Showing posts with label New York City. Show all posts
Showing posts with label New York City. Show all posts

Sunday, August 13, 2023

Dating Family Photos and Investigating Photographers

Most of the old family photos I inherited had no dates but had some clues to help me determine when, not just who. Now MyHeritage had introduced its new PhotoDater feature, which provides an estimated date as a starting point if we need clues. IMHO, it's a very exciting feature that is well worth taking for a spin.

Dates plus/minus 5 years

The first photo I tried was of my Dad, Harold Burk (1909-1978), holding his elementary school diploma after graduating from PS 171 in East Harlem, NYC. (Today, that school is Patrick Henry Elementary School.) Since I have Dad's diploma, I know the exact date of graduation, even though there is no year noted on the photo itself. In less than a minute after I uploaded this photo, MyHeritage's PhotoDater suggested an estimated date of 1923. Right on the nose! 

Although I don't expect PhotoDater to pinpoint the exact year for every photo, this is a quick and easy way to estimate the dates of mystery photos, in particular. Be aware that the feature typically provides a date that is plus or minus 5 years. Also, the technology intended to date photos taken between 1860 and 1990.

Of course, nothing replaces the in-depth expertise and insights of professionals like Maureen Taylor, the Photo Detective and Sherlock Cohn, the Photo Genealogist. But estimating the date of a family history photo via PhotoDater can at least put me on track toward more complete identification. I highly recommend this new feature and suggest you give it a try! For more info, see the MyHeritage blog here.

Researching a photographer?










Since all four of my immigrant grandparents settled in New York City, I was pleased to discover the NYC Public Library's Photographers' Identities Catalog. This database isn't confined to the Big Apple, but it does have many of the photographers who snapped my ancestors' posed portraits.

Above, I filtered my catalog search by surname of the photographer, Beldegreen. Two are in the catalog--including the one I sought, Gustave Beldegreen. 

Below, when I clicked on Gustave Beldegreen in the results, I got this page, showing that some of his photos are in the collection of the Museum of Jewish Heritage (link also), sources of info (links), and birth/death dates, studio locations. I can compare the studio locations with the home addresses of my ancestors to narrow down the date/place if the photographer's full info is missing from an old photo. Try this with one of the photographers from an old family photo in your collection! Again, the link to the catalog is here.

ONE MORE LINK! Thanks to a kind geneadon on Mastodon, here's a link to Langdon's List of US photographers active in the 19th and 20th centuries. My guy Beldegreen is on the list, having been named in a city directory. Another resource new to me!

Thursday, January 19, 2023

Library of Congress Images Add Context to Family History


Going beyond ancestor portraits, basic facts, and stories passed down from earlier generations, a family history project might benefit from outside images that add social or historical context. The idea is to provide a more well-rounded picture [pun intended] of ancestors' lives.

That's why I've been looking at the US Library of Congress prints and photos collection. It includes a gazillion digitized images available to view, and sometimes to download, for free. Not just of America, but well beyond.

LOC prints and photographs online catalog

Start by going to the Library of Congress catalog page for prints and photos. One entire area of the collection is devoted to US Civil War images (my husband has 20+ ancestors who served on both sides of that war).

Other featured collections are listed by name on the main page. A tiny sample includes:

  • Stereograph cards
  • Wright brother's negatives
  • African American photos for 1900 Paris Expo
  • Posters from World War I

It's easy to browse specific collections and check whether any of the images are available for free download.

Search by keyword (place, subject, etc)

Another way to find suitable images for family history projects is to use the search box. At top, you can see I searched for "New York City" images and received more than 27,000 results. Most of my immigrant ancestors came through Castle Garden and Ellis Island and remained in the Big Apple, which is why I'm interested in images of the city and its people and institutions. 

I found lots of images depicting aspects of daily life in Manhattan during the first decades of the 20th century--when and where my ancestors first lived upon arrival from Eastern Europe.



Another search, for images of Jewish life in New York City, resulted in numerous results, including the collection shown in this image, covering the period when my Jewish ancestors were just getting settled in the city. 

This group of images is part of the much larger George Grantham Bain Collection. The Library of Congress notes: "The collection richly documents sports events, theater, celebrities, crime, strikes, disasters, political activities including the woman suffrage campaign, conventions and public celebrations."

Free to use and reuse

The Library of Congress has made free images very accessible with a link at bottom of its home page that leads here.

Down the rabbit hole I go, and if you're interested in images to illuminate your family's history in America (and beyond), do take a look at the Library of Congress.

Friday, September 30, 2022

Don't Be in a Hurry! Check the Actual Vital Record


Over time, I've been researching vital records for my husband's Work, Short, McClure, McKibbin, and related ancestors who spent time in Indiana. 

Although the Hoosier State began requiring registration of births in 1882, not every county or municipality complied. Luckily, nearly all of the births after 1920 were registered with the state health department. This informative page on the Family Search wiki explains the details.

Recently, I heard from a descendant of my husband's McKibbin line, who was kind enough to mention new clues that jumpstarted my research.

