©2018 copyright owned by Deborah Sweeney
Post originally found: https://genealogylady.net/2018/01/31/wordless-wednesday-leonard-siblings/
Wordless Wednesday – Leonard Siblings
Leave a reply
Tag Archives: photograph
Siblings
Gladys and Jim certainly enjoyed posing for the camera. They were the two youngest siblings of their family, born twenty-one months apart. By the 1920s, their oldest sister Lydia Allie (Foster) McCammon had died. An even older half brother—whom they may never have met in person—lived in Arkansas. Jesse was partially raised by their grandparents, James H. and Margaret (Rea) Lawhead, and an uncle Jasper Lawhead. Another brother Glenn moved west at some point. James E. Foster, the father, had long left the family so Gladys and Jim remained to take care of their mother. The siblings possessed strong work ethics and helped to support their mother until Emma died in 1943.
[Photographs from the private collection of the author.]
©2018 copyright owned by Deborah Sweeney
Post originally found: https://genealogylady.net/2018/01/30/siblings/
A Family of Three
Roscoe, Gladys, and John Yegerlehner, 1932 (Photograph from the author’s collection)
Sometimes, even when you think a project is finished, the project isn’t done! I’ve been sorting through the digital images I have stored over the years, from scans of old photographs to my contemporary collection of iPhone photographs. When I posted the collection of pictures of my great grandmother holding my uncle John a few days ago, I completely forgot the above photograph. It belongs in the same pile.
The weather was certainly mild in late February 1932! The 28th landed on a Sunday that year. The perfect day for a family get-together and presumably attending church. Roscoe and Gladys moved frequently in the early days of their marriage. He worked in Clay County teaching school. The setting isn’t rural enough to be Clay County. I presume the photograph’s location to be Terre Haute. In 1932, Emma and James Foster resided at 719 Harrison Street, Terre Haute. When the photographs were taken, James’ divorce from his first wife Gladys was about to be finalized (March 1932). I am also making the assumption that the automobile belonged to Roscoe and Gladys. He bought his first car a year or two before he married Gladys.
719 Harrison Street, Terre Haute (Image courtesy of Google Maps)
If Roscoe, Gladys, Emma, and Jim were standing at the curb, looking back at the house when the photographs were taken, their house would not have been visible. By panning the angles in Google Street view, a large tree obscures the view of the house directly behind the family! Notice the newly planted trees in the background behind Roscoe and Gladys. However, by moving back down the street a house of interest is detected. The two-story house behind Gladys’ head has a gable window as well as roofs of two different heights.
Harrison Street, Terre Haute (Image courtesy of Google maps)
Emma and Jim’s house is the first house on the right. The tree obscures the house directly across the street, but the house with the two roofs and gable is visible to the left of the tree.
Have you searched for an ancestor’s home using Google yet?
©2018 copyright owned by Deborah Sweeney
Post originally found: https://genealogylady.net/2018/01/29/a-family-of-three/
Identifying Everyday Clues in Photographs, Part IV
Today I present the last part of this series focusing on dating the photograph of Elizabeth (Schwartz) Yegerlehner. My aim was to take the reader through the process of dating a single photograph by using clothing cues. Stay tuned for addition posts on specific fashion trends like the evolution of the sleeve, skirt shapes and hair styles. My goal is to make this a weekly post.
At the end of part three in this series, I said that we would look specifically at the clothing worn by the “granddaughter” in the photograph because it is easier to gauge the styles of the young. Before I do that, I want to focus on Elizabeth. I am lucky because I have several identified pictures of Elizabeth. I want to make a point about using hairstyles to date pictures.
Elizabeth Over Four Decades
The earliest photograph was taken in the 1880s. Elizabeth is standing while her husband, Christian Yegerlehner, is seated. The photograph is a fairly typical of the times.
Christian and Elizabeth (Schwartz) Yegerlehner, c1880s (Photograph courtesy of Eric Graham)
The next photograph was taken in 1890-1 in front of the Yegerlehner farmhouse. The baby, William Otto Yegerlehner, was born on 8 March 1890. Elizabeth is standing behind the fence. Her two youngest daughters, Matilda and Sophia, stand with their niece, Bertha (the littlest girl with the doll who was about 4-5 years old).
