Now, About All Those Other Guys

Mayor Sherman Henderson's instructions to Police Chief Fred Rose in early April 1923 testified that, in spite of all those recent acquittals, plenty of people in Hobart were selling and buying vice in the form of liquor and gambling.


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Hobart News, April 5, 1923.

I had to ask Professor Google what punch boards are. In his letter, His Honor sounds as if he were still mad about losing money on them.[1]

In the left-hand column, we find another type of eradication underway, as local cattle were getting tested for tuberculosis, and many failing.


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[1] I'm kidding.

Henry Halfman

This is Henry Halfman, who farmed on the northeast corner of Broadway and 61st.


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Image courtesy of the Merrillville-Ross Township Historical Society.


The photo is undated. Although I can't find a listing for the photography partnership of Iverson & Boyd, the Chicago Historical Society's index of photographers places Henry Iverson at 2176 Archer Avenue from 1881 to 1885. In that timeframe, Henry Halfman, who was born in 1837, would have been in his late forties, which looks about right.

For a sketch of his life, we turn to his obituary:


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Hobart Gazette, March 24, 1905.

Not Guilty

The big Prohibition trial in Indianapolis in the spring of 1923 ended well for the locals — mostly. Mike Drakulich had pled guilty to one charge and was found guilty on another, but all the other Hobart defendants were acquitted: Fred Rose (marshal), Laurence Traeger (night marshal), George Fleck and William Busse (soft drink proprietors). ("Jury Renders Verdict of Guilty for 55 Conspirators," Hobart News, April 5, 1923.)

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On a totally unrelated note, Charles Sapper appeared at a meeting of the Hobart City Council and "notified the city that the fence around the abandoned cemetery near his place was in bad condition. St[reet] Com[missioner] Tyler was instructed to repair same." ("City Council Proceedings," Hobart News, April 5, 1923.) The cemetery in question was Old Settlers Cemetery. So Charles is telling us that by 1923 it was "abandoned" and neglected. Scanning over the NWIGS listing from its book of Hobart Township cemeteries, I find the most recent date of death for someone in that cemetery to be 1933, but he's an outlier. All the other death dates are before 1871.

The Vanishing Albees

Jesse B. Albee was Hobart's second postmaster, appointed in 1854 to succeed George Earle.[1] A few years later he was elected Hobart Township Trustee; this page from the trustees' ledger records the beginning of his term in April 1859:


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.


In the same book we find Jesse serving as a "school director," and "buylden" a new schoolhouse for the township. Elsewhere the book notes his services as a justice of the peace in 1873, giving him the customary title, "Squire":


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.


I do not know how long he held the office of J.P. — at least until November 12, 1879, according to the 1874 Secretary of State's annual report.

In a book published in 1884, W.H. Rifenburg mentions Jesse as a member of the committee charged with overseeing the construction of the Unitarian church building.

All of this shows that Jesse B. Albee was a prominent figure in Hobart's early history.

And yet, as I noted in the post about his son's death, if he and any family members have their final resting place locally, exactly where is a mystery to me.

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The census records all agree that Jesse was born in Vermont circa 1815. Local historians cautiously say: "It would appear that Albee came to Hobart from Ohio sometime between 1843 and 1848"[2] without noting a source for that information. In my indexing work, I have encountered him conducting business locally as early as August 1846:


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.


In the 1850 Census, Jesse shows up with his wife, Sarah (Hendershot),[3] whom he had married in Ohio in 1841,[4] and their two sons, Americus and Alonzo.

In 1851, Jesse bought the whole northwest quarter of Section 21, Twp. 36 N., Range 7 W. — 160 acres southeast of Lake Station on the county line (U.S. General Land Office Records, 1776-2015).

When Sarah Albee died is unknown — 1858 or later, it would seem, since the 1860 Census lists no wife in the household, but there is a two-year-old Jesse Junior. There is also a 25-year-old "domestic," Mary Hoff.

On January 29, 1861, Jesse (senior) married Emily Wilcox; on July 15, 1861, Mary Ann Pierce; and on May 25, 1864, Caroline (Spencer) Carpenter (Indiana Marriage Collection).[5]

In the 1870 Census, Jesse and Caroline are living near Lake Station with the two younger sons from his first marriage; the eight-year-old son from her previous marriage, James Carpenter; and the two sons they had together: four-year-old Clarence and an unnamed two-month-old boy.

