#52Ancestors52Weeks....Week 22...Creativity...Anna King Painted a Picture

  Closeup of the small oil painting done by my Great Great Grandmother Anna Levers King.  Photograph taken sometime in the early 1900's. 

   This week's theme is Creativity...our family tree is certainly full of creative people on both sides!  It was difficult deciding who to feature or what creative endeavor to focus on.  Music? That's a big one.  Working with wood and creating beautiful furniture? Designing homes and building them? Costume design? (think Nino)! Gardening?  Working with iron? Cake decorating? Quilting and sewing? Building computers? Photography? Crocheting? Creating content for YouTube and Blogger? Hum...

 

    I chose to focus on my Great Great Grandmother, Anna Levers King.  She dabbled in painting as a young lady, something many middle and upper class Victorian ladies of her era did as a creative outlet. She married Charles King who was an engineer in the British Army, but who also sketched and painted in watercolors, designed houses and was a master carpenter.  

 

 This photograph was found in the King Album.  It was probably taken in the early 1900's.  I am not sure of the location; it could have been taken in their Golden Gate Avenue home in San Francisco. The wallpaper in the background can be found in other family pictures as well. 

The King Album

   What caught my attention when I found this photograph in Anna King's Album several years ago was the fact that I've had the original oil painting in my possession for over 40 years! It has hung in my dining room for almost 30 years.  I knew Anna painted it, but to see her standing next to it in this photograph was very special.  I especially love the fur rug on the floor and the careful staging of the photograph. It almost looks like a still life waiting to be painted. I do not know who took the picture; it may have been Lester Hayes, my Great Grandfather.  He was a photographer in San Francisco and had his own studio on 22nd Street in the early 1900's.  The picture itself is only 7"x 8" and was painted on thin board.  It is still in its original frame, and is unsigned.

My painting....the original! Some paint has flecked off on the right.

    

 Close up of Anna's painting in the photograph....

 A close up of the original painting.  It looks like a church steeple in the background.  You can see her brush strokes. 

 I love how delicate the reeds are next to the water. I don't know if she painted this from memory, or plein air, or if she created the scene herself. 

      I think this painting could use a good cleaning!  It is over 100 years old, after all. I would love to see what the painting looked like to Anna as she was creating it.  For now, I still have it hanging up in my home. 

Relationship Reference:

Me->Margaret Boothby Hansen->Margaret Hayes Hansen->Emma King Hayes Van Duzer->Anna Levers King m. Charles J. King

    

#52Ancestors52Weeks....Week 21 Theme...Nicknames....Harald (Harold) Hansen Was 'Almost Universally Known as "Heine"....'

   1928 Stray Leaves Senior Class 

Grass Valley Highschool

Grass Valley, California

My grandfather's given name was Harald (note the Norwegian spelling of his first name).  Harald was misspelled on his birth certificate and he went by Harold in adulthood.  He was nearly named Salvador; Grandpa was born while his father John Hansen was working as a mine foreman in La Union, Republic of Salvador in 1910.  John's cable-gram with his wish to name his third son Salvador luckily did not come in time and the name Harald Lloyd was already chosen by his mother Vere.  Did you know Grandpa also had a Norwegian nickname? 

  Pictured above is  Grandpa's senior picture and accompanying  caption found in his 1928 yearbook.  His  nickname "Hiny" was spelled wrong; his family nickname was "Heine",  a nod to his paternal Nordic heritage.  Grandpa used his nickname during his childhood, through high school,  and signed many of his 1930 letters written to his parents during his visit to Norway as Heine.  

 Undated photograph of L-R Grandpa (Heine) in his jaunty hat and bow tie, Alma Goins (Uncle Bob's wife), Vere and John Hansen.  Probably taken around the late 1920's or very early 1930's.  Alma and Bob were married in October of 1930.  From the Bob Hansen Family Album.

  We don't know the meaning of Heine or why it was chosen for Grandpa by his parents...in the Norwegian language it means "to be holy".  It also is used in the German language to mean the same thing. Maybe it was used to refer to Grandpa being at the tail end of the family as he was the youngest of three boys! Chuckle. 

  

  This is the closing section of  Grandpa's letter written from Oslo, Norway on October 8, 1930.  He signed off at the bottom....."So if you'll give my regards to all friends & relatives whom you meet I'll remain your soon to be 20 year old red haired brother who is almost universally known as "Heine". "  He signed his name  Harald L. Hansen.  His Norwegian relatives probably also called him Heine during his stay there. He celebrated his 20th birthday with his Norwegian extended family on October 11th, 1930.