Christian Yegerlehner Family, in 1890-1, in front of the farmhouse in Clay County, Indiana
The next photograph of Elizabeth was taken with one of her sisters, possibly Sevilla. It was likely taken in the late 1890s.
Elizabeth (Schwartz) Yegerlehner and her sister Sevilla Sheneman (Photograph courtesy of Eric Graham)
Here again is another photograph of Elizabeth. This time her daughter, Sophia, as well as another un-named sister are in the picture.
Elizabeth (Schwartz) Yegerlehner with her daughter Sophia and an un-named sister, c1900 (Photograph courtesy of Eric Graham)
A few years later, Elizabeth took another photograph with Sophia. This time Sophia’s son, Russell, is in the picture. Russell was born in 1905 so this photograph was probably taken about 1909. Sophia lived in Indianapolis and she was very fashionably dressed for the times. Her hair is a wonderful example of the style.
Elizabeth (Schwartz) Yegerlehner with her daughter, Sophia, and grandson, Russell, c.1909. (Photograph courtesy of Eric Graham)
During the 1910s, Elizabeth sat for a photograph with Elizabeth (Krieble) Schiele. Both grandmothers lived with John Henry Yegerlehner and his wife, Lovina (Schiele) Yegerlehner, near the end of their lives. Both women died in 1922.
Elizabeth posed with some of her great grandchildren around 1919. She had only one granddaughter (with three children) by 1922. The only candidate is Mary Anna (Wolfe) Snedeker. Her oldest three children were Walter, Mary and Charles. The youngest was born in 1918. Elizabeth is wearing a white shirtwaist which is very a-typical of her! at least in comparison to her other photographs.
The one thing I want to point out about Elizabeth in these pictures is that her hair style did not change for 40 years – a part in the middle with a bun in back. Judging a photograph based on hair alone is NOT a good idea!
Back to the Photograph!
So far, I have written down every noticeable detail about the clothing in the photograph. I created age ranges based upon the possible candidates for Elizabeth’s grand-daughter. To recap, there are seven possible women:
- Emma’s range (1899-1908)
- Mary Anna’s range (1901-1910)
- Bertha’s range (1902-1911)
- Minnie’s range (1904-1913)
- Pearl’s range (1911-1920)
- Sophie Grace (1913-1922)
- Bertha Steuernagel’s range (1902-1911)
Around 1910, fashion began moving away from from the trends of the 19th century. The women’s silhouette became more columnar, and excessive curves of the late 1890s and early 1900s became straighter. One result was skirts became less full, using less fabric. Instead of being triangular (narrow at the hips, wide at the base), skirts were more rectangular. The hobble skirt, a short lived fashion trend from 1910-1913 was the epitome of the straight and narrow. While I doubt that my unknown Indiana farm girl indulged in such fashion, it is important to know what was happening in the fashion world. Another result of the shift in fashion was the elevation of the waist line.
On the other side of Indiana in 1913, my great grandparents, Robert and Sara (Troxell) McGraw, celebrated their 50th anniversary. They had a large family and many friends came to celebrate the occasion. They all posed for a photograph. I am showing this photograph because they were of a similar socioeconomic status as my Yegerlehner relations. They also lived within 150 hundred miles of each other. Notice the waistlines on the women – young and old. The majority of the women are wearing dresses or shirtwaists and skirts that are higher than the natural waist.
Robert and Sara McGraw 50th Anniversary, 1913, Fayette County, Indiana
Our mystery Wolf woman is wearing a dress that sits at her natural waist. I would deduce that my photograph was taken before 1910. Therefore this eliminates Pearl and Sophie Grace as likely candidates for the mystery girl. The earliest date in their ranges occurs after 1910. I would also point out (based upon the photograph of Elizabeth with her great grandchildren) that the mystery woman does not look like Mary Anna (Wolfe) Snedeker. So Mary is probably not the mystery girl either. So we are left with Emma, Bertha Wolfe, Minnie and Bertha Steuernagel as possible candidates. The remaining girls have ranges that are virtually identical so I am not likely to determine who the mystery girl is. My only hope at this point is to find a relative from the Wolfe or Steuernagel branches who can identify her.
The Years 1900-1910
Our mystery girl’s silhouette reminds me very much of the Gibson girl. Charles Dana Gibson was an illustrator from the 1890s onward. His illustration “Love in a Garden” was published in 1901.