The 1874 Plat Map shows Jesse owning nearly 160 acres in the next section north of his 1851 purchase (which by then was in other hands). Here I have marked his 1874 parcel on an image from the 1950 Plat Book so we can better see where it lay with respect to present-day streets:


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Then comes the 1880 Census — and no Albees. That is to say, I can't find them in the census on Ancestry.com under any reasonable spelling of their name, not in Hobart Township or anywhere else. It's possible they were not counted, or the enumerator got their surname completely wrong — but I've also searched on their first names only, with no luck.[6]

And yet it seems that they had not left Hobart. Ballantyne and Adams state: "In the Hobart Township School enumeration for 1885 Jesse Albee is listed as having a son of school age (between 6 and 12)" and "Jesse Albee died in Hobart in 1886." I wish they'd given their source for that second item. I can't find anything to confirm it.

The year after Jesse's death, Caroline married Henry James in Lake County (Indiana Marriage Collection, the marriage being recorded under her middle name, Amelia). She died in 1903 (Indiana Death Certificates) and is buried in Hobart Cemetery — at least we've found one of them!


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[1] Dorothy Ballantyne and Robert Adams, Along the Route: A History of Hobart, Indiana, Post Offices and Postmasters, Hobart: The Hobart Historical Society, Inc. (1979, rev. 1992).
[2] Ibid., p. 12.
[3] Ballantyne and Roberts (p. 12) describe Sarah as a four-year-old daughter, but the image of the 1850 census on Ancestry.com clearly shows her age as 24, which, together with the Ohio marriage record, leads me to believe that she was Jesse's wife.
[4] Ancestry.com. Ohio, County Marriage Records, 1774-1993 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2016. Original data: Marriage Records. Ohio Marriages. Various Ohio County Courthouses.
[5] Caroline's maiden name was Spencer, per Ballantyne and Adams (p. 12), who add that she was the widow of James Carpenter, a Civil War casualty, and mother of James Carpenter Jr. — whose name I have often encountered in my reading; he sat on Hobart's town council and otherwise made a prominent citizen of himself in the early 20th century.
[6] If I had the time, I would just read through all of the Hobart Township 1880 census in search of something that could pass for the Albee family.

Saved for the Wrecking Ball

Thank goodness for the fine work of Hobart's fire department and its "most splendid motor fire truck" in March 1923 — or what would there have been to raze 17 years later?


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Hobart Gazette, March 30, 1923.


The "Fasel fire" was the subject of an earlier post.

Notice Axel Strom's advertisement lower down in the right-hand column. I suppose he had to move all his things back from the Fleck residence.

Death of a Sunday Scholar

While indexing the Union Sunday School record book from the 1870s, I came across this draft of a resolution memorializing the late Clarence Spencer Albee.


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Image courtesy of the Hobart Historical Society.


That these people, so sadly familiar with the loss of children, should mention that Clarence was taken by "death in one of its most terrible forms" really makes me wonder what happened to the poor boy.

One might expect a fair copy of this undated draft to appear in the Sunday School minutes, giving us a rough date for Clarence's death, but so far I have not been able to find it.

Naturally, I set about trying to find out where he is buried … and got nowhere. Neither the NWIGS books of Hobart Township and Ross Township cemetery readings, nor findagrave.com record him. I believe he died in 1878, since the pages immediately before and after this resolution record events in 1878. The death records on Ancestry.com do not go back that far. Nor was there any newspaper in Hobart then that survives today. A search on two historical-newspaper sites[1] doesn't turn up anything. I expect I shall have to start scrolling through various other local microfilm someday, when I have time.

Clarence was born circa 1866 (1870 Census) to Jesse B. Albee and his fourth wife, Caroline (Spencer) Carpenter. Among his wives, Jesse had several offspring. But their final resting places, like Clarence's, are a mystery to me — and so is Jesse's, which is surprising given how prominent a figure he was locally in the mid-19th century.

I shall have to post a bit more about the Albee family in the future.

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[1] Newspaperarchive.com and Newspapers.com.

Updated Ledger Index

I have posted an updated draft to the Index to Hobart Historical Society Ledgers page. This new draft includes five more items: four Union Sunday School record books, beginning in 1873, 1888, 1889 and 1891, respectively; and one daybook recording business transactions beginning in 1836.