The Basement House

The reporting of the terrible tornado that devastated a community near Oklahoma City, Oklahoma brought to mind root cellars. If you watched the Wizard of Oz movie with Judy Garland, her aunt and uncle took shelter in the root cellar as a tornado was approaching. I remember visiting relatives who lived on farms having root cellars.

The root cellar was under the house and access was from outside. They were not very deep, but deep enough to store vegetables. Most had a dirt floor. In the days of root cellars, they served an additional function, that of a storm cellar.

My parents bought a house in the city. Like all the houses on my street, we had a basement. I am not sure, but I think that city houses had basements to accommodate the furnace that was used to heat the house. Our house had a huge gas furnace but the older houses must have had coal burning furnaces because a couple of the old houses in my neighborhood had coal chutes from a small window at ground level into the basement below. I can't recall visiting a house in Minneapolis that didn't have a full basement.

Not all of my friends and relatives had lived in an above ground house. Some lived for a short time in a basement house. Instead of buying an existing house, the family purchased the land and built their own house. The first step was making the basement and foundation for the eventual house.

It usually took a few years to complete the entire house. Once the basement was complete, some families moved into the basement. When the main floor was finished, the family moved up to the main floor.

The basement house had a distinct appearance. It was a small structure on with a door. I remember these so distinctly that I was certain there would be a photograph on the Internet. I was surprised to find almost none. It seems now a basement house has a new meaning.

This was the only image that I could find of the entrance of a basement house like those of my childhood.





 

My Childhood House -- So Huge Yet So Small

It was many years that I last saw the house where I lived until I was twelve. In my memory, it was a big house with a big backyard. I was married with children when I saw my house next. Oh my! How very tiny!

The exterior of the house wasn't much different from when we moved. Most changes were in the landscape. The lilac bush that stood near the street on the left side of the yard was gone.

The tree near the front of the house to the left of the walkway was gone as well. I wasn't surprised as it was struck by lightning about a month before we moved. A portion of the tree was split from the tree so I expect that the tree didn't survive the next winter.

The tree on the right side of the walkway was still there. My father and I visited his uncle's farm one day and came home with a sapling. It was the first tree in our yard. When we moved, the trunk of that tree wasn't much more than 5 inches in diameter. How it had grown!

The next time that I saw the house was 10 years later. The exterior was quite different. The fake stone façade was removed and new windows installed. The poor little house looked quite plain.

When my sister and I visited the house in 1991, we did not see if the residents were at home. When we visited the house in 2001, she knocked on the door. The son of the current owner was home and invited us in to see the house.

We learned that his parents bought the house from our parents. They had not enlarged it or appreciably remodeled it other than adding a deck behind the house. The huge old furnace in the basement had been replaced by a much smaller, modern one. I remember that it seemed to take up a large portion of the basement on one side of the staircase. As my sister and I walked through the house, we couldn't image how 8 people fit in that house.

About a year ago, I saw the house again. I don't know if the people who owned it in 2001 were the current owners, but whoever owned the house had made a number of improvements to the exterior and the landscaping. I am really sorry that the fake stone façade was removed. But the red door and the shutters on the windows really help make the little cute again.

I am hoping that the interior was updated too.

Most of the houses on our side of the street looked like this house. We called them Monopoly houses because they were shaped just like the green houses in a Monopoly game. They were built after World War II to support the baby boom. When my parents bought this house, it had two bedrooms, one bathroom, a living room, a kitchen, a basement and an attic.

The front door opens to the living room, which is on the right of the photo. The window on the left side of the door is in the master bedroom. The second bedroom is behind it. Behind the living room is a staircase to the attic. The kitchen is on the other side of staircase. Below this staircase is one to the basement and is accessed from the kitchen. The bathroom is located between the rear bedroom and the kitchen.

As our family grew in size, my father finished half of the basement into a recreation room, sometimes called a rumpus room. One year, my grandfather came from California to help my dad turn the attic into another bedroom with storage space.

That house holds a lot of fond memories.

 

Shingles Vaccine and Shingles (Herpes Zoster)

Shingles is caused by the same virus that causes chickenpox, varicella-zoster virus. After the symptoms of chickenpox have disappeared, the virus remains in a dormant state in the nerve tissues. When the immune system of a person who had chickenpox is compromised, then there is a potential of an outbreak of shingles.
 
I have not found a definitive explanation of what a compromised immune system is. Stress appears to be a factor but lots of people have stress yet not everyone has an outbreak of shingles. Earlier this week, I was diagnosed with shingles. My doctor asked me if I was having a lot of stress. Considering that my daughter had just received her MD and in a week my son will be hooded for his PhD, I didn't see that stress was a factor in my case.
 