 Grandpa "Heine" with an unknown Norwegian relative.  Taken in Norway, 1930. 

  I know that Grandpa's oldest brother Jack Hansen had a nickname.  He went by Gunnar, which means "bold warrior" in Norwegian.  I do not know if Grandpa's brother Robely (who went by Bob) had a Norwegian nickname.  I'd love to know if he did!

  Which reminds me...I really need to finish transcribing Grandpa's letters from Norway! 

Relationship Reference: 

Me->Margaret Hansen Boothby->Harald/Harold "Heine"Hansen->John Hansen and Vere Burrows Hansen

  

#52Ancestors52Weeks...Week 20 Theme: Taking Care of Business....The Cummings were Silversmiths, Jewelers and Watchmakers By Trade: The Crawford Family Working Tree (Part 4 )

  Death Notice for Thomas Van Buren Cummings who died December 6, 1868. 

Found in family papers for the Crawford Family.  This was most likely in a Sacramento, California newspaper.  He was 28 years old. 

    In my previous post of February 25, 2024 I talked about the two marriage certificates I had for the Crawford Family.  One was for John Washington Crawford and Sarah Byerly and the other was for their daughter Sarah Elizabeth Crawford who married Franklin Hayes. Franklin and Sarah "Sallie" Hayes were my great great grandparents.  Both of those marriage certificates provided clues that helped me discover a connection to the Cummings family through Rebecca Byerly (or Byrley) Cummings.  Rebecca was most likely Sarah Byerly Crawford's sister or a very close relative.  This small snippet of newspaper (above) that I found in the Crawford papers also provided a clue that the Crawfords were somehow connected to the Cummings family.  Who were the Cummings?  Their various trades as silversmiths, jewelers and watchmakers helped me put together their family tree. 

   Let's go  back to Philadelphia first......

  The 1850 Census for the 2nd Ward (Moyamensing) in Philadelphia found Henry Cummings and his wife Caterina/Catherine (Jeffries) living with a Rebecca Byerly Cummings and her five  children: Thomas, William, George, Emma and baby Lewis.  Henry was 27 years old and was a silversmith.  I know from Rebecca Cummings' obituary that her husband William Cummings left Philadelphia for California during the 1849 Gold Rush and that she was pregnant at that time. She stayed with William's younger brother Henry back in Philadelphia.  This was the same Henry who witnessed Sarah Byerly and John Washington Crawford's 1848 marriage at St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Philadelphia. This census information fits Rebecca's obituary.  William was away, Rebecca was living with his brother Henry, and she had given birth to baby Lewis by that time.  

  My working theory is that Henry Cummings, Sr. was father to William (b. 1820) and Henry (b. 1823).  There was a John B. Cummings that also lived in Philadelphia. All three were silversmiths.

   *William Cummings was a silversmith, learning his trade in Philadelphia and Boston per his obituary.  He married Rebecca Byerly in Philadelphia before 1840. He made his first trip to Sacramento, California in 1849 and then brought his family out west in 1851-52 and started a jewelry business on J Street with $50 to his name. 

   *Henry Cummings was a silversmith in Philadelphia and was originally buried at St. Paul's Episcopal Church grounds in 1891 with his wife Catherine and then reburied in Fernwood Cemetery after St. Paul's cemetery was abandoned. 

    *John B. Cummings was listed as a silversmith and jeweler working in Philadelphia in 1837 and 1841. He may have been a brother, or another Cummings relation.  I cannot find anything else definitive about him, but the jeweler and silversmith occupation fits with the other Cummings brothers' chosen vocations. 

By NMGiovannucci - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=108697665

The back view with the remaining cemetery. 

   This is St. Paul's Episcopal Church today...the building now houses Episcopal Community Services.  It is located at 225 S. 3rd Street, Philadelphia.  It was just a few blocks away from Henry Cumming's house on Christensen Street where he was recorded living on  the 1880 Census. 

  

By ProfReader - Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=33768525

 The front view.  The church was built in 1761 and altered in 1830.  

 From Philadelphia to Sacramento.....

 From William's obituary I know that he and Rebecca had a total of 10 children and only three were alive at the time of his death: William, Louis and Benjamin. William died in 1891 in Sacramento.  I have pieced together the story of his family....

