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Archive for the ‘Photography late 19th century’ Category

Where Did My Family Get Their Meat Over 100 Years Ago?

Posted in Adrian Zuidweg, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Michigan history, Photography late 19th century, tagged , , , , , , on April 8, 2014| 21 Comments »

Answer to my title question: the townfolk got their meat from a butcher!

Occasionally, in my collection, I find a photograph of someone who isn’t family. Quite some time ago, I posted a photograph my family saved of the local saloon keeper, the famous Dutch Arnold. I’m pretty sure there is a story there that didn’t get passed on–at least not to me.

I also have a photograph of the local butcher, Tom Richmond, and his family.

Tom Richmond and family Butcher and slaughterhouse Balch Street, Kalamazoo circa 1900

Tom Richmond and family
Butcher and slaughterhouse
Burdick and Balch area, Kalamazoo circa 1900

Apparently, he had a slaughterhouse and butcher shop close to where my relatives lived. Grandpa told me it was on Balch Street. But maybe it was just close to Balch Street.

I did find one of Tom’s ads in the Kalamazoo Gazette. It appeared April 9, 1898.

Kalamazoo Gazette ad April 9, 1898

Kalamazoo Gazette ad
April 9, 1898

Notice that this ad gives a North Burdick address. My relatives’ homes and businesses were mainly congregated near the intersection of Burdick and Balch in Kalamazoo. Maybe as a small boy, Grandpa thought the shop was on Balch, but it was on Burdick. Or maybe he remembered incorrectly (unlikely–his memory was amazing). Or maybe the shop moved.

Someday when I have all the time in the world ;), I’ll try to put together a map of the area with my relatives’ homes and businesses, as well as the surrounding ones. Create a little village on paper, in a way. At that point, I’ll have to use the City Directories to figure out precisely where Tom Richmond’s butcher shop was. What makes it hard, though, is that the address numbers have been changed since that time.

This is what I don’t really understand: what kind of custom would be responsible for my family winding up with portraits of neighbors, friends, or merchants they frequented? I am entertaining the thought that maybe somebody’s somebody married into this family. I’ll have to keep searching.

If your family has old photographs, do they have portraits of non-family in the collection?

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Paak-a-boo

Posted in DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Michigan history, Netherlands history, Paak, Peek, Photography early 20th century, Photography late 19th century, Remine, Zuidweg, tagged , , , , , , on April 1, 2014| 30 Comments »

The other day I posted a photo of a couple I had not yet been able to identify. Once I got it posted and readers started pointing things out to me, I began to wonder if it could be George Paak.

On the advice of some readers, I pulled the original photograph out of storage and looked at the back and at the sleeve. The back is blank, but the sleeve itself says this:

PATENTED MCH 271917

I still have a lot of work to do on the research, but I thought I’d post the photo with a concentration on the man’s face along with photos of the women I suspect could be his sisters. See what you think.

What I want to eventually find out is if this is George Paak.

Alice Paak DeKorn

Alice Paak DeKorn

Alice is my great-great-grandmother. Look at their mouths. The hairline, forehead, and sparkling eyes. Don’t they look alike?

Carrie Paak Waruf

Carrie Paak Waruf

Mary Paak Remine

Mary Paak Remine

The ones above are sisters Carrie and Mary. They don’t look quite like Alice or the man. Or do they?

Annie Paak

Annie Paak

 

There’s another look alike. I think Alice and Annie look a lot like each other–and they look equally as much like the man.  What do you think?

PAAK / PEEK FAMILY

 

Teunis Peek immigrated to the United States from the Netherlands with his children.

He was the son of Joost Peek and Annigjen den Besten, born on June 5, 1822 at Zijderveld. (He died on April 24, 1893, in Kalamazoo, Michigan).

Teunis was married on December 21, 1848 at Lexmond to Jacoba Bassa, daughter of Dirk Bassa and Aaltje van Nek.  Jacoba was born on June 18, 1824. She died on November 23, 1865 at Lexmond, before Teunis took the kids and left the country.

From the marriage of Teunis and Jacoba:

1  Joost Peek (George Joseph Paak) was born on August 25, 1850 at Lexmond. He died December 9, 1925, in Kalamazoo, Michigan.*

2  Aaltje Peek (Alice Paak) was born on September 9, 1852 at Lexmond. She died in Kalamazoo, Michigan, May 5, 1908, a few months before her grandson, my grandfather, was born.

