Reading a Death Certificate

I have read many death certificates as a part of my family history research. Often times I found numbers written by hand in the margins and in the middle of the page. I just assumed that they were some codes used in filing the death certificates so I did not pay much attention.

Today, I was looking at a death index from the State of New York. One of the columns was labeled "cause of death." The contents of that column were all numbers. The numbers were mostly 3 digits long. Being curious as to the cause of death of a relative, I was curious what those numbers meant.

There is an international classification of diseases (IDC) that has been in existence since the early half of the twentieth century. It has been revised over the years and is now replaced with a different coding system.

I revisited the images of death certificates that I have. My great-grandmother's death certificate was one of the first at which I viewed. Her name was Anna Stevens Stoutenburg so it was near the top of the list of files. She died in 1955. Since I remember visiting her and the dresses she made for me, I was hoping that I would find a handwritten number somewhere on her death certificate.

In the left margin were written three numbers, one on top of the other. They were 277, 270, and 99. None of these numbers in the 1948 revision of the IDC fit with her cause of death. It is written on her death certificate that she died of a cerebrovascular accident, i.e., a stroke.

I found 270 also written in the part of the form that gives her usual residence. Next to the name of her spouse, I saw written 331X. In the IDC, 331 is the code for cerebrovascular accident. Now I knew what the cause of death of the distance New York cousin.

I was briefly a Boy Scout

The Boy Scouts of America (BSA) is changing its name to Scouts of America. The BSA has seen a gradual decline in its membership. The organization experimented with allowing girls to join in their younger program (7-10 years old). It was a success and the boys in this age group did not have a problem with girls in the organization. As a former marketing executive the decision by the BSA made complete sense to me for an organization that wants to survive.


American Express and Wells Fargo are companies that transformed themselves in order to survive. Both of these companies that are well-known in the financial section started out as wagon freight and passenger companies. These companies were threatened by the emergence of the transcontinental railroad.


It looks like the BSA is also trying to transform itself somewhat in order to survive. It is no surprise that the Girl Scouts of America is having issues with the BSA's decision as the organization sees the BSA as potentially taking away potential members.


Change is hard for many. I remember when my church replaced the hymnals that included the order of service. I had memorized every part of service and then this new hymnal changed a lot of chanting portions. I suddenly felt as if I had come to a new place. I adjusted and thankfully I have been able to adjust to other changes that have happened in my church over the years.


So when was I a boy scout...
I was in high school in the 1960s. I wanted to be a doctor. I discovered a club at my high school. It was called Medical Explorers so I joined. More girls joined than boys. We went on several trips to the Orange County Medical Hospital. At some point, the Boy Scouts of America discovered that it had a troop of more females than males. That was when I lost my status as a Boy Scout.


I was a Girl Scout and a Pioneer Girl too.

Trip to Washington and Freemasons

I spent several days in Washington, D. C., last week and visited war monuments and museums. The first war monument that I visited was the World War II Memorial because my father was a proud veteran of that war. Unfortunately, he did not live long enough to see the memorial come to reality. As I walked around the memorial, I encountered a few veterans that were visiting the memorial in wheelchairs. They were there because of the Honor Flight Network.


There was a small monument dedicated to the residents of Washington DC who lost their life in World War I. It had inscribed the names of every Washington DC resident who died in that war.


Then, I came across the Korean War monument. I was captivated by this monument. Unlike the other monuments, this monument was full of statues of men who looked as if they were in the middle of a march. I felt that a monument like this would have been a better monument to honor the military men of World War II.


The last war monument that I visited was the Vietnam veterans' memorial. Like the Washington DC WWI memorial to its dead, recorded the names of all of its dead. Although I am glad that there is a monument to those who died in the Vietnam war, I would have like it to be like the Korean War memorial. I found the name of one of my classmates on that wall. I found myself choked with emotion.


The next day, I went to the Portrait Gallery and the Holocaust Museum. As I viewed the portraits of our presidents. I found myself looking at their eyes. I have blue eyes but had learned at some time that blue eyes are recessive. As I looked at these portraits, I was struck by the number of blue eyed presidents. The majority of our presidents had blue, gray-blue, gray and hazel eyes.


Then, I visited the Holocaust Museum. I had no idea that Hitler also targeted freemasons. Fourteen of our presidents were freemasons and 14 of our vice presidents were freemasons. Our founding father, George Washington, was a freemason. But the most chilling moment that I took away from my visit was how much our president's rhetoric sounds like Adolph Hitler.

Britton or Button

My great-great grandfather was William B. Stoutenburg. I did not know what the initial B represented. Then about 20 years ago, I came across family trees on the Internet that gave William B. a middle name. That name was Britton.

As the years passed and I continued my research, I began to think that Britton made no sense to me. It wasn't Britain to honor the British colony in which Luke Stoutenburgh and Elizabeth Case settled about 1800.

So who was Britton? After perusing over many records, I could find no connection, strong or loose, to someone named Britton.