*Thomas Van Buren Cummings was born in Philadelphia the 18th of November 1840.  By the age of 19 he was living with his family in Sacramento and worked as a watchmaker; his skills as a watchmaker fit nicely with his father's jewelry business.  He died at the age of 28 and was buried in the Sacramento City Cemetery (obituary above). 

*William Cummings (Jr.) was born in Philadelphia August 5, 1842.  He worked in Sacramento and San Francisco as a jeweler.  He died in 1912 and was buried in Pacific Grove, California with his children and their families. 

*George Washington Cummings was born July 15, 1844 in Philadelphia and died November 21, 1870 at the age of 26. He worked as a jeweler with his brother Louis in San Francisco at one point. He was a resident of Sacramento at his death. 

*Emma S. Cummings was born December 23, 1846 in Philadelphia, came to Sacramento with her family in 1852 and died in 1866 at the age of 20.  She was buried in the Sacramento City Cemetery.  

*Louis Broomall Cummings was born in Philadelphia October of 1849 and died in Sacramento in 1923 of accidental burns. He was buried in the Sacramento City Cemetery. Louis owned Cummings Sons Jewelry in San Francisco and was also a watchmaker. 

*Mary Cummings was born in Philadelphia in 1850, and was listed on the 1860 census when she was ten years old.  Her death date is unknown, but she was buried in the Sacramento City Cemetery. 

*Sierra Nevada "Sarah" Cummings was the first child born in California in 1852, and she was named after the beautiful Sierra Nevada mountains which the Cummings and Crawfords had to cross to make it to Sacramento.  They came by wagon. 

*Benjamin Franklin Cummings was born in Sacramento in 1856 and died on April 14, 1893 of heart failure.  He was 37 years old. He worked with his brother Louis in San Francisco in the jewelry business.  He was buried in the Sacramento City Cemetery.  He witnessed my great great grandparents' wedding ceremony in San Francisco in 1881. 

*Alice Cummings was born in 1858 in Sacramento. 

*Nellie Cummings was born December 17, 1860. 

    Philadelphia was the largest silver market in America from 1760 to the 1820's and a center for silver manufacturing through the 19th century.  William Cummings was able to take his skills with him out west where he trained his boys and built a jewelry business that was very profitable and provided his family a comfortable living.  His son Louis opened up his own shop  'Cummings Sons' in San Francisco and employed his brothers at various times. William Jr.'s son William M. Cummings was listed on the 1930 Census as being a proprietor of a jewelry store in Pacific Grove, California, so it appears the family business was moved from San Francisco to Pacific Grove.  William M. Cummings son Russell Howard Cummings was listed on the 1940 Census as a watchmaker, and son Stanley was listed as a salesperson at Cummings Sons in Pacific Grove in the 1951 Directory. So, the Cummings were involved in this trade for over 100 years. 

  With the exception of William Jr., the entire Cummings family is buried in the Sacramento City Cemetery. 

 Sacramento City Cemetery, Lot 96

Find A Grave for William Cummings (1820-1891)

 Entrance to the cemetery

  The Byerlys and the Cummings families were true California pioneers, and it has been a fascinating journey learning about their lives.  I have added the Cummings family to our family tree.  Another branch!

#52Ancestors52Weeks...Week 19 Theme: Preserve....Preserving the Hurd Burial Plot in Virginia City (Bluett, Hurd, Burrows)

 

 Silver Terrace Cemetery, Virginia City, Nevada. Hurd Plot in foreground, mine tailings in the distant background. Facing south. I used the mine tailings as a reference to help find the location of the plot. 

Photograph taken September 14, 2023 by Patti Alden

  The theme for this week is Preserve....this is the perfect week to share the location where my three times great grandparents William Hurd and Harriet Bluett Hurd were buried.  If you have been following the "saga of the cemetery", you know that going as far back as the mid 1940's relatives on this side of the family  have been searching for this location, with no luck. I am happy to say we now know exactly where the Hurd plot is!  This information needs to be preserved for future generations. 

  

 

  This last summer I took a trip down to Bowers Mansion with my daughter and son-in-law to look for family heirlooms (Bowers Mansion label on the right will take you to the post).  While there I discovered that a Bluett relative had visited previously, and left a folder of information on the Hurd family with the curator.  In the folder Mr. Bluett also left his email address!  I reached out to this cousin in early September, and got a reply the very next day.  It turns out his great grandfather James Wellington Bluett and my great great great grandmother Harriet Elizabeth Bluett Hurd were brother and sister!  We exchanged several emails and I found out that he knew where the gravesite was located and that he had visited in 2019.  Amazing!

