Babies and Burglars

Happy events in the early days of August 1922 — William and Mayme (Brand) Fleck have a son (William Jr., their first child), and Ernest and Myrtle (Nelson) Sitzenstock have a daughter (Florence, their third child).


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Hobart News 10 Aug. 1922.

But two columns over, we see that there's been a lot of burglary going on.

In the last column, the Old Folks at Home business is being taken over by some new folks from out of town. Looking over the 1920 Census, the best candidate I can find for "Mrs. M. Roberts of Hammond" is Margaret Roberts, a widow with two sons, either of whom would have been old enough in 1922 to help her run a business.


Additional Sources:
♦ 1930 Census.
♦ "Births." Hobart Gazette 11 Aug. 1922.

His Awesome Alfalfa

On July 13, 1922 — about three months after the sudden death of her husband — Maud Hardesty gave birth to his last son. The child's name was not given in the newspaper; it may have been Bruce, but at the moment I'm not sure.

Three days earlier, on their farm southeast of Ainsworth, Emil and Bessie Buchfuehrer welcomed a baby daughter — she would be named Grace, I believe.

But the really surprising thing to happen in July 1922 — surprising to me, anyway — was that Henry Nolte came in to the office of the Gazette to show off his alfalfa.


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Hobart Gazette 21 July 1922.

That page is loaded with news, including visitors at the Paine farm, an expansion of the Wood garage in Deep River, and a thief in the night at the Hayward farm.


Additional Sources:
♦ 1930 Census.
♦ "Births." Hobart Gazette 21 July 1922.

A Dance and a Daughter

The Niksches were planning yet another dance for July 12, 1922, in the old Deep River schoolhouse; and the day after Independence Day, Mayme Harney gave birth to a baby daughter … unnamed at the time, apparently, but she would soon be Gladys.


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Hobart Gazette 7 July 1922.

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From the same issue of the Gazette, some random news — Calvin and Howard Shearer had a contract for sewer work; Old Settlers Cemetery on S.R. 51 was in sorry shape; someone had run a car down the "steep embankment" near the George Lutz farm (which steep embankment you can still run a car down, if you are so inclined); and on the Peterson farm, a big family reunion … but no list of surnames that might help a genealogist.


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Radiophone

By the spring of 1922, gramophones were common. The next thing in entertainment was the "radiophone."


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Hobart News 27 Apr. 1922.

KYW was the first radio station in the Chicago area.

The real-estate transaction described below that ad was reported in greater detail by the next day's Gazette.


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"Local Drifts," Hobart Gazette 28 Apr. 1922.

"Near the Collver place," was it? Well, the only thing I can identify out of all this is the Collver place as it appeared in 1908:


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From the 1908 Plat Map.

I find a Fred Trapp in Gary in the 1920 Census and the 1930 Census. In neither does he describe himself as a carpenter, but I can't find anyone else by that name.


Anyway, just above that item we see that Calvin C. Shearer had started work on present-day S.R. 51, which had aroused so much interest because of its bad condition.

Over in the "Births" column, a second child for John and Lillian Call, and two Halfman babies — news that only reminds me how little I've kept track of the Halfmans of Ross Township. John and Joe were brothers, I believe: sons of Frank Halfman, and thus brothers also of young Carl Halfman, who had died in an Army camp in 1918. Their grandfather was Henry Halfman, who had arrived in Lake County by April 1860 (when his marriage was recorded), but he did not appear in the census that year. He did, however, show up in the 1870 and subsequent censuses. The 1874 Plat Map shows him owning 80 acres at the northeast corner of Broadway and 61st Ave (the parking lot of Ultra Foods, in other words). Henry and his wife, Mary, had three children: Frank, Clara, and William. We shall have news of William soon.

Joseph Halfman was born circa 1889 and married Marian Adler circa 1912-3. The child born in 1922 was either their third or fourth. As for Joe's younger brother, John, born circa 1893, he had married Clara Adler (Marian's sister) in 1915, and the child born in 1922 was their third, a son named Leo. I can't find the Joseph Halfman family in the 1920 census. The John Halfman family was running a dairy farm on rented land near his Uncle William's farm — possibly his grandfather's old place.


Additional Sources:
♦ 1860 Census.
♦ 1870 Census.
♦ 1880 Census.
♦ 1900 Census.
♦ 1910 Census.
♦ 1920 Census.
♦ 1930 Census.
♦ Indiana Marriage Collection.
♦ "Mrs. Halfman Dies at Lowell," Hammond Times 4 Apr. 1940. Newspaperarchive.com.