I was given the shingles vaccine about 5 years ago. As friends and family learn that I have shingles, I heard many comments. The most common is "I thought the vaccine was supposed to prevent shingles."
 
Well, I am testimony that it does not. In fact having shingles does not prevent you from another outbreak. So what does the vaccine do?
 

• Can help prevent an outbreak of shingles if you have had chickenpox.
• Can help prevent a recurrence of shingles if you have had a previous outbreak of it.
• Shorten the duration of the outbreak.
• Affect the degree of pain during an outbreak.
• Affect the incident of post-outbreak pain.

 
The articles that I read concerning shingles use the phrase "can prevent" not "will prevent." Apparently, the vaccine reduces the risk of developing shingles by 50%. That might not seem like a lot, but shingles is very painful and can pose some serious long term issues.
 
Before the shingles vaccine was introduced, I knew a few friends and relatives who had shingles. They all talked about the excruciating pain and how long it took to be pain free. The duration of pain and the severity of it seem to be what the vaccine helps. My doctor told me that it was most beneficial in preventing the pain that lasted after the blisters and scabs disappeared.
 
The vaccine is primarily available to people 50 or older because the incidence of shingles is much higher as you age. Apparently the number of people who had a bout of shingles in which the pain lasted months or even years increased markedly in the older population. This pain is called postherpetic neuralgia; meaning pain due to nerve damage from the herpes virus.
 
I couldn't tell from the articles I read what percentage of people who have an outbreak of shingles suffered postherpetic neuralgia. However, according to WebMD, over 50% of the cases of postherpetic neuralgia occur in people over 60.

Last weekend, I was having some strange pain in one spot on my right side but could find no evidence of a bruise, irritation, or sore. The next day, the pain near my armpit was worse and an area of pain appeared near my shoulder blade. When the pain turned from an ache to a tingling sensation, I suspected shingles.

I made an appointment with my doctor. A rash was just beginning to appear when she examined me. That turns out to be significant because the anti-viral drug is more effective if started within 72 hours of the appearance of the rash.

Although I am not a "happy camper," the pain and discomfort I am feeling is not unbearable. This is largely due to the fact I did have the shingles vaccine in combination with the medications that were prescribed for  me.

For more information regarding shingles, chickenpox, the vaccine and treatment for shingles, visit the CDC and WebMD web sites. Both sites have information regarding who should not receive the vaccine.

John Stoughtenburgh Prince Update

The other day I wrote about Mayor John S. Prince and speculated that his namesake was John Stoutenburgh, the son of Isaac Stoutenburgh and Elizabeth Will. I just had to know if my hunch was correct.

Isaac Stoutenburgh was a very prominent figure in New York City where John Prince's mother was born. Her mother was Bridget Turner who would have been a contemporary of Isaac's son, John Stoutenburgh. Charlotte's grandfather, John Turner, would have been a contemporary of Isaac Stoutenburgh. So I decided to look at the 1790 Census and some directories and records of New York City between American Revolution and 1800.

Isaac Stoutenburgh and his son John were merchants as was John Turner. Isaac Stoutenburgh and John Turner had business locations near one another. I did not find anything that would imply that the Stoutenburgh family and the John Turner family had a close relationship. Hence I was becoming less certain that John Stoughtenburgh Prince was named after John Stoutenburg.

Isaac Stoutenburgh was a colonel during the American Revolution. He represented New York City in the newly formed state's government. He was an alderman in New York City for many years. Isaac was the Commission of Forfeiture for the Southern District along with Pierre Van Cortlandt.

Although I cannot rule out that John Prince's namesake was John Stoutenburgh, I have a stronger sense that his mother chose his given name to honor her grandfather John Turner. Then she chose for a middlename Stoughtenburgh in honor of the more well-known person of her childhood, Isaac Stoutenburgh.

John Stoughtenburgh Prince

A few years ago as I was researching my ancestry, I came across John Stoughtenburgh Prince. I found several books and websites that either mention this man or include a small biography of him. None of the articles or books gave me much information about his ancestors.

I had made the assumption that he might be a descendant of Pieter Stoutenburg based on his middle name through his mother. However, I did not rule out that he might be a Stoutenburg descendant from his father's family. At that time, I was not able to find anything that would connect him to Pieter Stoutenburg.

John Stoughtenburgh Prince settled at St. Paul, Minnesota about 1854. He was a banker and also held the office of mayor for several terms. From what I read, he was a very influential person in St. Paul during his life. He was the son of Joseph Prince and Charlotte Osborne and was born in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1821.