Love in a Garden by Charles Dana Gibson, 1901 (Image via Wikipedia Commons in the public domain)
In 1901, fashionable women were still piling their hair on top of their heads. Our mystery girl’s hair is not. She has fullness at the side of her head instead of on top. Here are some factory workers in 1908 in Indianapolis with some more realistic hair styles:
Lewis Hine Collection. Library of Congress. Young People in An Indianapolis Cotton Mill, Noon, Aug., 1908
I would also point out that several of the young woman are wearing half sleeves and their shirtwaists are collarless, in particular the woman in the front row with the checkered pattern.
Conclusion
Ultimately, we can only do our best to date photographs. Fashion is not static. We can learn the trends but we can not always account for all the variables. While I would estimate that this photograph was taken mid decade, I could be off by a couple years in either direction. There are many resources out there and many are free! If you are interested in honing your photography skills, check out Mauren Taylor’s website: http://www.maureentaylor.com/ She covers additional photo identifying techniques beyond clothing.
Come back next week to find out more about a specific fashion trend! If you have a topic that you would like me to cover, leave a comment below.
If you missed the first three posts in the series:
https://genealogylady.net/2015/05/02/identifying-everyday-clues-in-photographs-part-i/
https://genealogylady.net/2015/05/09/identifying-everyday-clues-in-photographs-part-ii/
https://genealogylady.net/2015/05/16/identifying-everyday-clues-in-photographs-part-iii/
©2015 copyright by Deborah Sweeney
Post originally found: https://genealogylady.net/2015/05/23/identifying-everyday-clues-in-photographs-part-iv/
Identifying Everyday Clues in Photographs, Part II
In my first post in this series, I set out to date a photograph of my 2X great grandmother, Elizabeth (Schwartz) Yegerlehner and one of her granddaughters, an unidentified Wolfe. I went through the process of identifying clues in the photograph that would provide me with usable information. Each woman was broken down by age and by the various parts of her clothing.
Before we proceed further, I want to add a few fashion warnings. Dating photographs is never a precise process, and oftentimes, without other documentary evidence, may never be completely accurate. My goal is to help the average genealogist or vintage photography enthusiast to understand and recognize fashion trends as well as to give advice for finding resources.
- Older people may not change their clothing fashions as quickly as younger persons do or be inclined to adopt new trends, however this is not always the case. A great example would be in the costumes of Downton Abbey. The Dowager Duchess was wealthy enough to buy new clothing every season but her clothing style evolved more slowly than some of the younger characters like those of her granddaughters: Mary, Edith and Sybil.
- People from metropolitan areas are more fashionable than rural areas (sometimes!). With the advent of ladies and fashion periodicals, like Godey’s Lady’s Book, country women were able to see the latest fashions more quickly. Mail order catalogues, like Sears, Roebuck & Co. and the National Cloak & Suit Co., allowed women away from the big cities to purchase the latest fashions. Even if they made their own clothing, they could be inspired by the fashion plates. Pattern companies, like McCall’s and Butterick, also sold high fashion to rural customers.
- Working class people dressed differently than wealthier people. One must always consider class when dating a photograph. The “best” dress for a poorer woman might last for many years while the “best” dress for a wealthy woman might last one season. People tended to hold onto clothing, and remade dresses year after year, as well as handing them down to young folk.
The second step is to Identify the Period Silhouette:
What is a period silhouette, you might ask? A handout from the The Secret Life of Costumes by Canada’s National Art Centre describes it thus….
“A silhouette provides an uncluttered outline of the basic shape of a person from a particular period in history as dictated by the clothing worn. Each shape is different from any in the century either before or after. The outline of your body wearing today’s styles would be very different from your great grandmother’s or grandfather’s shape at the same age.”
The pdf article contains wonderful advice as well as a fun activity for identifying some different silhouettes. Make sure you download it for future reference!
Fashion silhouettes can change very rapidly. They can also overlap as evidenced by my first point above. A woman from 1880 will have a different silhouette from a woman in 1860 or 1900. In both of my costume history courses, I was required to keep a sketchbook of period silhouettes for every century from the 1st through the 20th, for men and women. Within a hundred year period, fashion silhouettes can change a dozen times or more. Just for fun, I’m including two costume renderings from two different time periods, about 100 years apart. Try guessing the decades of the two pictures, and leave your answer in the comments!