When I got to hubby's 4c1r, it would have been easy to quickly read the transcribed info and add to my tree without looking at the digitized image of the record.

BUT if I'd hurried on, I would have missed the extra details that Indiana so thoughtfully requested on its birth certs at that time, and which I didn't know about till I looked at the record itself.

Multiple birth?

Note the questions in the hot pink oval: 

  • Is this birth a twin or triplet or other?
  • Number of order of birth of this child
  • Is this child legitimate?
Although this child was not part of a multiple birth, I would have liked answers to such questions on other vital records for twins elsewhere in the family tree.

Researching decades after a twin or triplet has died, it's often difficult or impossible to learn who was born first and who was born next. Because I'm an older twin, and but my mother was a younger twin, I have a special interest in birth order among multiple births!

Learning about legitimacy is also of interest to my research, a nudge to look for marriage documents (or not). 

How many children in all?


I'm familiar with New York City/state birth certs because that's where many in my family tree were from. As shown above, there's a question on the NY cert asking how many previous children were born to this mother and how many are now living, in all. This child was the second for this mother, and both were living in 1908, the year of this cert.

Similarly, in Indiana, as shown at top, the blue oval highlights those questions:

  • Number of children born to this mother, including present birth?
  • Number of children still living, including present birth?
For the McKibbin ancestor born in Indiana in 1921, this cert revealed he was one of 8 but only 7 living at that point.

Now I had a narrower window for researching the other siblings, including the one who sadly was born and died before 1921. This is especially important for children who were lived their entire lives between Census years.

By taking a few moments to look at the actual vital record, and read the fine print, I saved a lot of research time in the end. Slow and steady wins!

Wednesday, March 16, 2022

New, Free New York City Vital Records!

Anyone with ancestors who were born, married, or died in New York City from 1855 through 1949 can now search the New York City Municipal Archives site and view more than 9 million document images, at no charge. This action wasn't directly due to any specific lawsuit by the nonprofit Reclaim the Records, although it has sued the agency four times to get public images made public. This particular release of documents is a project that New York City has been working on for years, and now the results are being made available for free

As shown in the image above, note that these images are for vital records only from 1855 through 1949. Also, not all images have yet been scanned, but the majority are available to be found via search or browsing.

Search by cert number

NYC recommends searching by certificate number, borough, and year for the best results. You can find a cert number in a number of ways. There are indexes on Ancestry, Family Search, and other sites, but usually I use the databases at ItalianGen.org - also free, thanks to the efforts of many incredible volunteers. 

As shown above, you can search the ItalianGen databases for birth, marriage, death by surname and given name or initial, specify a range of years, and narrow the search to a specific New York City borough. When I did this for my great aunt Sadie Mahler's marriage, I found two possibilities. I know her spouse (Samuel Smith) but if I didn't, the ability to look at either of these certs FOR FREE is a big, big plus.

Once I plugged in the cert number, borough, and year using the NYC search function, up popped Sadie and Sam's marriage document, both page 1 and page 2 (with their signatures and the witnesses). I don't need a certified copy for my genealogy, but if you do, you can click to buy.

Want to browse?


If you want to browse in search of an ancestor's cert (maybe you can't find the cert number, for instance), you can use the browse interface here. Select type of certificate, borough, and don't forget to use the slider to narrow the range of years.

What a wonderful treat to have, just two weeks before the 1950 US Census is released!

PS: I tried finding Sadie's marriage cert at FamilySearch but "no image" was available, only a transcription. Much better to have the actual image to view!

Saturday, February 19, 2022

1950 US Census Prep: Using ED Maps and Descriptions


A good number of my ancestors lived in New York City--many in the Bronx, some in Queens, some in Brooklyn, a few in Manhattan, but none in Staten Island. 

As I get ready to find them in the 1950 US Census when the records are released in April, I'm finding I have to dig even deeper to determine the specific Enumeration District for a few of these Big Apple residents. This holds true for other big cities, by the way, as I've discovered searching for Cleveland ancestors.

Details matter

Here's a mini case study featuring ED maps and ED descriptions. My cousins lived at 3706 72d Street in Queens, New York. But studying the map, I see that the borough of Queens also has 72d Avenue, 72d Avenue Ext, 72d Crescent, 72d Drive, 72d Lane, 72d Place, and 72d Road. 

So my first step was to be sure I entered the correct street name when using the nifty Unified Census ED Finder by Steve Morse and Joel Weintraub. 

With only the street name/number, there were too many potential Enumeration Districts for me to browse. As the site directs, I next looked at the Google map and entered a cross street (Broadway) and a back street (37th Avenue) for the block where these cousins lived. 

These two additional details narrowed the number of EDs to three. I couldn't enter a fourth cross or back street, because my cousins lived on a triangular city block. 

Go to the NARA map

My next step was to look at the National Archives map for the three EDs that were around the address. The Steve Morse site has an easy one-step process to go to the maps. Be sure you set the year to 1950. 

Once I located the map for this section of Queens, I enlarged it to read the street names. I found my cousins' address was at a location numbered as block 12 on the NARA ED map (at top). 