The only other Stoutenburg descendant who had lived in St. Paul before the late 20th Century was Frank Stoutenburg. I already knew that Frank Stoutenburg was born in Iowa but spent his childhood in the State of New York before heading west to Minnesota. Frank arrived in Minnesota around the time that John Stoughtenburgh Prince died. As far as I could tell there was no connection between these men.

I had hit a brick wall and decided to move on to another area of my research. But the other day that name popped up while I was searching for information on someone else. This time I came across a book published in 2009 that was authored by descendants of John Prince's sister, Amelia Prince, entitled John Broome and Rebecca Lloyd Their Descendants and Related Families 18th to 21st Centuries Volume 1.

Pages 149 - 151 of the book provided me with enough clues to resume my search to find a connection. Charlotte Osborne was born in New York City in 1797. Joseph Prince was born in Boston, Massachusetts in 1788. He and Charlotte Osborne married in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1818. The book gave no indication as to how these two met, nor why they were in Cincinnati in 1818. Joseph Prince's father was the mayor of Cincinnati in 1803 so it would appear that Joseph and his parents were in Ohio before 1803.

After the Revolutionary War, the US government paid soldiers of that war in land warrants. The warrants were mostly for land in what is now the State of Ohio in what was then the Northwest Territory (Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, Illinois, Wisconsin and parts of Minnesota). In March 1803, Ohio became a state and what was left of the Northwest Territory became the Indiana Territory. As parts of the original Northwest Territory became states what remained subsequently became the Illinois Territory, Michigan Territory, Wisconsin Territory and finally the Minnesota Territory.

It seemed to me very unlikely that Joseph Prince and his father had much contact with the Stoutenburgs of New York. When I learned from the book that Charlotte Osborne was born in New York City in 1797, I decided to look for the connection there. Her father, Bilious Ward Osborne was from New Haven, Connecticut but married in New York City Bridget Turner, the daughter of John Turner of New York City.

After Joseph Prince died in 1833, Charlotte was a widow with small children so it was only natural that she would remarry. According to the book, she married Gabriel Franchere in Detroit, Michigan and a Colonel Mack was a witness. Charlotte Osborne and Joseph Prince had a son named James Tallant Prince and a son named Andrew Mack Prince.

I could not find any direct relationship with the Stoutenburg family in New York City and wondered if their sons might be named after influential friends or business relations. Since Col. Mack was at witness at Charlotte Osborne's second marriage, I did some research on an Andrew Mack because one son was Andrew Mack Prince. I found that Col. Andrew Mack was in the Ohio Assembly and ran for mayor of Cincinnati in 1829, the same year in which Andrew Mack Prince was born. Col. Andrew Mack was the founder of the Detroit Free Press and was a mayor of Detroit.

Next I turned to James Tallant Prince. I wondered if there was a James Tallant living in Cincinnati about the time that James Tallant Prince was born. Well, there was! I found a court case in Louisiana in 1830 in which a James Tallant was involved. He was the owner of a steamship, Walter Scott, in Cincinnati.

Now I wondered if there was a John Stoutenburgh in Cincinnati, Ohio about the time the John Stoughtenburgh Prince was born. I haven't found any such person. Then I next wondered if there was a connection to Charlotte's family when she lived in New York City. I haven't found a clear link but Isaac Stoutenburgh was a very wealthy merchant and auctioneer in New York around that time. He had a son, John Stoutenburgh, who followed in his father's footsteps.

I don't absolute proof that John Stoughtenburgh Prince was named for Isaac and Elizabeth Will Stoutenburgh's son John. But it does seem very likely to me.

A Tale of Two Collingwoods

As a child, I was told that my great-great grandfather was born in Collingwood, Ontario, Canada. Since I was born in the United States as was my mother, her father and her grandfather, Collingwood, Canada was just a name. I had no idea where Collingwood was except that it was in the Province of Ontario.

 

When I first started the research on my ancestors, I found some death records of descendants of some of my great-great grandfather's siblings in Collingwood, Simcoe County. I assumed that he was born in Collingwood, Simcoe County. Later I discovered via census images that his parents had settled in Collingwood Township. Grey County, Ontario.

 

It doesn't surprise me when I come across family trees that have him and some of his siblings born in the wrong Collingwood. However, last week I came across a record that did surprise me because the record was made about a cousin by herself.

 

In 1958, at age 65, Edith Victoria Schnack filled out a statement of birth form. She was living in Edmonton, Alberta at that time. I found voter registrations that place her in Edmonton by 1945. And I found information about a son, Keith Schnack, who born in Edmonton in 1929.

 

From the information that she wrote, it appears that she knew very little about her parents or of her own birth. I am a bit surprised that she didn't know more about her parents because she was 21 years old when her mother died and 20 when her father died.

