Grace Wood Mundt

Since my previous post mentioned Grace Mundt, daughter of John Warren Wood and Margaret Hollett, I'm posting the only portrait of her contained in the Wood/Vincent photo album.


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Grace was born in 1884. In this photo she looks about 14 years old, so we can estimate that it dates to 1898 or thereabouts. The style of her dress (what little I can see of it) seems consistent with that. Unfortunately, there is no photographer's name on the photo.

She is identified by a handwritten caption.



On June 8, 1906, Grace married Dr. Gustoff Henry Mundt in Chicago. His obituary, from 1962, gives you some idea of what sort of people they both were.


Suburbanite-Economist (Evergreen Park, Ill.), April 4, 1962.

Grace's entry at findagrave.com includes a photo of Grace and Henry and two children.

Little Carrie Bullock

Since my last post mentioned Carolyn Bullock Winters, this seems a good time to show you the photo of her as a little girl that is preserved in the Wood-Vincent photo album.


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The identifying caption:



The photographer was W.H. Hayward:



Carrie was born in December 1880. In this photo she looks perhaps one year old.

About six years ago I posted some photos of Carrie and a little information about her (unfortunately short) life.

The Rev. William C. Litchfield

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This photograph comes from the Wood-Vincent album. Fortunately, the album's owner included a caption telling us who he was:



The back of the photo shows that it was taken in Rockland, Massachusetts:



One source I found online says that E[dwin] A. Bass operated in Rockland, Massachusetts, during 1878 and '79.[1] Those dates are consistent, I think, with William's apparent age here — he was born in 1840, so would be about 38 or 39.

He shows up several times in the Union Sunday School record books that I have indexed so far: once, in January 1877, as a student in the school, which would mean he was in Hobart; other times, later that same year, as donating books to, or purchasing books for, the Sunday School, which could have been done from far away. Loose in the back of one of the record books is this letter William wrote from Massachusetts to Joseph Blackhall of Hobart on June 16, 1877, in which William promises to carry out some favor for the Sunday School, and disclaims the title of "Reverend" since he has not been formally ordained:


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.

My transcription of the body:

Your note of the 9th inst. was duly received. In reply I would say that I will gladly comply with the request of the Sunday School the first time I visit the city or have opportunity to do so by the help of a friend who will understand what you want.
I am very busy with town business this month but will attend to the matter of the book soon as possible.
I reached home in safety Tuesday P.M. about 1/2 past 4. I found my family & friends well. Give my regard to the Hobart people, & accept my thanks for personal kindness.
I see you honor me with a "Rev." While I have letters[?] frequently marked thus, I make no claim to the title, as I have never been ordained after the form of men, therefore am not entitled to the prefix & do not want[?] it used for me at present.

Here are William and his family at home in Plymouth County, Massachusetts in the 1880 Census:


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Image from Ancestry.com.

The 1900 Census and 1910 Census also record him in Plymouth County. William died in 1911.

I note from the findagrave.com entry that his middle name was Cummings. In the 19th century, people sometimes christened a child with a surname to honor some family connection. I also notice that the Wood-Vincent album includes a Lottie Barker Cummings of Attleboro, Massachusetts, who was a granddaughter of Hannah (Pattee) Wood's sister Lois. I wonder if there was some connection between the families (Wood and Cummings) that might explain why William Cummings Litchfield of Massachusetts happened to journey out to Hobart, Indiana, of all places?


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[1] https://www.stereoworld.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/03/US-PHOTOGRAPHERS.pdf. From another source: "Bass, E. A., photographer, Rockland, MA (1870s-1880s) cdv image," Langdon's List of 19th and Early 20th Century Photographers, https://www.langdonroad.com/ban-to-baz.

Cousin Emily Identified

With the help of clues in the Wood-Vincent photo album, I have been able to identify the Cousin Emily who, in 1870, wrote the letter to Mary Wood that I posted some years ago.

On one page of the album, I came across two captions: "Cousin Mary Ann Low" and "Cousin Emily Lowe." Both of those given names (Emily and Mary Ann) appeared in the letter. With the surname Low(e), it was easy enough to track down their household in Andover, Essex County, Massachusetts.

Emily's letter describes the death of her sister, Hattie, on May 11, 1870. The 1870 Census, taken in June, shows the diminished household:


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A page from the paperwork dealing with Harriet's estate gives a fuller picture of the surviving family:


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Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Wills and Probate Records, 1635-1991 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2015.

Two years later, Emily's mother Sally Low died. The record of her death states that her parents were Moses and Salley (i.e., Sarah) Wood,[1] meaning that she was a sibling of John Wood. That accounts for the cousin relationship between Emily Low and our Mary Wood Vincent.

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The photo album includes the caption, "Emily Lowe," but the photo it was written for had disappeared by the time the album reached me.


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Mary Ann's photo remained.



