Many Happy Days

H.S. Hazelgreen was in out Cincinnati in October of 1902 — supervising railroad construction work, I suppose. He wrote a letter to his little daughter Elna, at home in Lake Station, that probably reached her in time for her eighth birthday on October 24.


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Cincinnati Sta L Ohio Oct 22th 1902

The Lord Bless you

My Darling little Elna —

I here with congratulet you on your 8st Birthday and wish you many happe days and a good helt. You know when wi have a good helt wi injoi the life. I am glad that I can tell you I and the boys your loving brothers are all in a good helt. Be kinde to tell sweet Mamma that I am ever so much tank full for her sweet Letter, it cheer me up so mutch. I must stop now for I am bissy but my best love to you, Mamma, Esther, Clara. Kiss them all for me. Your Loving Father H.S. Hazelgreen

(I added a little punctuation for clarity.)

Grief and Glory

One hundred years ago today, the joyous news of the Armistice reached our shores. The Great War was over. Celebrations broke out all over the country.

In Lake Station, one family's joy was tempered by a recent loss: Christina Blank Hazelgreen had died on October 31, 1918, and was laid to rest on November 3.

Christina's daughter, Elna (now about 24 years old), received from a friend in Chicago this letter dated November 12 that expressed a range of emotions from private grief to public joy to horror at the flu epidemic that was still going on.


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The letter reads:

Dear Elna:

Received your letter Sat. telling the sad sad news of your bereavement, in the death of your dear mother.

You have our sincerest sympathy and our hearts truly ache for you, and with you, for we feel that we, too, are bereft of a sincere friend, one whose true womanly influence was always felt in the desire she gave one, to do better and be better. How glad you are now of the years of devoted services rendered.

If we had only known of your sorrow, we would have been with you and yours in those last sad rites.

In trying to lighten the burden of others, we find our own load grows less heavy, and you will find it so in this "7 in 1" drive.[1] Wish you the greatest success.

Will come to see you at the first opportunity. You know we left E[ast] Gary sooner than we expected, and I intended, as much as could be, returning on the following day, to say "Good Bye" to all old friends, and neighbors, but on reaching the city that night, found Jay had made plans to go to Detroit instead. On our return, was a victim of the "flu" and for four weeks, was in the house every minute. Am feeling fine now and glad to be alive. So far, we have made no plans for the Winter, but will probably remain with Hazel. And I want you, Clara and Malcolm to be sure and come to see us. Take a Hammond car to Grand Crossing, then transfer to a 75th street car, last get off at Jeffery, walk to Chappel and we live the sixth door from the corner in a little brick bungalow.

Isn't it glorious the war is over? This was some mad town the 11th. I understand there wasn't much of a celebration in Gary. Well, dear will be glad to see you or hear from you at any time, it seems odd not to have one of our "weekly midnight conflabs" [sic].

Was sorry that Esther Olson had been so ill. Oh that epidemic was something terrible – in many cases it was impossible to bury the dead on account of no caskets being available.

Hazel is waiting for me to make button holes, so will close.

With love and best wishes.

Yours Sincerely,

Belle Lewis.

Belle Lewis appears in the 1910 Census as a resident of East Gary (Lake Station). She and her husband, Jay, had come there sometime after the 1900 Census (which recorded them living in Michigan). Hazel was their only daughter, born circa 1890.

Clara and Malcolm were Elna's siblings.

Esther Olson was some relation to Elna — either the wife or daughter of Elna's cousin on her mother's side, Floyd Olson (also an East Gary resident).

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[1] I don't know exactly what she is referring to, but it may have involved the Fourth Liberty Loan Drive.

Missionary to Puerto Rico

While looking for something else, I came across this little item in the Hobart Gazette's "Local Drifts" of July 29, 1904: "Miss Clara Hazelgreen, of Lake Station, has decided to devote her future to missionary work and about September will leave for Porto Rico" (as Puerto Rico was often called in the early 20th century). The September 16, 1904 Gazette mentioned that Clara had departed earlier in that week.

This information reminded me of a photo in my Hazelgreen/Papka collection, on the back of which someone wrote: "Clara Hazelgreen in Porto Rico."


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And I had assumed she was on vacation there! — I'm so frivolous.

The time she spent in Puerto Rico would have been short of six years, since (as we already know) by 1910 she was in Seattle.

"Dear Honey Lobey Dubby Sister"

Albin Hazelgreen, lasted glimpsed as a toddler, was a young man of 19 when he wrote this affectionate letter to his little sister, Elna, in 1902:


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He may have been away on a railroad-grading job with his father; the letter seems to come from a station in Cincinnati, Ohio, where H.S. Hazelgreen apparently spent considerable time around August of 1902.[1] Dated October 22, the letter reads as follows:

Dear Honey Lobey Dubby Sister Elna,

Tomorrow you will be eight years old so you must be a good girl now and help mamma and when I come home maybe I will give you a hug and a kiss.