   My new found cousin sent me three pictures he took of the gravesite, but no other information on the exact location.  The Silver Terrace Cemetery in Virginia City, Nevada, is a large pioneer cemetery made up of many smaller sections and covers quite a lot of hilly, gravelly  ground.  Most graves are covered in sagebrush and weeds.  If you go, wear good hiking boots and watch for snakes! 

  My next step was to use his photographs and find geographic markers, fences, trees and homes that I could match to google satellite maps of the cemetery.  I also watched a Youtube video someone made of a drone flyover of the cemetery.  From there I knew where to start searching.  My husband and I drove up to the cemetery on September 14, 2023 and found the plot within a short amount of time.  It was located in the corner of the Odd Fellows section; plot B4-021-OF to be exact.  

   Plot B4-021-OF was a mystery!  Unfortunately this information provided only a general location. And, I wasn't sure this was our Hurd family member.  Until I had Mr. Bluett's photographs I didn't know the exact location, or who was buried in this plot. 

 From the Tombstone Transcription Project from Storey County, Nevada. 

 The exact location is in the bottom right hand corner of the Odd Fellows section near the white picket fence. Unless you know what to look for, you might walk right by the plot itself. 

Looking east. Picture taken by Patti Alden September 14, 2023

 The plot is outlined by a pink stone curb surround.  The stone is of unknown origin (this needs more research).  The plot is large enough that it would hold two people; I would surmise that William Hurd and Harriet Hurd were both buried here.  William died in 1876 and Harriet died in 1893.  Only Harriet's burial location was recorded with the county. 

  Under a clump of sagebrush we could just make out HURD.   

Picture by Patti Alden, September 14, 2023.

 Picture by Patti Alden, September 14, 2023.

  It looks like the letters were painted in black at one point, or this is black mold or lichen which may be removeable. More research is needed there!

 

 This is a picture sent by B.Bluett, taken in 2019.  It was not as overgrown as it is now and the lettering was easier to read.  Facing east.  I used the black iron fence, the white picket fence and the tree as references.  

  If you want to visit the Hurd plot, take Cemetery Road going north,  park in the cemetery parking lot and take the farthest trail on your right down the hill.  Go through the little gates leading into the Odd Fellows section (google maps lists it as Masonic Cemetery).  

Front Gate Silver Terrace Cemetery Virginia City, Nevada 

Picture by Patti Alden September 14, 2023.

  This is the view looking north up the hill.  The Hurd plot is behind the plot with the iron fence rail. It needs some TLC.  

  Some synonyms of the word preserve are: Conserve, maintain, save, safeguard, care for, shield.  My first goal was to record and preserve the exact location of the Hurd plot.  Going forward, our family's next step might be to clear the plot of weeds and sagebrush.  I have contacted the Comstock Cemetery Foundation and have permission to do so anytime. That would be minimal preservation that is doable at this point in time.  Beyond that, I will need to do more research into the type of stone that was used for the curb surround, and see if the black is paint or mold or lichen.  Do we want to remove it? Paint in the lettering again? I am just not sure.  The Cemetery Conservators United Standards advocate for "less is more" and "do no harm".  Things to think about. 

  The simple burial plot of my great great grandparents is mixed in with more ornate and elaborate marble headstones, as well as now unreadable wooden markers.  And how many grave sites are lost entirely due to time and vandalism? There is a beauty and serenity in this cemetery in the midst of the sagebrush and weeds and ever present wind.  Each grave tells a story and has become part of the history of Virginia City. The Hurd family was certainly a part of that history and I have told many of their stories in previous posts.  I am very grateful that I was able to contact a new cousin who had information that was not passed down on our side of the family. It amazes me how bits and pieces of vital information are lost in just a few generations and how fragile oral history is. 

 Remember Miss Alta Powers who was almost buried alive after a cave in near the cemetery? She was going to put flowers on her Grandmother's grave.  It was the grave of Harriet Bluett Hurd.  I wonder if the stone surround was put there before or after this event? 

   

3 June 1935 Nevada State Journal

Alta Powers was the daughter of Hattie Hurd Powers, sister of my great great grandmother Elizabeth Jane Hurd Burrows.  

The Mexican Mine was located near the cemetery. 