The little white star on image above is where my cousins lived in 1950. But the orange lines delineating the districts didn't show me precisely which ED my cousin lived in. What now?

Read the NARA map description

To further narrow the number of EDs, I clicked on the link to read the transcription of each district in turn. The description for 41-598 wasn't as close to the address as the descriptions for 41-608 and 41-880, shown here:


It wasn't enough to glance at the boundary descriptions, because 72d Street, 37th Avenue, and Broadway are listed on both ED 41-608 and ED 41-880.

I looked more closely at the specific blocks included within each ED. Remember, the NARA map at top shows that the address is on block 12.

Block 12 is described as being within ED 41-608. So on April 1st, I'll be looking for my cousins in this single ED!

For more about the 1950 US Census release, see my summary page here. To learn more about the US National Archives ED maps and other maps of interest to genealogists, see here.

Thursday, November 18, 2021

1950 US Census: Putting Reported Income In Context


When the 1950 US Census is released in April, it will have detailed information on a surprisingly large sample of the population.

One in five sampled

If I'm lucky, my ancestors will be among the 20% of people sampled, which meant they answered additional questions about 1949 full-year income and more.

My deep dive into the reported statistics about each state will give me good context for interpreting my ancestors' answers. (You can see each state's reported statistics in the publications at HathiTrust. There are so many fascinating tables of statistics, income and much more, on a state-by-state basis.) 

Apples-to-apples comparison 

As shown in the excerpt above, the median income for urban areas of New York state was $3,123*, higher than the median for the state overall. I would expect my Big Apple ancestors and other city-dwellers to report higher incomes than any who lived in rural areas. Common sense, but seeing the statistics in the official reports gives me a sense of how much people might have earned at that time, so I can compare with my father's income. 

In later life, when my mother occasionally talked about those post-war years, she said my father's travel agency was doing well. I won't know how well unless they were among the 20% of the population who answered those sample questions in the 1950 Census. 

Yes, I already have their Enumeration District listed so I can browse for them as soon as the Census is released in April.

*The 2021 equivalent of $3,123 in income would be more than $33,000. 

Wednesday, August 11, 2021

"Big City" Cleveland Ancestors in 1950











As I continue to prep for finding ancestors when the 1950 U.S. Census is released in April, I'm using my RootsMagic7 genealogy software's reporting functions.

When Census documents are initially made public on April 1, the only way to find ancestors will be to browse the proper Enumeration District. If I wait a few months, the Census will be indexed and I can search by name. But I really want to learn more about my ancestors sooner than that, which means preparing to browse by finding specific addresses and turning those into individual Enumeration Districts.

Who was there?

Above, an excerpt from one of the "Who Was There" lists I created with RootsMagic 7. This list covers ancestors who were in Cleveland in 1950. The report lists ancestors by surname in alphabetical order, shows birth and death dates, age in 1950, and a chronological listing of places for each ancestor (based on my research). As the image shows, the listing includes street addresses from my sources.

Interestingly, the software allows me to indicate an average life span to be considered when compiling the report. Sometimes I don't yet know an ancestor's death date, so this parameter helps me cast a wider net and include people who might be still alive and in that area, based on their last-known address in my database. I like this flexibility.

Edgar James Wood, my father-in-law, was one of many ancestors in my husband's tree who lived in metro Cleveland in 1950. By grouping these ancestors according to where they lived, it's more efficient for me to look up and browse their 1950 Enumeration Districts (see step-by-step process here). 

Context: Cleveland vs the Bronx

In 1950, Cleveland had 914,800 residents. It was truly a major city, the seventh largest in the United States, thanks to the influx of industrial workers during and after World War II. That year was a population peak for Cleveland, which had only 318,000 residents in 2019. 

My husband, a Cleveland native, often says he was born in an "Eastern" city. Because I'm a Bronx native, I respectfully refer to his home town as being solidly in the Midwest!

In 1950, the Bronx had 1.45 million residents. This will be the first Census where my parents are enumerated as a married couple, living in the Bronx, New York. If counted as a standalone city instead of a Big Apple borough, the Bronx would have been the sixth largest U.S. city in 1950. In other words, well ahead of Cleveland, where hubby's parents were living in 1950.

Just mentioning this factoid to put the 1950 Census in context for both sides of my family. Ahem.

-- "In the city" is Amy Johnson Crow's #52Ancestors prompt for week 32.

Monday, June 14, 2021

Honoring Grandpa Isaac, My Genealogy Inspiration

For Father's Day 2021, it is my pleasure to pay tribute to immigrant Grandpa Isaac Burk (1882-1943), who lived and died before my time.

How I wish I could tell him that he's the reason I became addicted to genealogy in the first place.

Isaac Burk, my inspiration

In 1998, the genealogist of my mother's side of the family asked me about my father and his parents, Isaac and Henrietta. She taught me, by example, how important it is to include in-laws on the family tree.

Sadly, I knew almost nothing about Isaac, nor had I even seen a photo of him. I knew precious little about his wife, Grandma Henrietta Mahler Burk (1881-1954), although I did recognize her in a couple of old family photos. 