3  Anna Catharina Peek (Anna or Annie Paak) was born on January 6, 1855 at Lexmond and died on October 6, 1933 at Kalamazoo (MI). She married Jacob Salomon Verhuist.

Anna was married on March 20, 1890 at Kalamazoo (MI) to Jacob Salomon Verhulst, son of Jacob Verhulst and Cornelia Strijd.  Jacob was born on May 1, 1848 at Kortgene, died on June 20, 1923 at Kalamazoo (MI).

4  Willempje Peek was born on September 17, 1856 at Lexmond (alive in 1870, as William ??).

5  Maaike Peek (Mary Paak) was born on July 28, 1859 at Lexmond. Mary married Richard Remine. She died in 1954 in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

6  Cornelia Peek (Carrie Paak) was born on May 8, 1862 at Lexmond, died in 1957 at Kalamazoo (MI).  Cornelia was 95 years old. Cornelia was married on June 2, 1882 at Kalamazoo (MI) to Hendrik Waruf (Henry).  Hendrik was born in 1863, died in 1945 at Kalamazoo (MI).

Later, Teunis was married on January 8, 1869 at Kalamazoo (MI) (2) to Prina Adriana Schoonaard (Perena), daughter of Jan Schoonaard and Tannetje Servaas.  Prina was born on August 1, 1814 at Borssele.

The other day another Paak descendent found this blog. I am looking forward to comparing notes with him about the family.  He is the grandson of George Joseph Paak (Pake).

 * Joost Peek, or George Joseph Paak (Pake): could he be the man in the photo?

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Who Is This?

Posted in DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Michigan history, Netherlands history, Paak, Peek, Photography early 20th century, Photography late 19th century, Zuidweg, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , on March 28, 2014| 38 Comments »

One of the most frustrating aspects of this whole family photo/genealogy project is not being able to identify some of the photos. It’s bad enough to see the names and not know what the people looked like, but to actually have a photo in hand and not know which person or persons it represents is just maddening.

Take this one, for example.

This photo is from my the photographs my grandfather gave me, so these people were part of the Zuidweg/DeKorn/Paak family. But who were they? Is there a way to collect clues from the photo?

What do you notice about the photo?

And what could I investigate to learn more about it?

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Dogs in the Family

Posted in Adriaan Zuijdweg/Adrian Zuidweg Sr., Adrian Zuidweg, Cora DeKorn Zuidweg, DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Photography early 20th century, Photography late 19th century, Richard DeKorn, Zuidweg, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 25, 2014| 16 Comments »

When I was a little girl, my aunt was in college and still lived at home. Her dog, the family dog, was an English Springer Spaniel named Sandy. That dog had bitten me near the eye when I was a baby so everybody was always warning me not to go near the dog and to be careful of the dog. In kindergarten, my grandmother babysat me and I had to negotiate my way through the house with Sandy. I tried to make peace with him by making him a meat pie (with Grandma’s help) for his birthday.

What I didn’t realize was that dogs had been part of the family for generations.

Grandpa shared these photos and told me which dog was which. They belonged to Richard DeKorn, and Grandpa and his parents lived for some time with Richard (Grandpa’s grandfather). It means that they lived well over 100 years ago. I’m sorry the quality of the following photos isn’t better.

TOM AND CARLO DEKORN

TOM AND CARLO DEKORN

BOBBY DEKORN

BOBBY DEKORN

Is the dog running toward Richard DeKorn?

Is the dog running toward Richard DeKorn? Adriaan Zuijdweg in the background.

The dogs with Cora, Adrian, and Alice

The dogs with Cora, Adrian, and Alice

That’s Grandpa as a baby in his mother’s lap, so he grew up with the dogs.

Bobby in the yard

Bobby in the yard

For those of you who know about dog breeding or shows, can you tell me anything about the following?

I’ve owned dogs, too, but now I have four cats. Did my family have cats 100 years ago?  Here’s the answer:

Baby Alice playing with the kittens

Is that baby Alice playing with the kittens?

I sense that you want to know about my cats ;), so here is a slide show of my beautiful cats, as well as my grand-cats.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

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Pulling Together Information on The Bosman Family, Part II

Posted in Adrian Zuidweg, Cora DeKorn Zuidweg, DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Jennie DeKorn Culver, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Photography late 19th century, Remine, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on March 4, 2014| 19 Comments »

Last week I shared a photo and information I have pulled together on the Bosman family. Let me share a little more.

This photo is two little Bosman boys, sons of my first cousin 4x removed, Adriana Remine Bosman. But which two boys are these?