The photo is undated, and I can't see enough to her dress to help me estimate a date; judging by her apparent age, I'd place this photo at circa 1885 or later.

Here's a puzzler:



There is obviously no Charles in that photo!

I'm guessing that this lady is Mary Low, the wife of cousin Daniel Low (cousin Emily's brother, mentioned in the probate paper above). She and Daniel did have a son named Charles. The family lived in LaPorte County. Unfortunately, the photo is a tin plate with no photographer's name on it. (According to information posted with Daniel's entry on findagrave.com, he was an interesting guy.) Mary's dress has the dropped shoulders and full skirt of the Civil-War era. Mary was about 55 years old when the Civil War broke out.

Two more missing photos:



I suppose this would be Joseph and Sally (Wood) Low; I'm just wondering why Alice Vincent Nesbit would describe them this way instead of calling them "Great-Aunt Sally" and "Great-Uncle Joseph."


This concludes our little side trip to visit the Low family.


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[1] New England Historic Genealogical Society; Boston, Massachusetts; Massachusetts Vital Records, 1840–1911, via Ancestry.com.

The Matriarch of the Woods

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This is the first photograph in the album that I mentioned in my previous post. She was born Hannah E. Pattee on October 13, 1802, in New Hampshire. At the age of 22, she married John Wood of Massachusetts.[1] Her children were: Nathan (b. 1825), Augustus (1828), Abbie (1830), John Warren (b. 1832-d. 1836), George (1835), John W. (1838), Mary (1840), and Oliver (1842). All but the last three were born in Massachusetts. John Wood came to Lake County, Indiana, in 1835, and the following year brought his family to join him.[2]

Hannah died on September 27, 1873, and was buried in the Woodvale Cemetery.

A fine granite monument, about fifteen feet in height, marks the burial place, on which is inscribed, "A true, faithful, loving wife; a kind and affectionate mother; ever toiling for the good of all; and this is her memorial." Mrs. Wood was another of those superior New England women … with native endowments and a Puritanic training, which fit their possessors so well for frontier life and for laying the right foundations for an enduring civilization. The comfort and hospitality of her home were not excelled by any in those early years. She was one of our unselfish women, and well does her memorial say, "toiling for the good of all."[3]

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On the back of the original photo of Hannah is the name of a Valparaiso photographer:



Steve Shook's blog, Porter County's Past: An Amateur Historian's Perspective, lists Lewis H. Mandeville among the known Porter County photographers and states that he arrived in Valparaiso in 1855. Hannah's elegant dress is of a style dating to the Civil War era, and that era is consistent with her apparent age; let's say the original photo dates to roughly 1865.

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The album does not include a portrait of John Wood. Fortunately, Porter and Lake Counties (Goodspeed-Blanchard) does:



From the same source and printed in 1882, a biographical sketch:

JOHN WOOD was born in Massachusetts October 28, 1800, and is a son of Moses and Sarah (Baker) Wood; the former was born May 25, 1748, and the latter July 14, 1756. John Wood's father died when he was quite young, and his mother placed him with a friend of the family, where he remained five years, after which he learned the trade of a tanner, in which vocation he began business for himself. On November 16, 1824, he married Hannah E. Pattee, to which union there were born eight children …. In 1835, Mr. Wood came to this township, settled on a quarter section of land, built a log house and went for his family. On his return, an Indian had claimed his land, and he was compelled to pay $1,000 for it. He built the first sawmill in the county, and in 1840 a grist-mill near by, at the same time farming and raising stock. He remained in the milling business until 1860, when he sold to his sons, Nathan and George; the saw-mill has gone to pieces, but the grist-mill was rebuilt, and is being run by Nathan Wood. Moses Wood was a soldier of the Revolution, and fought at Bunker Hill. John Wood, who is a Freemason, was present at the corner-stone laying of Bunker Hill Monument. He has been instrumental in establishing several Masonic Lodges — one at Valparaiso, one at Crown Point, and was the first to aid one at Wheeler. He is a Master Mason in good standing, and a greatly respected citizen. His wife died September 27, 1873, aged seventy years eleven months and fourteen days. His grand-daughter, Miss Abbie Shedd, is his housekeeper.

John died in 1883 and is buried beside Hannah in Woodvale Cemetery.

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Finally, I just want to say that, based on very little evidence and only superficial research, I've jumped to the conclusion that the album belonged to Alice Vincent Nesbit, the daughter of Mary Wood and Dr. Alonzo W. Vincent. Perhaps someday I will be able to update this post, either to say that after intensive research I'm convinced I'm right, or to say that it's a bad idea to jump to conclusions based on very little evidence.


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[1] Hannah's birth and marriage dates, and the list of her children, come from Lake County 1884, pp. 436-7.
[2] History of Lake County and the Calumet Region, p. 182.
[3] Lake County Encyclopedia, p. 133.