 

She responded to many of the questions on the form with "no knowledge." I am not surprised that she didn't know how much she weighed at birth or how many weeks in duration her mother's pregnancy was before her mother gave birth to her. The thing that did surprise me was that she did not know how old her parents were when she was born.

 

Edith gave her birth name as Edith Victoria Weldric (sic), her father's name as George Weldric and her mother's name as Caroline Gardiner. I have no idea why she would record her mother’s name as Caroline because I found no records in which Ann Caroline Gardiner Weldrick is identified as Caroline. In the census records, she is found as Ann or Anna. The name on her gravestone and death register is Ann Caroline Gardiner.

 

Edith believes that she was born in Collingwood, Collingwood Twp., Simcoe County, Ontario at Collingwood Hospital. I think that she confused Collingwood Township with the town. The Collingwood in Simcoe County is in Nottawasaga Township. Collingwood Township is in Grey County. Collingwood the town and Collingwood the township are proximate to each other with Grey to the west of Simcoe. Grey County was established in 1852, taken from Simcoe County. Collingwood Township borders the Georgian Bay and the town of Collingwood sits on the bay.

 

Confusing?

 

Edith’s parents were living at Concession 9, Lot 11 in Collingwood Township, Grey County, Ontario in 1901. Between an 1880 map of Collingwood Township and a Google map of the Town of Blue Mountain (current name of Collingwood Twp.), I was able to find where the family lived in 1901. The farm was located between the village of Ravenna and the Red Wing post office. The town of Collingwood is a little more than 8 miles east of their farm.

 

Her parents were living in Collingwood Township in 1891, 1901 and 1911. According to the Death Register, George Weldrick died on May 4, 1915 at his home at Concession 9, Lot 11 in Collingwood Twp., Grey Co. Ann Caroline Gardiner Weldrick died in Ravenna. Both are buried in the Thornbury-Clarksburg Union Cemetery in Collingwood Twp. Since it appears that George and Ann lived their married life near Ravenna, I suspect that Edith has confused Collingwood Township with the town.

 

But I would normally assume that a person would know where he/she was born so I decided to see if I could find a birth record of her birth in Simcoe County. I simply did a search at Ancestry.com for a female born on October 9, 1893 in Simcoe County. I found 3 names but none matched with her. Because the 1901 census recorded the date of her birth as October 9, 1894, I looked for her on that date. Again a few females were born in Simcoe County on that date but none matched her. Repeating the search, I looked for a female born in October of 1893 and in October of 1894. The searches returned more names but no matches.

 

Since Edith wrote on her statement of birth that she was born in Simcoe County, I wondered if she had tried to get a record of her birth from the wrong place and assumed that no record of her birth existed. At that point, I decided to look for a record around those dates in Grey County. Again, nothing matched. The next tactic I took was to look at each image in the birth register for Grey County in 1893 and 1894. A curious result occurred. Many of the images of the birth records were either a delayed birth record or a statement of birth.

 

I wonder what happened at that time that so many births were either not recorded in Grey County? Perhaps, the records were lost.

Who is Country Music Historian Robert Ray Gardiner Junior?

Canada Gen Web has a Cemetery Project in which volunteers take photographs of gravestones at cemeteries throughout the provinces and territories. Luke Stoutenburg and his wife, Elizabeth Case, settled in Upper Canada in the early 1800s. Upper Canada, also later called Canada West, is today's Province of Ontario. Their son and my ancestor settled in Grey County, Ontario.

I had some idea that many of my family members were buried in the Thornbury-Clarksburg Union Cemetery. My assumption was clearly true because as I viewed the gravestone images at this website, I found photos of the gravestones of many members of the Peter Stoutenburg and Caroline Ashton family and their descendants.

One photo intrigued me. It is the photo of the gravestone of Robert Ray Gardiner, Jr. His father is Robert Ray Gardiner who was born in 1913. His mother is Wilda Olive Simmons who was born in 1914. The only date on the Robert Junior's gravestone is June 24, 1935. This could be construed as the date on which Robert Junior died.

Based on the dates when each of his parents were born, it would seem that Robert Junior died as an infant. However, the other text on the gravestone implies that date on the gravestone is not the date of his death. It appears to be the date of his birth.

The text on the gravestone reads:

GARDINER
Robert Ray
June 24, 1935
County Music Historian
Keep it country
Loving son of Ray & Wilda
Praise the Lord
I saw the light

It's unlikely that a son who died in infancy was a country music historian. I tried to find out more about this person on Google but did find any additional information.

Maybe I'll find something later.