The oldest was Garrett. He was born in 1873 and passed away between 1880 and 1885.

Then came John, born 1876, who survived until 1943.

James was born in 1879 and died between 1880 and 1890.

Adrian, 1880-1884.

Carrie, 1882-1884. (Double sadly, she died 4 days before Adrian).

Gerritt, 1885-1921.

Jennie, born 1889.

Cornelius, born 1890.

This simple list tells a very sad story: lots of babies, born fairly close together, and many of them not surviving into adulthood.

Here’s a thought: in 1884, there were five Bosman children. Two of these children died in November of 1884. I don’t yet know when the other two died (only John survived out of that group). What if all four died at the same time or in the same month?!  I don’t know, but something tells me I need to find out.

So which two are in the photo?

It could be Garrett and John. The only other pair that works out with the dates would be John and Adrian, I believe.  My vote is with Garrett and John. For one thing, being the oldest, it’s more likely that the family would have had the portrait taken. (Another mystery is why it and the photo shared last week were taken in Goshen). Another reason is that the sweet-faced older boy here doesn’t really look like John in the photo I posted last week.

The main reason, though, is that my intuition tells me that the photo is Garrett and John.

Have you ever had intuition about the identity of a person in an old photo? Or about when or why something happened in your family history? If you found the answer or solved the mystery, did your intuition turn out to be right or wrong?

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Pulling Together Information on The Bosman Family, Part I

Posted in Adrian Zuidweg, Cora DeKorn Zuidweg, DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Jennie DeKorn Culver, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Photography late 19th century, Remine, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , on February 25, 2014| 17 Comments »

I only knew that the Bosmans existed because Grandpa told me that this photo was John Bosman.

This is what I wrote on the back of this photo, at Grandpa’s instruction:

John Bussman

2nd Reformed Church

on Park Street

Aunt Jen went there

Hmm. I have no idea what that means. I spelled the name “Bosman” incorrectly because Grandpa pronounced it “Bussman,” and I either didn’t ask how to spell it or he didn’t know.

Aunt Jen is Jennie DeKorn Leeuwenhoek, Richard DeKorn’s daughter, the sister of my great-grandmother.

The matriarch of the Bosman family was Adriana (also called Johanna and Jennie–very confusing) Remijnse or Remynse.  She was my first cousin 4x removed. She married Dirk Pieter Bosman, and John was one of their children. Grandpa told me that John was the oldest child, but according to the following information, there was another son, Garrett, who died between the ages of 7 and 12.

Dirk and Johanna/Adriana gave birth to eight children. At least four of them died as children.

In this photo, John looks like a boy who likes hunting. He was born 14 March 1876 in Kalamazoo. He grew up to marry Nellie Robb on 14 May 1903 in Windsor, Canada. On 30 April 1943, he passed away in Detroit. Please note that Windsor and Detroit are right next to each other, although they are in different countries.

Back to what I wrote on the back of the photo. Grandpa said Aunt Jen went to Second Reformed Church on Park Street, not that his mother did. The story he told me was that his mother donated a quilt to the church (Second Reformed or a different Reformed Church?) and saw a woman hanging it on her own clothesline, signifying that the woman had appropriated the quilt. Great-Grandmother Cora quit going to her church after that incident.

I’ve looked online for a photograph of Second Reformed Church on Park Street, but cannot find anything. It is probably gone, but I hope to find a photo eventually.

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What Do We Know About the Girls in This Photograph?

Posted in Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Klein, Netherlands history, Photography early 20th century, Photography late 19th century, Richard DeKorn, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on December 30, 2013| 39 Comments »

Here’s another photo I need a little (OK, a lot of) help understanding.  Here is what I know:

  • The photo was in my aunt’s photo collection, and it presumably comes from photographs belonging to my father’s grandmother who lived in Elmhurst, Illinois
  • The family came from Budesheim, a village outside of Bingen. This is in the district of Bitburg-Prüm, in Rhineland-Palatinate, an area along the Rhine river in western Germany.
  • The family was Catholic.

What are the ways I can discover more about the photograph?  Any ideas on how to find information on the photographer? What do you think is the occasion of the photo? The girls’ dresses are what kind of lace? What is the pole behind the girls? Why does the window appear to be barred? Does the umlaut over the “a” in the photographer’s name indicate that the photograph was taken in Germany, rather than the United States?