Have you got your bicycle yet?

Here is some ribbon for you to play with.

Can you read this or must you get Esther [their sister] to.

Well Elna I guess I must kiss you good bye as it is time to go to work so be sure and answer this letter and not do as you did last.

By Bye

From Albin.

Between Albin's asking her not to let this letter go unanswered like the last one, and her father's chiding her for her illegible handwriting, I gather that the young Elna was not the best correspondent.

__________________________
[1] "Lake Pick-Ups," Hobart Gazette 29 Aug. 1902.

Elna at Twenty-One

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Handwritten notes on the originals identify this young woman as Elna Hazelgreen at the age of 21. Since Elna was born in 1894, the photographs must have been taken in 1915. The photographer's imprint shows they were taken at the Koch Studio in LaPorte, Indiana (operated, I suppose, by Henry E. Koch).



I know that Elna's sister, Esther Hazelgreen Babcock Anderson, was living in LaPorte at the time of the 1920 Census. Perhaps she had already moved there by 1915, and Elna came for a visit, and during the visit had these photos taken.

10,000 Kisses

Haken S. Hazelgreen's work — railway and road construction — sometimes took him out of town for weeks at a time. It was probably from a work site in Danville (Illinois?) that he wrote this letter to his young daughter, Elna, in 1904, sending 10,000 kisses and begging her to improve her handwriting.


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Danville June 28th 1904

My dear lowing Elna

How should I thank you for your kind and nice letter of the 24th inst. I am well and is glad to here that you is in the same circumstances but I am werry werry sorry I do not be able to meet your wishes and request to meet you sone but I am thinking so much more abouth you now dear lithel toddelix hwen you next writh chanse your hand a lithel wi have lithel hard to read it your lowing letter. Good by darling Lord be with you. Your afectionat pappa

10,000 kisses

H.S. Hazelgreen.

Haken was born in Sweden and came to this country at about thirty years of age, so it's no wonder if he struggled a bit with English. He was able to win contracts for significant projects and supervise American crews, but English in a nine-year-old's bad handwriting was almost too much for him.

On the outside of the folded letter, he noted that it was intended for Elna J.J. Hazelgreen, personally.

Lake Station Schoolchildren, Autumn 1901

From the Elna Hazelgreen collection comes this photograph of Lake Station schoolchildren and staff in the autumn of 1901:


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The good news is that somebody wrote out all the names on the back.



The bad news is that the writer did not explain how the order of names related to the order of children. They seem to match up in terms of gender and apparent age if you start at the left side in the back row, go left-to-right in that row and the middle one, and then go right-to-left in the front row:



That would mean Elna Hazelgreen is at the far left of the front row.

Here's the information I found (if any) from the 1900 Census and 1910 Census about these people:

1901 Lake Station Students by AinsworthIN on Scribd

We've met Olga Foreman before. And Edna Seydel's dad once carried Claus Ziegler around the streets of Lake Station and Hobart in a wheelbarrow.

Blogger won't let me index all these names in one post, so here's something the search engines can read: Conroy, Erlandson, Fabian, Foreman, Fritche, Hazelgreen, Horn, Johnson, Killian, Lenburg, Marquardt, Matson, Miller, Nelson, Papka, Reich, Roper, Seydel, Thorne, Whent.

Papa, Mama, Malcolm, Elna

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Notes on the back of the original photo identify these only as "Papa, Mama, Malcolm, Elna." Since the photo was in the Elna Hazelgreen group, and the Hazelgreen family included a Malcolm, I think we can reasonably conclude that this is a partial family portrait.

"Papa" would be Haken (aka Henry or H.S.) Hazelgreen, and "Mama" Christina (Blank) Hazelgreen.

No date is given, but since Haken died in June 1913, the photo must have been taken before then — not long before then, I would say, based on Elna's fashions and apparent age; at any rate, not before about 1911.

The location is not identified, either. I wish I knew if that was the Hazelgreen house in the background.

Jacob William Hazelgreen

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He was born April 15, 1881 (WWI Draft Cards) to Haken and Christine Hazelgreen of Lake Station.

By the 1910 Census, he had moved to Washington State, and there he stayed, I gather, and there lie his earthly remains.

The photographer was A.O. Merrill of Hobart, Indiana, who, as we know, was in business from the autumn of 1899 to the autumn of 1902. The fact that William (he seemed to prefer his middle name) was around to be photographed in that era suggests he should have been counted in the local 1900 Census, but I cannot find him. The Lake Station/East Gary enumerator of 1900 seems to have been a bit overwhelmed by his task and has left us with some confusing records.