A Little Busselburg

The "Births" column of the Hobart News of Feb. 16, 1922, included this item: "Born — To Mr. and Mrs. George Bisselberg of Ainsworth, Feb. 12, a daughter." That would be George and Alma (Sitzenstock) Busselburg (that's how I spell it), and I suppose the daughter would be their eldest, Dorothy, who shows up in the 1930 Census at the age of nine.

The "Local and Personal" columns in the same issue enticed the public to the W.G. Haan School:

A box social will be given at the Ainsworth school, Friday evening, Feb. 24th. A sateen comforter will be given away. Tickets 10¢. Ice cream and cake. Ladies with boxes or cakes admitted free.

Shults-Kasch

When last we met Alfred Shults, on a summer's night in 1921, he was being held up by highwaymen.

Now it's noon on Saturday, January 21, 1922, and if we go to the German Lutheran parsonage in Hobart, we shall meet Alfred under much happier circumstances, as he stands before the Rev. E.R. Schuelke to exchange wedding vows with Miss Vera Kasch. The groom is 20 years old, the bride only 17.

Just a month earlier, Vera's older brother, Helmuth Jr., had married into the Baessler family. Now her second brother, Edward, witnesses her marriage, along with "Miss Leola Wilson of Blachly's Corners," about whom I know nothing except that she was the same age as the bride.

The young couple planned to live at Alfred's parents' home, and he would "assist his father in farming the Shults farm, near and southeast of Ainsworth." Their residence in 1930 was on the north side of the (old) Lincoln Highway, so the Shults farm may be the former Kruse farm.

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Elsewhere in the same issue of the Gazette, some random items … including the happy news that after nearly seven years of marriage, George and Pearl Yager have a baby. Also, some miscreant stole the pump from the Cleveland Ave. campground, and the Roper Bros. hold a tractor-bobsled party.


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Sources:
♦ 1920 Census.
♦ 1930 Census.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 3 Feb. 1922.
♦ "Quietly Married." Hobart Gazette 3 Feb. 1922.

Birth and Death

Nellie Peck had married Nicholas Ehrhardt, Jr. in November 1920; early in the morning of January 16, 1922, she gave birth to their first child, a daughter — but the little girl died at birth.

Nellie survived her daughter by only a few hours.


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Hobart Gazette 20 Jan. 1922.

I suppose the child was buried with or near her mother, but so far as I can tell neither Nellie's grave marker nor any other in the Mosier Cemetery acknowledges her child's existence, any more than the obituaries do. I would not have known about her but for the "Births" column in the News.


Additional Sources:
♦ "Births." Hobart News 19 Jan. 1922.
♦ "Funeral of Mrs. Nellie Peck-Ehrhardt Held on Wednesday Morning." Hobart News 19 Jan. 1922.

Birthdays

Down near Ainsworth, Claude and Mary Ann Bullock welcomed their first daughter (and only) daughter, after two sons; while up in Hobart, Henry and Anna Harms welcomed a crowd into their home to celebrate his 69th birthday.


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Hobart News 22 Dec. 1921.

We also learn another name to add to the Chester family tree: Luella (Chester) Olson's daughter Juanita had married Benjamin Reiman in 1917. By 1920 they had one son, Charles.

(I like that story about the "smooth game" in South Bend, although it has nothing to do with anyone around here.)

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The next day's Gazette mentioned that "E.L. Arment of Greencastle, Ind., was in Hobart Wednesday looking after his property interests south of Hobart" — which might mean he came here to see how his bungalow was progressing. Or not.

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[2/23/2015 update] Concerning the ninth item down in the left-hand column of the Hobart News page above, about Louise Sapper Schavey Dewell, the DeWell family archivist writes:

It was confirmation of a story I always heard from my dad.

He was born 11-28-1921, so was not even a month old when his mom went to Chicago for what I think was a kidney stone problem (can't be sure). My infant father had to go with his mom so she could breastfeed him. He was kept in a separate room, but she claimed she could hear him crying and would have crawled to him if necessary to comfort him. (Sounds rather dramatic!)

When they returned home, they reportedly stripped down, bathed, and boiled their clothing before entering the house to prevent a lice infestation.

Makes you wonder about hospital quality back then!

Additional Sources:
♦ 1920 Census.
♦ "Births." Hobart Gazette 23 Dec. 1921.
♦ Indiana Marriage Collection.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 23 Dec. 1921.

Edward and Tillie (Harms) Niksch

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Image courtesy of Eldon Harms.