William's uncle Martin was married to Sarah Elizabeth Button. She was the daughter of Major John Button, the founder of Buttonville, York County, Ontario, Canada.

John Button and his wife married in Dutchess County, New York and moved to Canada in 1799. Button's wife was a Quaker. Such a coincidence! Luke Stoutenburg's wife, Elizabeth Case, was also a Quaker living in Dutchess County and moving to Ontario about that same time.

John Button and his family lived in Markham Township at the same time that Luke Stoutenburg and his family were living there. John Button was a war hero in Upper Canada (Ontario Province). As I pieced these events and dates together, I was convinced that William B. Stoutenburg was not William Britton Stoutenburg but William Button Stoutenburg.

I had not found any record in which William B. Stoutenburg's full name was recorded. That is until now. William Button Stoutenburg applied for a land grant in Alberta, Canada. His son, Dill Stoutenburg, applied for a delayed birth certificate in which he named his father, William Button Stoutenburg.

As an aside Dill was born James Scott Stoutenburg. James at some point decided to be known as Dill James Stoutenburg.

The Money Never Came - A Scam from 1907

Scams and swindles are nothing new. They have been around as long as mankind has existed. I came across an article that was printed on July 31, 1907 in the Detroit Free Press. The article appeared on Page 6 and was titled, “MAY INHERIT $15,000,000.”

Per the article, “Hiram Stoutenberg” received a letter from a New York lawyer, “Walter G. Elliott,” indicating that he and his siblings may equally share in millions of dollars. I would love to see what that letter said because I found several the statements in the article to be untrue.

Walter Graeme Elliot was the husband of Maud Stoutenburgh, a descendant of Jacobus Stoutenburgh. She also was one of the founders of The Stoutenburgh-Teller Family Association, Inc., established in 1942. Maud’s direct ancestors remained in or near the Hyde Park area while Hiram Stoutenburg’s ancestors left Dutchess County, New York about 1800 and settled in Canada near Toronto.

Walter Elliot, on behalf of his wife, drafted the Stoutenburg Circles (descendants of Pieter Stoutenburg) that was published in 1916. He was an engineer and not a lawyer. I found it curious that the article reported that it was a letter from Walter. I don’t know precisely when the project to find the descendants of Pieter Stoutenburg was initiated, but it was at a time when letter was the most frequently method of communicating with distant places.

Hiram may have received a letter from Walter Elliot, but it would not have been to inform him that he was an heir to millions of dollars because the property was leased to the Frederick Vanderbilt many years ago. The article does not indicate why Hiram and his siblings might be heirs to the Hyde Park property. It does not say that the alleged lease has expired.

But that is immaterial because Frederick Vanderbilt purchased the property in Hyde Park on which he built his mansion in 1895. He did not lease the property. The property on which the Vanderbilt estate was built was owned by Samuel Bard by 1799. Jacobus Stoutenburgh did own a large tract of land in Dutchess County in which the downtown area of Hyde Park would have been located. However, he divided his property among his children.

One last point, Hiram’s great-great grandfather, Jacobus Stoutenburgh, did not settle in New York when it was known as Amsterdam. The Dutch colony was New Netherland and on the island of Manhattan was New Amsterdam. By the fall of 1664, the English had taken control of the Dutch colony and called it the Province of New York and New Amsterdam, New York City. Jacobus Stoutenburgh was born in New York city in the Province of New York. He had settled at Dutchess County about 1742.

Hiram was probably very disappointed to learn that he would not be receiving a windfall. The text of the article follows:

Eight Michigan Persons Heirs to Supposed New York Estate.

Port Huron, Mich., July 30.—Shades of Aladdin’s lamp! Just imagine being one of eight heirs to an estate of $15,000,000. Hiram Stoutenberg (sic), farm hand and machine shop employe, declares he has received a letter from Walter G. Elliott (sic), a prominent New York lawyer, informing him that such a windfall may come his way. The lawyer says the property was leased to the Vanderbilts many years ago by Jacobus Stoutenberg, Hiram’s great-great-grandfather settled in New York when it was known as Amsterdam and bought up 1,500 acres of land, part of which comprises the vast estate to which he may be an heir. Most of the property is in the downtown section and is extremely valuable.

If the fortune proves a reality the following eight Michigan persons will benefit equally: Hiram, (sic) Stoutenberg, of Port Huron; John, of Port Sanilac; James, of Cedardale; Albert, of Augres; Jacob, of Prescott; Mrs. Melinda English, of Forestville; Mrs. Mary Ann Ernest, of Applegate, and Mrs. Elizabeth Hyman, of Port Sanilac.

It is a small world!

Many years ago, I had a roommate when I was a student at the University of California at Berkeley. She was born in Switzerland to Chinese parents. Her father was with the UN and held a position as a professor of agriculture at the University of Liberia in Monrovia, Liberia. We lost touch with one another after I moved to Los Angeles and was a student at UCLA.