Before Elna Arrived

Here is a nice portrait of the Haken and Christine (Blank) Hazelgreen family:


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The only one missing is Elna, and that's because she hadn't arrived yet, as the identifying notes on the back explain:



Jeanette is a bit of a mystery: her birth predates H.S. Hazelgreen's marriage to Christine Blank (1874 per the Cook County, Illinois, Marriages Index). Perhaps Christine was his second wife, but I don't know his first wife's name or what became of her. Jeannette's married name was Ahlberg.

Esther, in the little rocking chair, was born circa 1886, so judging by her apparent age we can date this photo roughly to 1888 or '89. By that time the family had come to Lake County.

Born around 1883, Albin (on the far left) was still in skirts — not unusual for a boy of five or six at that time.

The painted backdrop suggests a photographer's studio, but nothing on the original identifies the photographer.

"We Have Come to Stay"

Two smiling young women, a bicycle, and a snowy landscape.


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Handwritten notes on the back identify them:



The photo has no date, but based on their leg-of-mutton sleeves and apparent ages (Clara was born circa 1877, Lena circa 1879), I would put it close to the turn of the 20th century.

I'm not sure which is Lena and which is Clara. Comparing them both to the person identified as Lena Triebess in the Old Maids' Basketball Team, I think Lena is on the left. Also, here's a photo of Lena in 1916:


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

Lena and Clara worked together as schoolteachers at the Miller school during the school year beginning September 3, 1900. Lena continued teaching there for at least two more school years; Clara did not. The school's principal was a G.F. Peterson — this may have been the George F. Peterson who in June 1907 became Lena's husband.

Their marriage is the first time I can find either Lena or George in the official records. I naturally wondered whether Lena was related to Ainsworth's own Julius Triebess. In January 1900, "Julius and Tillie Triebess made a short visit with their sister Lena" in Miller — I just haven't been able to find anything to show me if that was our Julius. (In 1910, we find a 29-year-old Tillie Triebess living in Miller, teaching school, but that doesn't prove anything. There was also a Triebess family in Hobart — one of whom married Fred Thompson — but based on the matriarch's obituary, I don't think she could have had any closer relation than aunt to Lena or Julius, if related at all.)

Here's the Gazette's story of Lena and George's wedding:

One of the prettiest weddings occurring in Hobart took place at the home of Mr. and Mrs. W.B. Owen last Monday evening, June 24, 1907, when Miss Lena A. Triebess of this place and George F. Peterson, of Miller, were united in marriage. The ceremony was performed at 8:30 o'clock in the presence of about forty relatives and friends by the Rev. Bruce Brown, Ph.D., pastor of the Christian church at Valparaiso. The Methodist Episcopal service was used.

The bridge was attired in white and presented a most handsome appearance. She carried a shower bouquet of pink sweet peas. Mr. and Mrs. Owen's little daughter Jessie was flower girl and gracefully performed her part. The Owen home was extensively decorated, suitable for the occasion.

After congratulations, a fine wedding dinner was served, following which the bride and groom departed to their new home, which, for the present, will be a cottage on the beach at Lake Michigan north of Miller. Their future residence will be either at Miller or at Gary, where at present the groom is engaged in his chosen profession, that of electrical engineer.

The groom was raised at Miller, educated at our public schools and two years ago he graduated from the department of electrical engineering at the Purdue University. The past year and a half he was engaged in teaching manual training in the public schools at St. Paul, Minn., while the bride has claimed Hobart as her home, having lived for a number of years at the Owen residence. After attending our public schools, she began teaching eight years ago, having taught five years in Miller and the past three years in the Hobart schools, having been very successful in her school work. Both young people are very popular among their friends and acquaintances and are highly respected in our community. We join their numerous friends in extending well-wishes and happiness.

Those present from out of town were: From Miller — Mrs. Hannah Peterson, the groom's mother, and his sister Clara, Mrs. Aug. Olson and two daughters and Prof. Frank Fitzpatrick; from Lake [Station] — Mrs. V.P. Babcock [née Esther Hazelgreen] and Misses Clara and Eleanor Hazelgreen; from Chicago — the bride's brother Julius and family and sisters Amanda and Annie; from Valpo — the bride's sister Tillie, Mr. and Mrs. Albert Kitchen, Mr. and Mrs. Rodney Kitchen and Mr. and Mrs. Frank Foster; from Cincinnati — Chas. Langeman, a classmate of the groom while in colleage, and from Kentucky, Dr. and Mrs. J.C. Boone.

That still doesn't tell us if this Julius Triebess was the Ainsworth Julius.

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As for Clara Hazelgreen, by 1910 she had left northwest Indiana and, along with several of her siblings, was living in Seattle, Washington, describing herself as a missionary teacher. It appears she lived out her life in Seattle, and now rests there. (Her findagrave.com entry includes photo of three people identified as Lena, George, and Clara.)