It was Thanksgiving Day 1964, and someone took this photo of Mathilda "Tillie" and Edward Niksch at the celebration of their 60th wedding anniversary.

As I was writing about their purchase of the former Deep River schoolhouse (yesterday's post), I realized that I've scarcely mentioned these folks in the blog, and I had better take some time to make up for that oversight. They were Ainsworthites, after all: Tillie grew up in the Harms farmhouse east of Ainsworth, and she and Edward moved onto the Lincoln Highway/Randolph St. farm in the spring of 1912.

Tillie was born November 12, 1884, so she had just turned 20 when she married Edward Niksch.


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Numerous unnamed Ainsworth-area residents also attended the wedding. (The "bride's home on south Main street" probably refers to Harms house at the southwest corner of Lincoln and 7th.)

Minnie Rossow Harms' family history gives us a brief summary of the next 16 years:

After Mathilda (Tilly) and Ed were married in 1904, they moved into his home on Devonshire street* in Hobart (Leona and son still** live there). Tilly had attended Valparaiso University and worked as a compositor for the Hobart Gazette. Leona was born December 28, 1907 and Laverne April 9, 1909. They had a great desire to go farming and soon Grandfather Harms purchased his Lincoln Highway farm where they raised their family. Donald was born July 3, 1916 and Edward Jr. July 28, 1920.

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I've talked a lot about the Harms family in this blog, but what about Edward Niksch and his people?

Edward was born May 13, 1882, in Hobart, one of ten children of Louis and Minnie (Niemann) Niksch, who by 1891 owned and farmed this land northeast of town:


Image from the 1908 Plat Map.


His mother died in June 1909.



(Yes, it was Edward's sister, Rosa, who had conquered the heart of the redoubtable Michael O'Hearn.)


Louis Niksch followed his wife to the grave in January 1912.



(While the 1900 enumerator recorded Louis' immigration year as 1860, the 1910 enumerator agreed with the obituary on 1854.)


Edward Niksch is described in the 1900 census as a farm hand, living and possibly working on his parents' own farm. Sometime between then and his marriage in 1904, he went to work in the brickyard, and bought that house in town. He remained a brickie through 1910 — probably until 1912, when he and Tillie moved onto the farm. After that, he stuck with farming, even through the Great Depression, as the 1940 census records him still farming on the Lincoln Highway land.

My notes record only pleasant events for the Niksches until 1917, when Edward became ill. Early in November he was in Chicago getting medical treatment for "serious affection of the eyes." The November 15 News included these unpleasant details:

Edward Niksch, who has been suffering with his eyes, underwent an operation at Dr. Dahlman's hospital in Chicago last Saturday for affected glands and another operation on Monday for pus forming on his face and for his jaws being set. Late reports were that he was some better.

In early December the Gazette reported that, after a couple weeks' treatment and much suffering, he was back home:

Edward Niksch who was operated upon Nov. 9th at the South Shore hospital by Drs. Werelius and Dahlberg for necrosis of the upper jaw bone and joint was able to return home the forepart of last week and indications are that he will meet with a full recovery. His head was so bandaged when he came home he was scarcely recognizable, except by voice. He has been returning every third day to the city for dressing of the wound. He says the pain he suffered before the operation was almost unbearable.

Either he recovered in good time or I was negligent in taking notes, as I have no further information on that illness.

So Edward and Tillie quietly got on with life in the neighborhood of Ainsworth, farming and raising their family. In May 1921, their eldest child, Leona, took part in the first commencement at the new W.G. Haan school.

Late that autumn, the Niksches bought the old Deep River schoolhouse, which started this digression.


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*1019 Devonshire, per Polk's Hobart City Directory 1962.
**I believe Minnie wrote this in 1952.


Sources:
♦ 1880 Census.
♦ 1891 Plat Book.
♦ 1900 Census.
♦ 1910 Census.
♦ 1920 Census.
♦ 1930 Census.
♦ 1940 Census.
♦ "Ainsworth Pick-Ups." Hobart Gazette 2 Dec. 1904.
♦ Harms, Minnie Rossow. As It Was Told to Me. 1952 – 1978. MS. Hobart Historical Society, Hobart, Indiana.
♦ "Local and Personal." Hobart News 8 Nov. 1917; 15 Nov. 1917.
♦ "Local Drifts." Hobart Gazette 16 Mar. 1912; 16 Nov. 1917; 7 Dec. 1917.
♦ "Niksch-Harms Nuptial." Hobart Gazette 2 Dec. 1904.
♦ "Obituary." Hobart Gazette 25 June 1909.
♦ "Two Pioneers Pass Away." Hobart News 11 Jan. 1912.
♦ WWII Army Enlistment Records.