Isaac's story proved elusive. It took five years of spare-time research to discover where, when, and why he died. The seemingly endless search became my inspiration for filling out branches on my family tree and that of my husband.

Hint, hint

After years of library research and by-mail requests for fruitless searches of New York City and state death records, I actually picked up the phone to call a Big Apple office. I knew where Isaac was buried by then, but not where he died and what caused his death. I threw myself on the mercy of the kindly clerk who answered the phone.

The clerk, in low tones, offered a completely unofficial, totally off-the-record hint to look beyond New York. The hush-hush suggestion was to, um, maybe consider, possibly, say, a place sorta like Washington, D. C. What?!

As a result of this hint, I was able to obtain Isaac's death cert. It turned out Isaac had died in Washington and his body was transported to New York for the funeral, generating paperwork that the clerk could view (but I couldn't see). Another lesson learned: sometimes it's a good idea to call and politely ask for help.

The hunt for Grandpa Isaac's history opened the door to decades of genealogy fun, finding many more ancestors and connecting with wonderful cousins along the way.

Thank you, Grandpa Isaac, for inspiring me. You are remembered with affection on Father's Day, 2021. My Sis and I have also paid to add you and Grandma Henrietta to the Ellis Island Immigrant Wall of Honor, as shown above, to keep your names alive for many generations to come.

--

Father's Day is the week 24 prompt for Amy Johnson Crow's #52Ancestors challenge.

Thursday, June 10, 2021

Family Search Remote Access Services Solves a Mystery


More than a few of my ancestors didn't know their actual birth dates. Sound familiar?

This week, I was able to solve the mystery of an uncle's birth date in New York City, thanks to the new Family Search Remote Services team.

When no image available or document is not viewable from home, this new team accesses the image or document (if available) via the Family History Library and sends it to the requester, for free.  

For more about this service, see the announcement here.

Pandemic PLAs 

During the pandemic, I would have posted an image request on the New York City Genealogy Facebook page.

Wonderful volunteers known as "parking lot angels" (PLAs) would go outside a Family History Center, tap its Wi-Fi, and look up images for folks like me. 

For the next 90 days, however, no images are available--except by request to the Family Search Remote Access Services team.

One uncle, two birth dates

I knew my uncle, Charles Lang (1906-1968), was born in New York City. On his World War II draft registration card, he said his birth date was September 10, 1906. On a document from his teenage years, the birth date was March 15, 1906.

What I needed was his actual birth certificate. The transcribed birth document is on Family Search, showing his parents and a birth date of March 2, 1906. But to be absolutely sure there were no transcription errors, I wanted to view the actual certificate with my own eyes. 

So late last week, I submitted a request to the Family Search Remote Access Services team, providing all the details requested on the form. 

Four days later, the terrific Remote Access Services team sent along the image of my uncle's birth certificate. And now the mystery is solved: his correct birth date is March 2, 1906, shown clearly. Because this document was filed only days after my uncle was born, I am very confident in its accuracy.

Thank you to the Remote Access Services team!

Saturday, May 1, 2021

My 1950 U.S. Census Release To-Do List: May 1 = Moving Day

This year, I'm taking steps to find a street address for each key ancestor enumerated in the 1950 U.S. Census. I want to be ready to find them when the unindexed Census records are made public in 2022.

Even when I do find these ancestors in the Census (browsing images in the Enumeration District where each lives), I have to remember that within a month, some city-dwellers could be living elsewhere.

The Tradition of Moving Day

In the Big Apple, May 1 was when all rental leases expired. The same was true in Chicago for many years, and other big cities as well.

Families that lived in apartments spent the weeks before May 1 talking with new landlords who might be willing to negotiate rents or offer another incentive to move. Renters also signed contracts to have moving companies lug furniture to the new place on Moving Day.

Moving Day is unlikely to change where I look for my urban ancestors in the 1950 Census, since they were probably counted in the early days and weeks of enumeration. But it does remind me that the 1950 Census address might be only one in a long line of address changes for each ancestor.

Look for an address after May 1949

My recently married parents (Harold Burk and Daisy Schwartz) were in their second New York City apartment by the time of the 1950 Census. Their parents and other relatives, however, weren't necessarily living in the same apartment in April of 1950 as they were in April of 1949.

Similarly, in the Chicago branch of my family, many were renters. From one Census to another, I noticed that many of these ancestors changed apartments--and very likely they moved more than once in the decade between each Census Day.

So as I research my New York City and Chicago ancestors who were renters, I'm trying to find addresses after May of 1949. I'm looking at birth records of their post-WWII babies, city directories, phone directories, advertisements, news articles, and social items in the newspaper, among other sources. 

--

This is part of my series of blog posts about getting ready for the 1950 Census release, which will occur on April 1, 2022. 

Sunday, April 18, 2021

April 1, 1950: Census Day News


As background for researching ancestors who were enumerated in the U.S. Census taken on Saturday, April 1, 1950, I'm looking at newspapers in the areas where they lived. I want to be ready when this mid-century Census is released to the public on April 1, 2022.