-
- Painted by Deborah Sweeney
-
- Painted by Deborah Sweeney
Learning the intricacies of fashion trends takes time, and requires paying attention to little details.
There are many great resources for learning about historical fashion trends, in contemporary documents. Here are a few:
A couple sources for Godey’s Lady’s Book
http://www.accessible-archives.com/collections/godeys-ladys-book/
http://onlinebooks.library.upenn.edu/webbin/serial?id=godeylady
Ancestry has many Sears catalogs available for searching from 1896-1993. To find them, go to Ancestry’s main catalogue and search under Sears. You can browse by year. Many years had more than one to chose from (spring/fall).
Internet Archive has many old catalogs and magazines in their collection. Here is a National Cloak & Suit Co. catalogue from 1907: https://archive.org/details/newyorkfashions00nati
Dover books sells reprints of old fashion catalogues. Be careful of some of their “costume” books as they are secondary sources.
http://store.doverpublications.com/by-subject-fashion-and-costume-vintage-fashion-catalogs.html
Dated photographs are great resources since fashion plates are not always realistically drawn.
The Library of Congress has a Civil War Collection: http://www.loc.gov/pictures/collection/cwp/
The website PhotoTree has thousands of dated photographs:
http://www.phototree.com/gallery.asp?cat=90s&f0=1890s
Several museums have clothing collections.
One of my favorite is the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute. Here is an example of a shirtwaist, dated 1899-1902:
http://www.metmuseum.org/collection/the-collection-online/search/109353?rpp=30&pg=1&ft=shirtwaist&pos=10
©2015 copyright by Deborah Sweeney
Post originally found: https://genealogylady.net/2015/05/09/identifying-everyday-clues-in-photographs-part-ii/
Genealogy Crowd Sourcing (with family)
One of the tasks in my quest to organize and scan all the hundreds of photographs in my personal collection is to label the photographs as much as I am able. Many of the photographs from the Yegerlehner collection are labeled. Between my father and my grandmother, they did a great job overall. However, there are still hundreds of unlabeled photographs. This is where my genealogy crowd sourcing comes into the equation.
The Yegerlehner family was very good at staying in touch. They regularly had family functions and reunions. They were great about taking group photographs and not necessarily great at labeling all the individuals in the pictures. I have dozens of pictures from family reunions over the decades. Many of the individuals in the photographs are no longer living. There are children and grandchildren still living who can still identify them. While I don’t know many of my Yegerlehner second and third cousins, I am trying to connect with them. Facebook has been a great tool for finding long lost cousins and I have been relatively successful with this strategy.
After scanning the original photographs for preservation, I made a second copy in which I numbered all the people. Since I had two pictures from differing viewpoints, I numbered the people the same between them. People shifted and moved around (or left the photo). In one picture, it was easier to see an individual and in the other not.
This weekend I posted a few photographs on Facebook in an effort to start identifying the people in the photographs. It was great to see the various family members agreeing as to “who was who.” To reach a broader audience, I am going to share some of the pictures here as well.
These four photographs were taken in November 1940 when Roscoe and Gladys celebrated their housewarming party for the house on E. Dunlop street in Kentland. All of the Yegerlehner siblings came with their families.
-
- Group pose #1
-
- Group pose #2
-
- Roscoe and Gladys (with an unknown girl in window)
-
- The house on E. Dunlop Street, 1940
For those readers who have been following along with the letters, here are some of the faces that go with the familiar names.
#1 – Caroline Mary Yegerlehner
#2 – Mark Yegerlehner
#3 –
#4 –
#5 – John Yegerlehner
#6 –
#7 –
#8 – Ruth Yegerlehner (Floyd’s wife)
#9 – Dolores Yegerlehner?
#10 – Silvester Schiele
#11 –
#12 –
#13 –
#14 –
#15 –
#16 – John Henry Yegerlehner
#17 –
#18 – Jesse Schiele
#19 – Emma Foster
#20 – Floyd Yegerlehner
#21 – Romaine Mutchler
#22 – Gladys Yegerlehner
#23 – Clarence Yegerlehner
#24 – Ruth Mutchler
#25 – Earl Mutchler
#26 – Lovina Yegerlehner
#27 – Ralph Yegerlehner
#28 – Samuel Yegerlehner
#29 – Roscoe Yegerlehner
Photographs from the private collection of Deborah Sweeney.