I shared a studio apartment in a cottage of two units. The cottage was one of three cottages on a narrow pathway in the middle of Fraternity Row at UCLA. My roommate was a young woman from Memphis, Tennessee. She was an only child. I was the eldest in a large family.

UCLA is situated in the middle of a very wealthy area of Los Angeles. Westwood Village had a number of exclusive shops that were frequented at that time by Hollywood celebrities. My roommate's parents provided her with an allowance that allowed her to shop in these shops. She purchased a dress with a very distinct and vibrant pattern.

One day, as I was sweeping the steps to our studio, a black man passed by on his way to the cottage that housed the men that we called the Black Power People. He had a shirt with the exact pattern in my roommate's dress. I stopped him and told him that my roommate had a dress made of the same fabric. He told me that his mother made him the shirt from fabric that she made.

When he spoke to me, I could tell that he was not a native American. His English sounded more like he had learned English in another English speaking country. He was a graduate student at UCLA who earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Liberia. On a hunch, I told him that a former roommate's father was a professor of agriculture at the University of Liberia. It was much further into our conversation that it was apparent that Dr. Ma was this man's thesis adviser when he was working on his masters degree.

That was many years ago. Recently, I had an online experience that was similar. At the beginning of this year, I happened to see a death notice of a Pam O'Hare. Something about the notice caused me to look at my family tree of my relatives... distance and close.

Her husband was Dennis O'Hare who is a high school classmate. We were in high school in Orange County, California. Dennis moved to the Bay Area at sometime after he graduated from high school. Apparently, it was there that he met my 7th cousin.

Dennis' wife was Pamela Lynn Little. Pamela was the daughter of Charles Little and Julia Hurtado. It was through her mother that we are connected. Julia Hurtado was the daughter of Leon Hurtado, Jr. and the granddaughter of Leon Hurtado. Leon Hurtado was born in Poughkeepsie, New York. Leon was the son of Pedro Hurtado and Julia A. Stoutenburg.

Pedro Hurtado died in Cuba. He had moved his family to Cuba. Some ended up back in the Poughkeepsie area but Leon Hurtado settled in America Samoa for a time. He returned to the US mainland. His daughter, Julia, settled in California.

I wonder if Pamela Little realized that she was descended from William Stoutenburgh, whose home is the oldest home in Hyde Park. New York.

Juan Linn, A Street in Victoria, Texas

A distant relative, John Howland Wood, went to Texas from New York in 1836 to fight on behalf of the residents of Texas who were seeking independence from Mexico. Instead of returning to New York, he remained in Texas and married Nancy Clark, a woman of Irish descent.

John H. Wood's mother was Reformed Dutch and his father was born of Quaker parents. The couple were married by an Episcopalian minister. John was raised in a Protestant community. However, Nancy Clark was Catholic. They were married by a Catholic priest in Texas. His offspring were active in the Catholic church to the point that two of his daughters became nuns.

I periodically came across a record in which one of John H. Wood's descendants was living on Juan Linn Street in Victoria, Texas. The first time I saw Juan Linn, I thought it was an odd name for a street. Juan is a name in Spanish and Linn is, it seems, an Irish name. I wondered how a street got such a name.

John H. Wood's children married people with surnames like Sullivan, Mahon, McCurdy, etc., mostly Irish surnames. A little research revealed that Mexico actively recruited the Catholic Irish in the early 1800s. I suspect that the Mexican government was concerned after the United States acquired the Louisiana Purchase from Catholic France, a concern that Britain had after the American Revolution when the United States was moving its citizens into the lands to the west acquired by the 1783 Treaty of Paris.

Britain had been persecuting the Irish Catholics but also the Irish Episcopalians. At that time the Church of England and the Episcopal Church were not the same. After the close of the American Revolution, the Church of England in the United States and the Episcopal Church were one and the same.

John H. Wood must have felt a bit like an outsider as he was settling into his new life.

I happened to come across a booklet about the Irish in early Texas and, in particular, a chapter entitled, "The Irish of Victoria." On Page 91, it stated that John J. Linn was one of the most prominent Irishmen in Victoria. He apparently was looked upon in favor by the Mexicans and that did not surprise me as I read the booklet. However, the one item that struck me in the booklet was that he was the son of a college professor who was involved in an Irish uprising and fled to the United States. His father settled at Poughkeepsie, New York, obtaining a teaching position by 1800. In 1822, John J. Linn move to New Orleans, then later to Victoria, Texas.

There was no indication the John Linn's father moved to Texas, so I assume that his father remained in Poughkeepsie during John Howland Wood's formative years. I have no way of knowing if John H. Wood had any association with John Linn's father or other of his family members that might have had an influence on John Howland Wood's desire to fight in the Texas-Mexican War.

According to the Texas State Historical Association, John Joseph Linn was called Juan Linn by the Mexicans. Because he was fluent in Spanish and could communicate between the Mexicans and the Irish settlers, he served a valuable function to the Mexican government.

So a this point, Juan Linn Street doesn't sound so strange to me.