I was working my way thru blogs on my google reader while my computer saved a large file, while I saw that Chezerby looked up their house on the newly released 1940 Census. I gave it a quick whorl for our address and this is what I found:
Our alley originally did not go through the block. Huh. This has actually been a point of contention on the block since the people at the other end of the block illegally closed off their end of the alley recently. (This means we get all the traffic at our end. Stinks.) According to the new city records, the alley currently does turn and go all the way through the block.
And something more interesting too, in 1940, four people lived in this house:
Daisy Davidson, 53, no job listed.
Fred Jones, 60, husband, police detective.
Maude Jones, 59, wife, no job listed.
Robert Jones, 38, son, accountant.
I showed this to Marc who already knew this because he dug through the old city phone books right after we bought the house. From what we can gather, Daisy lived here with her husband who died(?), then the Jones family moved in. About 5 years later, Daisy is listed as the only person living here again.
Marc just assumed that after her husband's death she rented the house to the family and then moved back in. Now we aren't so sure. We think she may have lived here with the family, otherwise the census would not have listed her, right? Interesting. Now I wonder if they were strangers? friends? family?
Now Marc is going to try to dig up where he wrote down all the past residents of this house. I'll post when he does.
If you want to find out the history of your house, go to the National 1940 Census, or better yet, your local library's old phone book section (you can look up by address which makes it easy!).
Labels:
history
This is too cool, thanks for posting! I may print the map of our area to hang up...
ReplyDeleteWhat a good idea to print the map! Might have to do that too.
DeleteIf you look closely at that census page you'll see that there are 2 households in your house in 1940. 1st household = Daisy (aged 53 and single) and the 2nd household = Fred Jones with wife Maude & divorced son Robert.
ReplyDeleteThe really interesting thing is if you go back to 1930 - again there are 2 households in the house. 1st household = Fred with wife Maud & their son Robert & his wife Ruth but they have a different last name! Pretty sure it is the same family as Fred's occupation is listed as Detective for the City.
2nd household in 1930 is James & Sara Davidson with their daughter Daisy (single & a stenographer).
Both years show that the house was a rental - in 1930 The Davidsons paid $30/month and in 1940 Daisy paid $25/month. Fred's family paid $50/month in 1930 and $35/month in 1940.
I do not find the Davidsons in 1920 and Fred's family appears to live at 68 Flint Street with the last name Jones. His occupation is listed as Policeman for Railroad. Didn't have time to go page by page to find the house (took a quick break at work).
Hope this helps in your house history search!
Cheryl,
ReplyDeleteThanks so much! I couldn't make out the text on the census report.
I wonder how there could be 2 households in this house? It was never two separate units. So interesting and the different last name thing is bizarre!
Cheryl, how did you find the 1930 census info? I tried checking it on 1930census.archives.gov and it said the documents were mircofilm only and you had to order?
ReplyDeleteIf you have an account for one of the geneology websites, they have the scanned pages for the 1930 census. That's one of the reasons "everyone" is so excited about the 1940 census release, everyone has access to the scanned pages this time around.
ReplyDeleteI have a subscription to ancestry.com since I try to do genealogical research on my family. They have census images with index for all years. I think you can try it out for free for a limited amount of time before you have to start paying.
ReplyDeleteSeveral sources have census images available along with indexes. The most common sites had the 1940 images up within days of their release earlier this month and are now working on creating indexes for 1940.