After looking at only a couple of newspapers, I learned two things that encouraged me to keep looking at other newspapers in the coming weeks.

  1. Some special aspects of the Census were highlighted in areas where they were of significance. This was the case for merchant ships docked in New York City (see below). I learned a few tidbits about the questionnaires for crew members and how the count was conducted.
  2. Small, local newspapers listed the names of enumerators! Maybe your ancestor was an enumerator or was mentioned as being interviewed by an enumerator?

New York City: Counting crew on merchant ships

The official start of Census Day was reported in a long front-page article in the New York Times. Top local officials were quoted, but no local enumerators were named. For broader context, I browsed ads (ladies wearing hats and gloves), real estate ads, political news, radio and TV news, and the weather report.

A related Census article printed that day told of crew members on 2,000 merchant ships worldwide completing a special Census form. Each crew member at a U.S. port was to answer 23 questions about demographics, citizenship, and income. (However, crew members whose vessels were at sea or in foreign ports answered only 9 Census questions.) 

Crew members in U.S. ports were being counted as part of the population of that location--meaning those on vessels at New York City piers would be counted as part of the Big Apple's population. 

Bucyrus, Ohio: "Shnozzle counting" and names of enumerators

"Shnozzle counting in the rain began in Bucyrus and Crawford county as some 38 Census enumerators took to the roads and streets today to check the county's approximately 35,000 population for all sorts of things."

That's the rather informal first paragraph of the front-page story in the Telegraph-Forum newspaper of Bucyrus, Ohio. Some of hubby's ancestors lived in the area.

After describing some highlights of the Census timing (see snippet at right), the article went on to list the names of all 38 enumerators! None were ancestors I'm researching, but maybe I'll be lucky in another small local newspaper.

And of course, I continued browsing that day's paper for more historical context--such as the report of local farms being larger in 1950 than in 1900, also on page one.

Over the coming weeks, I'll be browsing local newspapers for more insights into the 1950 Census and anything else I can learn about the people or areas where ancestors lived in 1950. Local newspaper reports can be informative (and entertaining) background!

Wednesday, October 28, 2020

Happy Birthday Lady Liberty, From My Immigrant Ancestors

 


"The Statue of Liberty Enlightening the World" was dedicated on this day in 1886. A gift from France to the United States, Lady Liberty is situated on Liberty Island in New York Harbor. She doesn't look a day over 134, does she?

My maternal great-grandparents (Moritz Farkas and Leni Kunstler Farkas) passed the iconic statue when arriving in New York City from Hungary. Moritz sailed in 1899 and Leni sailed in 1900. Four of their children (including my maternal grandma, Hermina Farkas), followed them to New York in 1901. I remember folks in the Farkas family expressing a fondness for Lady Liberty, a symbol of freedom and opportunity for our immigrant ancestors.

My widowed paternal great-great-grandmother (Rachel Shuham Jacobs) and her daughter (my great-grandma Tillie Jacobs Mahler) both arrived in 1886. Along with Tillie came her two children, my grandma (Henrietta Mahler) and great uncle (David Mahler). All of these immigrant ancestors saw the Statue of Liberty on their way into New York City. 

My paternal great-grandfather Meyer Elias Mahler (husband of Tillie Jacobs Mahler) arrived earlier, in May of 1885, so he definitely did NOT see the statue, which was brought to America in June of 1885. 

On behalf of my immigrant ancestors, I wish Lady Liberty a happy birthday--and I salute the courage and determination of my ancestors who sought a better life in America! To celebrate, I enjoyed a breath-taking virtual tour of the State of Liberty, seen here

Tuesday, September 29, 2020

Family History as Window into Local History


My Dad, Harold D. Burk (1909-1978) was born in the middle of an historic celebration in New York City and environs. Despite the magnitude of this special event, I had never heard of it until I looked at the front page of the New York Times for his birth date, September 29, 1909.

New York was marking the 300th anniversary of Henry Hudson sailing up the river that now bears his name...plus the 100th anniversary of Robert Fulton successfully using steam power on a paddle-boat. 

This combined commemoration was called the Hudson-Fulton Celebration, a multi-day extravaganza that captured the American imagination and attracted millions of viewers to parades on land and on water, flyovers, children's events, and much more. Wilbur Wright actually flew over the Statue of Liberty on the day Dad was born. Who knew? 

This celebration (remembered in postcards, medals, coins, and many other items) put the spotlight on new technology of the time, such as airplanes and electricity. Meanwhile, Dad was being born at home in Manhattan, just a couple of miles from all the fanfare and the honored guests (including President William Howard Taft, Vice President James Sherman, and NY Governor Charles Evans Hughes).

On what would have been Dad's 111th birthday, his special day in family history led me to learn about a special period in New York history. Miss you, Dad. 💙

Tuesday, September 22, 2020

Adding Context for 3D View of Ancestors, Part 3


In addition to examining family situation (part 1 of this series) and community (part 2), another way to flesh out ancestors' lives is to look at influences on society at that time. 

So many elements influenced the society in which ancestors lived and the daily lives they led--including religion, economics, legal and political considerations, industry and technology, urban/suburban/rural life styles, plus local and global health developments. Not everything had a profound impact on every ancestor, but I try to consider key developments that shaped the course of their lives.  

