(As for the "Hayward farm south of Ainsworth," I believe it was the southwest quarter of Section 29, so it lay on the west border of part of the Hurlburt land that gave Hurlburt's corners its name.)

The following day's Gazette carried an item that brought to mind another person I just can't find:

Mrs. W.H. Wagoner of Goshen, Ind., came to Hobart Wednesday to visit at the home of her daughter, Mrs. C.H. Messick. She was joined yesterday by her son, W.B. Wagoner, and wife, from Chicago, the occasion being their mother's birthday.

It's clear enough that Mrs. W.H. Wagoner was the mother of Bertha Wagoner, who married Cephas Messick in 1905 — thus the grandmother of Dalia Messick. And while I don't know her given name, I don't really care … except that all this reminds me of W.N. Wagoner, the mysterious saloonkeeper who flitted into and out of Ainsworth between September 1905 and March 1906, leaving behind no trace but a remonstrance. His identity has thus far completely eluded me. I wonder if there was any family connection between him and these Wagoners?

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*I hope I've identified her correctly. She was about 66 years old, the wife of our strawberry-growing Jacob Yager, living in Union Township, Porter County. Adam Yager was their son (who lived with them per the 1920 Census), and the Jake Yager mentioned as attending may have been another son, unless that was the News's very strange way of naming Jake Sr.


Sources:
♦ Indiana Marriage Collection.
♦ "Local and Personal." Hobart News 12 May 1921.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 13 May 1921.

Another Chapter in the Story of the Saloon

We've already learned that the Ainsworth saloon came into the world in 1899, built by Ed Sauter and first christened Sauter's Place; and that Ed sold it early in 1904 to Claus Ziegler, a former Hobart saloonkeeper who moved to Ainsworth to run the saloon himself.

Claus ran the saloon for a little more than a year and a half. Then it seems he sold it: the Hobart Gazette of September 22, 1905, carried a notice of application for a liquor license, describing the former Sauter's Place and signed by W.N. Wagoner (whose true Christian name remains a mystery to me).[1]

The licensing process didn't go smoothly for W.N. Early in October the Lake County commissioners denied his application due to a remonstrance filed by that quietly respectable Ainsworth farmer, Cyrus E. Smith, "et al."

Most of what I know about the Indiana remonstrance law comes from Judge Woodfin Robinson, whose Powers and Duties of County and Township Officers in the State of Indiana, published in 1900, summarizes the then current statute and case law concerning liquor licenses. The remonstrance law dated back at least to 1894. It granted to any voter in the township in which a particular applicant wished to sell liquor the right to file a formal objection to the granting or renewal of that applicant's license on account of his "immorality or other unfitness." (And it was always "his" — women could not hold liquor licenses.)

What constituted "immorality or other unfitness"? The statute specified only the "habit of becoming intoxicated," but subsequent case law expanded the potential grounds for remonstrance, so long as the remonstrant could prove specific acts of immorality — not just allege a generally immoral character. Courts had sustained the decisions of county commissioners to deny a license based on any one of the following facts:
♦ The applicant frequented places where gambling was permitted.
♦ Drunken men often congregated in front of the applicant's saloon.
♦ Drunken men had been seen going in and out of the applicant's saloon.
♦ The applicant had allowed minors to use pool tables in his saloon.
♦ The applicant had gambled at dice with minors.

But the county board was not obligated to deny a license in the face of such facts, nor to grant a license in their absence — it was a case-by-case, county-by-county decision. "No standard of morals is or can be fixed by law," said Judge Robinson.

I wish I knew what exactly Cyrus et al. had against W.N., but unfortunately the Gazette didn't report the particulars. And ultimately Cyrus lost; in November 1905 the county commissioners reversed themselves and granted W.N. his license.

After all that trouble, he ran the Ainsworth saloon for only a few months. In March 1906, the Gazette reported that Claus Ziegler had bought the saloon back. (W.N. moved to Hobart and took over management of the Kuschinsk saloon.)

Once again a year and a half was about Claus' limit. In September or October 1907, he sold the saloon to William F. Wollenberg. (Claus moved to a small farm north of Hobart; if he farmed, it wasn't for very long — by early 1909 he had hired on to run Hugo Zobjeck's saloon in Hobart.)

William had been farming rented land near Merrillville when he decided to quit farming and go into the saloon business. He moved his family to Ainsworth, where the 1910 census finds them living, probably, in the saloon building — William and his wife, Adelphine, and their children, Myrtle, William Jr., and Edward.

The saloon business suited William better than farming, it seems: I've gotten through 1912 in the microfilm, and he is still happily keeping the Ainsworth saloon, and getting his license renewed year after year with no recorded opposition from Cyrus Smith or anyone else.


________________
[1] 6/27/2019 update: I now have a theory about his given names.


Sources:
♦ 1910 Census.
♦ "Application for License." Hobart Gazette 22 Sept. 1905; 12 Apr. 1907; 1 Nov. 1907; 19 Sept. 1908; 8 Oct. 1909.
♦ "General News Items." Hobart Gazette 6 Oct 1905; 17 Nov. 1905; 4 Oct. 1907.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 16 Mar. 1906; 8 Feb. 1907; 27 Sept. 1907; 26 Feb. 1909.
♦ "Notice for the Renewal of Liquor License." Hobart Gazette 6 Oct. 1911.
♦ "Notice to the Citizens of the Town of Ainsworth." Hobart News 10 Oct. 1912.
♦ Robinson, Woodfin D. Powers and Duties of County and Township Officers in the State of Indiana. Indianapolis: The Bowen-Merrill Company, 1900.

Our Musical Postmaster

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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.