A Little Mackey

A year and a half after the loss of their daughter, Dr. Dwight and Ruth Mackey welcomed a son into the world: David Marvin Mackey was born September 5, 1921, at Mercy Hospital in Gary.

The next evening, Dr. Dwight celebrated with his buddies at the American Legion:


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Hobart Gazette 9 Sept. 1921.

Ruth and the baby came home from the hospital about two weeks later.


Additional Sources:
♦ "Births." Hobart Gazette 9 Sept. 1921.
♦ "Births." Hobart News 8 Sept. 1921.
♦ "Local and Personal." Hobart News 22 Sept. 1921.

Road Trip News! Also, Baby News

Dr. Clara Faulkner, Mary Kipp, and Mrs. George Hatten returned from their four-week road trip on May 25, 1921, and got a big write-up in the News. (The News seems slightly better informed than the Gazette was about Mrs. Hatten's identity, thus suggesting that I correctly identified her as Ida Hatten, of Hobart.) The well-traveled Dr. Faulkner was impressed with Hobart's new camping ground … or at least she was kind enough to say she was.

Four days earlier, Peter and Hulda Palm had welcomed into the world their first son, after two daughters. That didn't get much of a write-up, of course, because a baby was nothing out of the ordinary. (But at least now I know exactly when Elmer Palm was born.)


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From the Hobart News of 26 May 1921.

A Bairn and a Barn

In April 1921, Owen and Caroline (Sapper) Nelson welcomed their first daughter, after two sons. The 1920 census shows the family farming rented land in southern Hobart Township, which may still be the "Hoffman farm."

And the Gruels put a lot of thought into planning a new barn, which I believe will be their glorious cow barn.


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Sources:
♦ 1920 Census.
♦ "Local and Personal." Hobart News 28 Apr. 1921.

What the Heck?

Now the 1926 Plat Book has me confused again because it shows some land being owned by Christian Heck that he reportedly sold in April 1921:


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From the Hobart News 14 Apr. 1921.

Here it is in 1926:



I don't know why I care, except that (1) Christian, with his parents, Frederick and Doretta, lived in Ross Township (northwest of Ainsworth) in 1870 and 1880; and (2) in 1900, when he farmed his own land south of Tenth Street, he shows up as a neighbor of Augusta Rossow, the second wife (and by then the widow) of Henry Rossow, who was Minnie Rossow Harms's grandfather. Augusta was renting (I believe) the land shown on the above map as belonging to William Lute, but in her time the land had belonged to Jacob Fiester, so it was known as the Fiester farm.

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In other news, John and Goldie Ensign had a new baby, John Jr.




Sources:
♦ 1870 Census.
♦ 1880 Census.
♦ 1900 Census.
♦ 1920 Census.
♦ 1930 Census.
♦ "Births." Hobart News 14 Apr. 1921.
♦ "C.F. Heck Sells His 187-Acre Farm to Louis Kelle of Gary." Hobart News 14 Apr. 1921.

Hoodoo? We Do!

In spite of bad roads, the East Ross Community Association continued holding entertainments at the W.G. Haan school during the winter of 1921. (Also, the "Births" column brings news of some acquaintances, and I do not know where the Buchfuehrer baby was buried.)


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I can't identify this "Mrs. O'Leary" who is promising to direct the upcoming play; the 1930 census shows a 64-year-old Margaret O'Leary living on the Sunderman farm in Ross Township, but she is listed as single. As for the play itself, though I can't find its text, other selections from its its author's body of work give you some notion of its tone.

The February 4 meeting felt the effect of the weather on the unpaved roads.



I don't know exactly what that reference to "Dinah and Sambo" means, but I fear the worst, and it may have involved blackface.

(Some sad news in this week's "Births" column about the former Carrie Zobjeck.)


Sources:
♦ 1930 Census.
♦ "Ainsworth Community Meeting." Hobart Gazette 11 Feb. 1921.
♦ "Ainsworth Community Meeting." Hobart News 10 Feb. 1921.
♦ "Births." Hobart News 3 Feb. 1921; 10 Feb. 1921.
♦ "Community Meeting at Ainsworth, Friday Evening, Feb. 4." Hobart News 3 Feb. 1921.
♦ "Local and Personal." Hobart News 3 Feb. 1921.
♦ "Play at Ainsworth, Feb. 18." Hobart Gazette 4 Feb. 1921.

A New Lee Baby

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From the Hobart News of August 22, 1918.


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From the Hobart Gazette of August 23, 1918.