This undated portrait of Clara Hazelgreen was taken in Seattle:





Sources:
♦ 1910 Census.
♦ 1920 Census.
♦ 1930 Census.
♦ 1940 Census.
♦ Indiana Marriage Collection.
♦ "A Pleasant June Wedding." Hobart Gazette 28 June 1907.
♦ "Deaths." "Mrs. Minnie Triebess." Hobart Gazette 14 Feb. 1935.
♦ "Miller Murmurings." Hobart Gazette 12 Jan. 1900.
♦ "School Begins Sept. 3rd." Hobart Gazette 24 Aug. 1900.
♦ "School Teachers For Next Year." Hobart Gazette 26 July 1901.

The Famous Hazelgreen

Here is a portrait of Elna's big brother, Malcolm — more formally known as A.M. (Alexander Malcolm) Hazelgreen.


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This isn't just any portrait; this is the one that got published in A Standard History of Lake County, Indiana, and the Calumet Region (1915), along with this biographical sketch:

For thirty or forty years a large amount of the railway construction work and of other similar types of contracting in this county has been performed through the Hazelgreen family. While the representative above named is one of the aggressive young business men and contractors, with his home in East Gary [Lake Station], it was his father who inaugurated that line of business in this county.

A.M. Hazelgreen was born in Chicago, January 14, 1879, but has lived in Lake County since infancy. His father, H.S. Hazelgreen, born in Sweden, January 20, 1838, and who died June 26, 1913, came to the United States at the age of thirty years, spent one year in New York, went west to Chicago, engaged in contracting, and did a large amount of pioneer railway construction in Northern Indiana. He had charge of the grading for the Baltimore & Ohio through this section, and also for the Wabash company. The mother's maiden name was Christina C. Blank, born in Sweden, June 26, 1849, and coming to the United States in 1863. She lived at Miller, Indiana, and she and her husband were married in 1873. Of their family there are four daughters and three sons still living. Mrs. Jeannette Ahlberg and Clara E. both reside in Seattle, Washington; Mrs. A. Esther Anderson lives at Laporte; and Elna J. lives at home. The other two sons are J. William and H. Albin, both of whom are unmarried and have their home in Seattle, Washington, and H. Albin is one of the leaders in the Luther League on the Northwest coast. The daughter Clara a number of years ago predicted the founding of the town and the development of the industrial center at East Gary, and just about twelve years ago drew a map on which the town was depicted, and since then East Gary has been growing rapidly up to the anticipations of Miss Hazelgreen.

When A.M. Hazelgreen was a year and a half old his parents located at Lake Station, and he lived at home, attending schools at East Gary and the high school at Hobart, until he was sixteen years of age. Since then his career has been almost entirely taken up with railway contracting, and he was with his father until his death. Mr. Hazelgreen is now president of the town board of East Gary, and has been instrumental in effecting many improvements for this community. He has led the way in getting the people to indorse and to vote the necessary bonds to establish a lighting plant. Mr. Hazelgreen was chiefly concerned in having the dedication celebration at the opening of the town hall, at which time a very elaborate program was held. Mr. Hazelgreen is fond of outdoor life, of baseball and fishing, is a republican in politics, and a member of the Swedish Lutheran Church.

The back of the original photo retains notes related to its use in the book, as well as the autograph that appeared below Malcolm's portrait in the book, ink blots and all.

Elna Hazelgreen at Twelve

For much of this blog's existence, I have managed to ignore Lake Station pretty thoroughly. Then last spring the coincidence of my buying a postcard of the Bijou resort and meeting some descendants of its one-time owners, Frank and Mary Kucaba, caused me to start paying a little attention to that area. And then this autumn I bought a collection of photographs and letters of the Hazelgreen family, who arrived in Lake Station circa 1880 and remained active and even prominent (though comparatively publicity-shy) for decades. This collection is too good not to share, and I suppose now I really have to acknowledge the existence of Lake Station.

The collection centers on the youngest daughter in the family, Elna Julia Johanna Hazelgreen. She was born October 24, 1894, in Lake Station, to Henry and Christina (Blank) Hazelgreen, delivered by Dr. Joseph C. Watson.

The earliest photographs we have of Elna are at age twelve (according to handwritten notes on the back), which would date the photos to circa 1906. A. Haase was the photographer.


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That second photo gives us some idea of how girls got those gigantic bows to stand atop their heads: by attaching them to combs. In her hand is a portrait of a woman — who, I wonder? Some random woman, or perhaps one of her older sisters?

You can compare her to the young woman I pointed out in that unidentified group photo and judge for yourself how much of a resemblance there is between them.


Sources:
♦ "Lake Station." Hobart Gazette 26 Oct. 1894.
♦ 1900 Census.