I read the news today, oh boy! 

My top pick for analyzing societal influences is the newspaper. Not just local newspapers where that ancestor lived, but statewide and/or national news sources. For ancestors who lived in the 19th and 20th centuries, papers are a particularly valuable research resource--I browse the news as well as the advertisements, which reflect norms and beliefs of the time.

My immigrant ancestors settled in New York City, so city papers are good starting points for me. Actually, most papers (even small-town papers) had some national and international coverage, I noticed while researching my husband's ancestors in rural Ohio and Indiana.

Newspapers provide accounts of local/national politics, infrastructure improvements, crime, food and fashion, and so much more. Ads and reporting reflected new types of jobs, new transportation, new products and services, all part of societal influences on ancestors. Letters to the editor reveal unvarnished opinions expressed at the time and are fascinating to read.

Constant change

All these changes kept coming, affecting my ancestors day to day and over the long period. After the Roaring Twenties, when many ancestors got on their feet economically, the Great Depression was real challenge, followed by World War II. News reports allow me to follow along and understand these influences. Commercial radio, motion pictures, commercial television, jet planes, computers--these innovations were in the lives of my parents and some in the lives of my grandparents, and all were covered in the newspaper. 

Political and legal events made a huge difference in ancestors' lives. My mother was born late in 1919, a few months after Congress passed legislation granting women the right to vote (the 19th Amendment wasn't ratified until 1920). I read all about it in the newspaper! No wonder Mom brought her children to the polling place each year so we could watch her exercise her right to vote.

The drafts instituted in WWI and WWII affected the men in my family tree--of course, all well documented in newspapers of the time. Food rationing was a daily concern for ancestors living through WWII, especially for my maternal grandparents, who ran a grocery store and needed customers to bring ration books along when they made a purchase. 

Many genealogy websites have information and videos about paid and free access to old newspapers, just go ahead and search...and think creatively about the personal and professional lives of your ancestors. It was fun to run across ads for a Hungarian-style restaurant run by an ancestor in New York City when I searched via Fulton History, for instance. When this type of restaurant went out of fashion, he went out of business, context I kept in mind while looking at the arc of his life.

Don't forget: New newspapers are added to free and paid sites every month, so redo your searches now and then to pick up new clues to the context of your family history.

Wednesday, September 16, 2020

Ancestors Followed the Subway Out of Manhattan

1989 map of New York
City subway system

Sometimes a map or multiple maps can help us understand ancestors' movements within a city or region. That's the case with my immigrant Farkas and Schwartz ancestors who lived in New York City around the turn of the 20th century. 

Although they began their new lives in Manhattan, my maternal great-grandparents and grandparents were able to move to less-crowded residential neighborhoods in the northern borough of the Bronx because of the subway.

The Farkas family rode the subway and "the el"

My collection of now-obsolete
New York City subway tokens


My great-grandfather Moritz Farkas (1857-1936) was escaping financial ruin after hail destroyed his crops in Hungary. He sailed to New York and initially was a boarder in someone else's Lower East Side Manhattan tenement apartment. This was in August of 1899, before any modern mass-transit systems were even built. Once his wife, Lena Kunstler Farkas (1865-1938) and their children arrived from Hungary, they moved to an apartment of their own on the Lower East Side.

By 1920, however, Moritz, Lena, and their family (and many of the married children) were living in the borough of the Bronx, just north of Manhattan. This move was made possible by the expansion of the city's subway lines into what was then a much less-populated area. Ironically, many of the subway lines were actually overhead, not underground, and were usually called "the el," short for "elevated."

Now Farkas family members could ride the subway to work and to visit each other, not to mention go to the Bronx Zoo, the Bronx Botanical Gardens, and Coney Island by train! Family stories, corroborated by more than one cousin, say that to save money, Lena sometimes gave her two middle sons only a nickel each per day to ride the subway to work...one way. They had to walk home when the nickels ran out.

Teddy and Minnie never needed a car

My maternal grandpa Theodore "Teddy" Schwartz (1887-1965) also came to New York City from Hungary, arriving in 1902, before the subway opened to the public. He lived as a boarder on the Lower East Side for the first nine years, then married my grandma Hermina "Minnie" Farkas (1886-1964) in 1911. At that point, the subway system was growing by leaps and bounds, reaching far and wide year after year.

With affordable mass transit within walking distance, Teddy and Minnie moved their family from Manhattan to the south Bronx, then a fast-growing residential area with new schools and parks. They settled on Fox Street, directly across from an elementary school, and Teddy opened a grocery store down the block.

Teddy and Minnie never had a car and didn't need one, given the ongoing improvements of the New York City subway system. Here's what the network looked like in 1939. By that time, all three of their children were working--taking the subway into Manhattan and back to the Bronx on every business day. The price was right and the subway was the fast track to better-paying jobs in the heart of New York City.

"On the map" is the #Genealogy prompt for week 38 of the #52Ancestors series.