I will say that from the time I first saw this photograph, because its appearance is so different from the rest of the family photographs, I assumed it was either brought with the family from Germany or was sent from a family member in Germany to my great-grandparents in the U.S.

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Making My List and Checking It . . .

Posted in Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Michigan history, Photography late 19th century, Remine, tagged , , , , , , , on December 10, 2013| 25 Comments »

I have a lot of genealogy projects I need to work on and posts I want to write, but it’s a busy time of the year, and so I am going to use today’s post to make my list and to show you what will be coming up here as well (bolded will be blog posts):

  • I have more results from Yvette Hoitink to share. One is about the Mulder family and how they made their living in Goes, the Netherlands.  This also relates to me and an occupation I have had in my life. So have my parents and my grandparents and great-grandparents. Any guesses?
  • Work on the occupations of my family in the Netherlands.
  • Check into the location of Etaples.
  • Work on my tree branch that connects to the Van Gessel family.
  • Write a post about my (Klein) connections with the Van Gessel family.
  • Update my tree with all the new information I have gotten from many sources.
  • Go through new information from Grady.
  • Write a post on the Flipse update and the DeSmits (one or two posts)
  • I plan to reorganize the pages of this blog (not the posts, but the pages, which are tabbed at the top of the page). I want to organize pages by family branch: DeKorns, Zuidwegs, Mulders, etc. 
  • Brook Lodge
  • Harold Remine
  • Alice Leeuwenhoek Moerdyk
  • Organize newspaper clippings and photos and eventually prepare posts

After I do all the above, there will be plenty more to do, including finding out more about some of these photos I have. Here is one of a boy in “Nymegen,” according to the name on the photo. W. Ivens is the photographer.  But so many mysteries. Who is W. Ivens? When was the photograph taken? Is Nymegen the same city as Nijmegen? If so, it’s a city on the opposite (eastern) side of the Netherlands than my relatives came from. Nijmegen is almost to the German border. It’s on the Waal River, which is the main distributary branch of the Rhine River and flows through the Netherlands. Who is the boy? Why is he so far from Goes?

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How Did My Relatives Get Around?

Posted in DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Photography early 20th century, Photography late 19th century, Zuidweg, tagged , , , , , , , , on November 26, 2013| 9 Comments »

Here are a few of my family photos showing their methods of transportation one hundred plus years ago in Kalamazoo, Michigan.

These first two photos (above and below) seem to be the same wagon, but is it the same horse? This house is Richard DeKorn’s house, so I am going to guess it was his wagon and horse. The wagon looks fairly comfy with the upholstered seat and the umbrella.

This next one is also at Richard DeKorn’s house (on the left in the photo). It’s a horse-drawn sled, necessary for getting around in the winter!

LHcd382_LHcd382-R1-E005

LHcd382_LHcd382-R1-E014This last one could have been taken out in public as the two men on the right side of the photo are not posing for the shot. This wagon is not plush like the other and is pulled by a team of two horses. It appears to be more of a work vehicle (like a pickup ;)), but the pole jutting up from the bed looks suspiciously like a fishing pole.

You are all good at finding things in photos I haven’t seen. What have I missed?

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Old Photos of Tom Sawyer and Pollyanna (Not Really)

Posted in DeKorn, Family History, Genealogy, Kalamazoo history, Kalamazoo late 1800s - early 1900s, Peek, Photography early 20th century, Photography late 19th century, Zuidweg, tagged , , , , , , , , on July 9, 2013| 10 Comments »

A couple of years ago we digitized the glass negatives of photos taken by Joseph DeKorn. In those photographs I found many children who remain unidentified. Because children change their looks rapidly–some kids more than others–they are harder to pin down than adults.

Here are a few:

This is just a sampling, but it’s important to concentrate on the details, so three is enough for now.  All of these would have been taken in or around Kalamazoo, Michigan. I am fairly certain they were taken on DeKorn property on Burdick Street.

I looked through my family tree, as it stands right now, and the kids who are closest in age would be the youngest DeSmit children (children of John and Mary DeKorn DeSmit).  Could it be Frances herself or a younger sister? Or are they unrelated neighbor children? Because the bottom two photos seem to be the same girl, at least, I suspect they are family.

Why would the boy in the top photo be wearing overalls and a straw hat? This seems more casual than the kids usual dress. Was he ready to go fishing?  If so, wouldn’t he have a pole in his hand?

The Van Lieres, another branch of the family, had a bus load of kids, starting in 1902, but from everything I can find they were all boys, and I think this photo is too early for them.

Any details which speak to you?

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