© Deborah Sweeney, 2014.
Post originally found: http://genealogylady.net/2014/04/28/genealogy-crowd-sourcing-with-family/
Book of Me – Prompt 6: Diaries and Journals
The Book of Me – Written by You is a weekly blog prompt created by Julie Goucher of the blog Angler’s Rest. This is a fifteen month writing project to highlight my life so that I will have something to leave behind for my descendants. Week six asks about personal diaries and journals. For those of you who have been following along, this week I am not using my traditional 3rd person narrative. I did not feel that the prompt supported that format.
- Do you keep a diary or journal?
- When did you start?
- What information do you record?
- How do you keep a journal – written or electronic?
- If you have a written journal, do you always buy the same one or buy whatever takes your fancy?
- What are your succession plans for you journals & diaries?
- Do you include pictures & other items as a way of recording events?
- What do you use to write your journal – a special pen, or a fountain pen, or even the closest writing implement to hand?
- Have you inherited any? If you have what are your plans for them?
Failed journals
When I first read this week’s prompt, I admit my first response was to be a little flip. Do you keep a diary or journal? No. When did you start? Not applicable. What information do you record? Not applicable…and so on. I have attempted to write a journal in the past. It was mostly in my young, carefree and unattached adulthood. Back when I had time to spare, and little responsibility to anyone beyond myself. I never wrote one when I was a kid, at least that I recall. I do have the four journals that I attempted to use to express my feelings and daily activities. These were all purchased in the late 1980s or early 1990s. One is filled with poetry that I liked at the time. Another is virtually blank. It was also purchased to record inspiring quotes and poetry. The third book I used as a travel journal on my big adventure through Great Britain in 1991, although it had been started a couple years earlier as a combination budget book and who knows what else. Again, the book is only half filled. The fourth book does have some more traditional diary like entries but it is not completely used either. Half the pages are empty, like a broken promise.
The fact of the matter is I am just not that kind of a person. I have my daily routines, like having tea first thing in the morning, every morning, rain or shine, no matter what. I can’t stand coffee. I even travel with my own tea bags so I can have my tea. But writing is not part of my routine. As I stated in one of my early blog posts last year when I began my blog, I have never thought of myself as a writer. I’m an artist. I express myself in other ways. I have never used words as my medium before. So the questions remain hanging in the air. Do you keep a diary or journal?
No, but I have other things that paint a picture of my life. There are the quilts that I have made for myself and my children. I have the programs of all the theatrical shows I worked on during my college and graduate school years and some from later on when I started to work professionally. I have renderings of costumes I designed, pictures of costumes I constructed (and sweated over), and clothes that I have made for myself. I am the family photographer. I have photographs. I have scrapbooks that I made using some of those photographs. I manage the collection of photographs that chronicle all the trips we have taken, the special events and holidays, and the ordinary. A picture is worth a thousand words, right? And now that I have taken the steps to “become” a writer, I have my blog. Granted the major focus of my blog is transcribing the letters of my grandparents. But doing that is part of my daily routine. When my descendants look through my daily chattel, they can deduce what I did every day for 3 or 4 or how many years it takes me to get through this immense stack of letters. And in today’s (and the future’s) age of technology, I am sure my descendants will figure out a way to see all my ordinary everyday Facebook posts. That’s about as close as I am ever going to get to writing a journal.
Berets knit by Deborah Sweeney
Costume rendering Merchant of Venice
Costume from Merry Wives of Windsor
Sweater by Deborah Sweeney
The above photographs were all taken by Deborah Sweeney
P.S. On a side note, my father has been keeping a daily journal since I was one month old. Let’s just say I am officially middle aged so that is a really long time! I have already made my case as the family archivist that I want those journals and he has already made provisions for the journals to be passed on to me when he is gone. So no, I haven’t inherited any journals yet but I will someday but I am more than happy to wait.
©2013 copyright owned and written by Deborah Sweeney
Post originally found at: https://genealogylady.net/2013/10/05/book-of-me-pro…s-and-journals/
Genealogy Lady 