Tuesday, July 14, 2020

Local Knowledge, Part 3: Free Big Apple Directories

Easy access to free New York City phone books via stevemorse.org








Knowing that May 1 of every year was Moving Day in New York City helped me understand the timing of moves for siblings of my paternal grandfather, Isaac Burk (1882-1943). That was Part 1 of my series on local knowledge of Big Apple genealogy resources.

In Part 2 of my series, I used free NYC Municipal Archives tax records to find clear b/w photos of the buildings where ancestors lived in 1940.

Now for Part 3. I wanted to look up my grandpa's New York-based siblings in 1940s phone directories, relying on local knowledge for free access.

New York Public Library's Virtual Resources

The New York Public Library is a fabulous source of genealogical resources, not only for researching New York ancestors but well beyond. Many of its resources have been digitized and posted online, available for free without a library card on a 24/7 basis.

The library's digital collection includes New York City directories, which it has been scanning and posting in recent years. This makes valuable genealogical info widely available to anyone, anywhere, who wants to search for a person or a business in the Big Apple, going back as far as 1786. These directories also feature interesting advertising and street maps of the time (context!).

Actually, the library's virtual collection includes both city directories (pre-telephone era) and phone directories--the latter for the five boroughs (Manhattan, Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens, and Staten Island).

Not all borough directories are posted and not all years are available, but this an excellent source to tap if your ancestors lived or worked in New York City.

Steve Morse's Super-Easy Search 


My favorite way to search 1940 NYC phone directories for free is through Steve Morse's One-Step access to the books, borough by borough (snippet at top shows a sample from my research).

If you use this one-step access, select a borough on the drop down menu at top left of the search screen. Then click the arrows to progress through pages, or do a name search, or skip to the proper alphabetical page for the name you want.

The snippet shows my search for grandpa Isaac's brother Max Birk, who lived in Brooklyn in 1940. I specified "Brooklyn" as the borough and typed in "Birk" as the name. Steve Morse's super-easy search tool brought me to the page showing Max Birk at 602 Avenue T in Brooklyn, NY. This is the correct address for that time, as it matches Max's 1940 Census location.

By the way, I searched the 1940 Bronx phone book for Paul and Jennie Salkowitz (Jennie was Max and Isaac's sister). They weren't listed. Why? The light bulb went on: According to the 1940 U.S. Census, Jennie and her husband were boarders in somebody else's apartment. No way to have a phone of their own! They moved shortly afterward (on Moving Day, May 1, I'm willing to wager) and had a phone number in later directories.

Internet Archive: Browse Page by Page

There's a third way of accessing some NYC phone directories for free: via Internet Archive. The collection here is more limited. Happily, I did find a 1941 Brooklyn, NY phone directory for free.



Shown here is Max Birk's entry in this Brooklyn phone book, located by browsing page by page. Note the directory's specific date: August, 1941. That's a clue to check the dates on your sources, especially fast-changing phone directories in fast-growing cities like New York. More about dates in Part 4 of my series.


Monday, July 13, 2020

Local Knowledge, Part 2: Big Apple Building Photos

Tax photo of building where great-aunt Jennie and
great-uncle Paul lived in 1941-2.
This is part 2 in my series about local knowledge helping me research my Big Apple ancestors. Previously, I wrote about May 1 being Moving Day all over the five boroughs of New York City. This was a factor in understanding the locations of my grandpa Isaac Burk and his siblings who lived in the city.

Google Maps Street View

At this point, I had the address where my great aunt Jennie Birk Salkowitz moved with her husband, Paul Salkowitz, after they left the apartment building on Valentine Avenue in the Bronx where my grandpa Isaac resided.

Jennie's new residence at 276 East 203d Street was a short walk from her brother's apartment, really just a few steps around the corner.

What did this residence on 203d Street look like? Checking the Street View on Google Maps, I saw a building constructed long after World War II was over. In other words, Jennie and Paul's residence had been torn down and replaced some time ago.

I switched to Plan B, using local knowledge to find out what Jennie's residence looked like 80 years ago.

Digitized Municipal Archives Tax Photos

In November of 2018, the New York City Department of Records and Info Services announced it had just posted more than 700,000 photos of buildings all around the five boroughs. The b/w photos were taken between the years of 1939 and 1941, primarily for property tax purposes--very clear and well marked. It was like a visual time capsule being opened eight decades later.

The news spread widely over social media and genealogy groups. When the release originally took place, I looked up several other ancestral residences, so I was familiar with the routine. At the time, Steve Morse had not yet posted his nifty shortcut to finding a New York City building in this tax photo archive.

Not using the shortcut, I first clicked to the main NYC Municipal Archives Online Gallery of 1.6 million images, then to the tax photos. Next, I looked for the Bronx section of the tax photos.

Here, I followed instructions to find the block and lot number of the street address. That search didn't give me a specific page, so I tried again with only the block number and then quickly and easily browsed photo sets until I came to the page shown at top of this post.

Now I could see that Jennie and Paul had moved to a neat three-family home along a side street. It was a quieter street yet still only steps from where Jennie's brother lived.

