Black Swallowtail Caterpillar

Found, on a branch of wild parsnip along Ainsworth Road, a Black Swallowtail caterpillar.


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Meanwhile, over in the tall grass …


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NOT SAFE FOR WORK

Get a room, you two!

A Casbon Blog

Jon Casbon, who has previously helped me out, has just started his own blog about his research into the Casbon family history, entitled Our Casbon Journey. I'm hoping for some interesting stories about the local Casbons!

Over in the right-hand column I have added a permanent link to the Casbon blog and to Steven Shook's Porter County history blog.

A New Type of Bungalow

I found this story about a steel bungalow interesting, but not interesting enough to reprint the page when I noticed I had cut off the bottom.


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Hobart News 21 Sept. 1922.

I wonder if the factory in question is the old one on South Indiana Street (now the home of Midwest Products, I believe). The oldest building on that parcel was built in 1916, according to the Lake County records … which fits the general description of the roller-bearing factory in the story above.

However, I could not find any home in that area with a building date of 1922 that could be described as "just across the street from" that factory.

And here I shall drop the investigation so someone else can pick it up, because — why should I have all the fun?

Honey

Here we have a young Minnie Rossow Harms, wearing an apron with a "HONEY" label pinned to it.


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Images courtesy of Eldon Harms.

As I've mentioned, the Rossows and Mundells were neighbors, and the most likely explanation I can think of for the "HONEY" apron is that Minnie was working at Joe Mundell's honey-producing operation. However, if she did so, her son Eldon Harms could not recall her ever mentioning it, nor have I heard of it from any other source.

The photo is printed on a postcard with a stamp box style dating between 1904 and 1918.



Though I can't see much of her dress, her skirt nearly touches the ground, which moves the photo back from 1918;* but I don't think Minnie (born 1897) could be less than fourteen here … so I would guess at 1911-15 for the date of this photo.

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*That's assuming she hasn't got herself up in some sort of fancy-dress costume, to which current fashion would be less important.

300-Plus Acres on the Lincoln Highway

Late in the summer of 1922, F.F. and A.M. Pierce left their homes in California to return to the Ainsworth area for the first time in 47 years. They were "two of four brothers left heirs to the Wheeler Pierce farm of 386 acres lying on the old Joliet road, now the Lincoln Highway, that was purchased by the pioneer Pierce nearly 80 years ago."

Looking at the 1874 Plat Map, we can see that Wheeler Pierce once owned a great deal of land at the intersection of the Sauk Trail (now 73rd Ave.) and the section road that is now Colorado Street.


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The week after the Gazette reported on their visit, the News carried this item:

For Sale — On the Lincoln Highway, 383 acres farming land two miles east of Merrillville; also 40 acres of timber. For particulars call on Simeon Bullock, Hobart, Ind.

By 1922 there was no Bullock land on the Lincoln Highway, so Simeon must have been acting for someone else. My guess is the Pierce heirs.


Sources:
♦ "Are Here to Sell Old Farm." Hobart Gazette 8 Sept. 1922.
♦ "Wants — For Sale, Rent, Etc." Hobart News 14 Sept. 1922.

"Other Useful Sites"

I have been asked to put links to my postcard-dating references in a place where they can be easily found, so I have added a new page on the right-hand side of this blog, labeled "Other Useful Sites" and containing not only the postcard reference sites but other sites I find myself referring to often.

To the "Land Ownership" page, I have added a general link to an excellent collection of Porter County maps.

Hobart Schoolchildren, Grades 2-3

None of the children in this photograph are identified:


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Images courtesy of Eldon Harms.

Since it comes from the Lester Harms collection, I'm more or less expecting to see Lester Harms among them. I can't say that I recognize him. But someone has penciled in an arrow pointing to the boy on the far right in the middle row:



Could that be Lester? Possibly.

In the second or third grade, Lester would have been around seven or eight years old — circa 1911-12. I can't see anything in the photo inconsistent with that date. It is printed on a postcard, unused, but with a stamp box of a style that Playle's dates between 1904 and 1918.



So, again — possibly, but not definitely.