    So, it is time to get the family together for another trip to the cemetery. We will need some basic gardening tools and a little time to clear the weeds and sagebrush.  And maybe leave some flowers!  At least we know where we are going this time. 

 

References:

The Tombstone Transcription Project for Storey County, Nevada    http://usgwtombstones.org/nevada/storeycem.html

Cemetery Conservators for United Standards 

https://cemeteryconservatorsunitedstandards.org/

#52Ancestors52Weeks....Week 18 Theme...Love and Marriages.....George and Emma Van Duzer Choose Oroville as Their Gretna Green...

  The Morning Union 6 January 1926 (Grass Valley, California)

Newspapers.com

  My great grandmother Emma Lavinia King married my great grandfather Lester Franklin Hayes in San Francisco  after the 1906 Great San Francisco Earthquake. They were married on December 1, 1908.  Together they had three daughters: Dorothy, Frances and Margaret (Betty; my grandmother).  Lester and Emma obtained a divorce December 5, 1924.  We do not know all the details of what precipitated the divorce, but the girls remained in contact with their father until his death in 1969. 

  Nana married a previously married man named George Freeman Van Duzer a few short years after her divorce from Lester.  Not a lot is known about George as he died in 1933.  We do know that he did provide some stability to Nana and her daughters in the way of property ownership when they returned to Grass Valley.  In 1930 the George Van Duzers were living next door to the Benjamin Van Duzers on the Auburn Highway.  The brothers George and Benjamin were barbers who originally came from Pennsylvania, probably with their uncle Eugene Townsend who purchased a small fruit farm in Rough and Ready. George was married to Annie Jacoby when they moved to Grass Valley sometime after 1910; I was unable to find any information on her death or if they were divorced previous to 1925. 

  We don't know when or how Nana met George, but he was present at Auntie Dot's eighth grade graduation in 1925 and the girls called him Daddy Van by then. 

 

George Van Duzer seated  with L-R  Dorothy (in her graduation dress), Margaret (Betty) , and Fran Hayes. 

George Van Duzer seated by himself.  These pictures were taken on the prune ranch of Charles and Anna King, Nana's parents, in Santa Clara, California.  George must have been an accepted part of the family by the time this picture was taken. 

    There are no surviving wedding pictures of this second marriage for my great grandmother.  In fact, there are no pictures of the two of them together at all.  Mom recently found a very small gold ring with the engraving E L H 12 30 26? 24?.  It turned out to be Nana's wedding band! She and George were married on December 30 of 1925 and returned from their honeymoon in early January of 1926. 

 The Morning Union 18 August 1933 (Grass Valley, California)

Newspapers.com

  George died on August 17, 1933 after only seven and a half years of marriage at the age of 58.  He died shortly after Auntie Fran and Uncle Joe were married on July 22 , 1933.  He  protested the marriage by calling the sheriff to stop the couple from driving to Reno, which of course still took place as Auntie Fran was in her early twenties.  The sheriff did not intervene. I bet that ride to Reno was a fun one! 

  I am sure there was some animosity between George and the three girls.  Divorce is hard on children no matter how it is handled. The girls didn't think he was a particularly nice man. I often wonder what Nana saw in Mr. George Van Duzer.  She never talked about him when I was growing up, but that was 40 years after his death.  Nana always went by "Mrs. Van Duzer" until her death, kept his ring and made the best of the property she was willed.  She never remarried. 

  George and Nana chose Oroville as their "Gretna Green".  This was a reference to the small Scottish village that became synonymous with runaway lovers and became the destination for eloping couples in the 1750's.  English law was changed at that time to require a young couple to be 21 years or older to get married without their parents' consent, the marriage had to be public in the couple's parish and presided over by an official of the church. This new law was strictly enforced, with punishment for any clergyman breaking it.  Scottish law, on the other hand, did not change and requirements for marriage were much less restrictive. These were called "irregular marriages".  Since Gretna Green was right over the border this became the popular place for English couples to marry and flaunt the law.  

  These days a "Gretna Green" marriage describes a marriage that takes place outside the jurisdiction of the couple's place of residence.  George and Nana slipped away quietly and drove 60 miles to Oroville, for reasons unknown.  Was it a romantic elopement? Was there some tension in the family? Did they just want a simple, private ceremony?   I would love to know the reasons behind their "Gretna Green" marriage!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gretna_Green

https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofScotland/Gretna-Green/