Isaac had other siblings living in New York City. I needed more info to find them in the early 1940s. Once more, local knowledge came to my rescue, as I'll show in Part 3.

Wednesday, June 12, 2019

Don't Just Cite Your Sources--Interrogate 'Em!

New York City directory listing for great-great uncle Joseph Jacob
Found a record? Cite your source. But that's not the end of the story.

Don't move on until you understand what, exactly, that source represents.

How was the information gathered, when, and why? What you learn by interrogating your sources may very well change your analysis of the evidence and how it reflects your ancestor's life.

City Directories Fill the Gap

A case in point: Old city directories, which I absolutely love because they can fill in the gaps between the years covered by U.S. and state census records. Many times (but not always) you can find city directories for FREE.

I use HeritageQuest Online (accessed online for free, with my local library card) when searching for ancestors in different cities.

If, like me, you're searching for ancestors in New York City, you can also browse the dozens of city directories posted for free by the New York City Public Library. I actually like to browse because it allows me to look for creative spellings, not rely only on indexing.

Date the Directory

Dates really count. Here, for instance, is one of the front pages from the New York City directory dated 1894.


You would think that means only 1894, right?

Nope. As shown here, the directory's contents actually end with people who were in the city as late as July 1, 1895.

In other words, your ancestor might have moved to the city in early 1895 and would still be listed in the 1894 directory. Or might have moved out in January, 1895, but could be listed in the 1894 directory anyway.

Note the underlined sentence saying that "names received too late for regular insertion are on preceding page." That means you need to check beyond the regular alphabetical listings to see whether your ancestor was included in the "late" names missing from the alpha listings.

Finding Great-Great Uncle Joseph Jacob(s) in 1886-1889

Today I was doing more research into my great-grandma's brother, Joseph Jacobs (1864-1918). Sometimes he's listed as Joe Jacobs, sometimes as Joseph Jacob, and other permutations.

I had previously found his naturalization index card, which shows him as a capmaker living at 49 Clinton Street on October 25, 1888. I also knew he was living at 49 Clinton Street when he married on March 2, 1890.

But when searching the New York City directory for 1888, I found Joseph the capmaker living at 103 Allen Street, "house rear" (see image at top), not on Clinton Street. Both addresses are on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, within walking distance of each other in a neighborhood filled with immigrants.

Digging deeper into the1888 city directory's date, here's what I found.

NYC directory for 1888 ends on May 1, 1888

It appears that great-great-uncle Joe was living on Allen Street sometime before May 1, 1888. Then he moved to Clinton Street later in the year. I checked the 1889 New York City directory (labeled as covering the year ending May 1, 1889) and found Joe on Clinton Street, as expected. 

Finally, I checked the 1886 New York City directory (for year ending May 1, 1887) and found Joseph Jacobs, caps, on Allen Street, as he had been earlier.

Every time I use a city directory, I'll have to check the time period covered. Otherwise, I may place an ancestor in the right place but at the wrong time.

PS: The NY Public Library has a helpful page about what to look at in city directories--see here.

Saturday, April 29, 2017

NERGC 2017 Last day

My last day of #NERGC2017 featured a New York City double-header. First: Susan Miller's 8:30 session on "NYC Municipal Archives." Susan offered a virtual tour of the many valuable records available at the archives, including some (like the Almshouse Records) not well-known but useful.

I scribbled lots of notes on my syllabus page! Top tip: Remember that NYC became a five-borough city only in 1898, and Bronx County wasn't formed till 1914 (before, it was part of NY County, meaning lumped with Manhattan).

Next, Jane Wilcox's session on "New York Gateway," all about immigration, emigration, and migration to and through New York, city and state. Not records, but really interesting historical context about who came when and where, also why.

Top tip: consider how ancestors got from point A to point B. Hubby's Bentley ancestors, for instance, were in Oswego in the 1800s but wound up in Indiana. How? I need to look at waterways, which many used to go to the midwest.

Thank you to the NERGC volunteers and committee and speakers! And a safe trip home to my gen blogger friends, whose company I enjoyed.

Monday, February 16, 2015

Genealogy Do-Over, Week 7: Digitizing Maps and More

Old maps have dates and memories that add richness and detail to my genealogy research.
In week 7 of the Do-Over, I'm digitizing the maps that have been passed down in my family because they're clues to my ancestors' daily lives and some of the places they lived and visited--places that were meaningful to them and to me.

My grandparents on both sides (Schwartz, Farkas, Mahler, Burk) settled in New York City. They never owned a car but they and their children and grandchildren knew the subway and bus routes very, very well.

My in-laws (Wood, McClure) liked to drive to New York City from their home in Cleveland to visit family, see Broadway shows, etc. My father-in-law also saved state maps that were given away by gas stations, including old maps for Indiana, Ohio, and beyond.

Above, part of the family's collection of New York City transit and street maps. The Hagstrom's maps are the oldest, and the World's Fair maps are the youngest (just 50 years old!). All being photographed and inventoried as part of Week 7 in the Do-Over.
PS: The Do-Over participants explained how to add my blog's name to photographs I post. Thank you!