The 1940 census - Who will be in it?

Given that tomorrow is the "big day" (at least insofar as American genealogy is concerned), I thought I would consider who I will look for in the 1940 U.S. Federal census. Both my parents should be in it (single, as they married in 1943). So I'll be looking for Dad in Newark, New Jersey (this may be tough given the size of the city), and Mom in Newberry, South Carolina (much easier, as it was a small town and I know where she was living 10 years earlier). All 4 of my grandparents should be in it (Dad's parents in Newark, Mom's parents in Newberry), as well as both of my paternal great-grandmothers (probably both in Newark). After those essential 8 individuals, I can look for a large number of aunts and uncles and cousins. UPDATE: It looks like I'll want to be looking at ED 25-73 and ED 25-76 for Newark, as their border runs along Chambers Street, where a lot of my Smith ancestors lived.

Altha Corinne Martin - 1938

SS-5 and the Grandparents

Let's complete the collection of SS-5 images by looking at the ones for my 4 grandparents.  3 of them were easy to obtain, because three of my grandparents were originally listed in the SSDI.

The 4th, belonging to my paternal grandfather William Henry Smith, required me to use his death certificate as the way to document his death (and thereby obtain his SS-5).  Here is his SS-5: 

Notes based upon other knowledge: His father's name was Charles Henry Smith, his mother's name was Mary Ann Bannon.  (The Bannon surname was sometimes spelled "Bonnon".)  

Next up is the SS-5 for my paternal grandmother, the most interesting (in my opinion) of all of the SS-5s:

Notes: In the early 70s (on a visit to my brother, who was living near DC at the time), I learned that Grandmother Smith had converted from Judaism to Catholicism in order to marry Grandfather Smith.   So she had taken the name "Elizabeth".  I had known her only as "Elizabeth C. Smith", without any idea as to what the "C" stood for, although if I had been asked to guess, I would have assumed another typical Catholic name, such as "Catherine".  Imagine my surprise to read "Conceptia".  Her birth name was "Rachel", but she was frequently called "Rae".  Also surprisingly, she was not born in the NY/Northern NJ area, but instead, in England, Arkansas.  And she fails to give her mother's maiden name, which I learned from other sources was "Grodowitz".

Now, my maternal grandparents, beginning with my maternal grandfather:

Note: His mother appears as "Jane" in most records, and with the surname spelled "Bodie".

Finally, to complete the set, the SS-5 for my maternal grandmother:

Notes: In nearly all records, she appears as "Lizzie", but she appears as "Elizabeth" in the 1930 census.

SS-5 and the Parental Units

If I'm starting my new family database from scratch, then it stands to reason that I should begin by focusing on my parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents.  I've previously posted my mother's birth certificate.

Now let's take a look at the SS-5 applications of my parents, beginning with my father's:

Notes: Dad worked for Reynolds Metals before and after World War II, but after he attended television repair training (RCA, funded by the G.I. Bill), he quit his job and became self employed as a TV and radio repairman.  He continued that job until his retirement.  Dad's mother was born Rachel Weinglass, but when she converted from Judaism to Catholicism to marry my grandfather, she took the first name of "Elizabeth".

Now my mother's:

 

Notes: Mom spelled her name "Corinne" throughout her life, but it appears as "Corene" on her birth certificate. 

To DNA or not to DNA

I have made numerous presentations about using DNA as a tool in genealogical research, although I have not yet had my own DNA tested (or had a cousin take a test).  However, with three of my lines involving very common surnames and very common first names, it is very likely that I will need DNA to make better progress.  Here are the 3 situations:

1.  My Smith ancestry has been traced back to the immigrant Smith ancestor (circa 1850).  I know him only as James Smith, and I have not yet identified any siblings for him nor the names of his parents.  I do not yet know where in Ireland he was from, although it is possibly County Cavan as that is where an obituary says his wife was from.  If I take a Y-chromosome test, I may be able to identify Smith cousins with Irish ancestry who already know the specific location in Ireland of their ancestors.

2.  My Martin ancestry has been traced back to the Edgefield area of South Carolina, with my earliest identified ancestor being James S. Martin (born around 1797).  There were a number of Martins living in that area at the time.  By having a male Martin cousin (my first cousins) take the Y-chromosome test, I may be able to determine which Martin families I should be focusing on.

3.  My King ancestry has been traced back to the Laurens area of South Carolina, with my earliest identified ancestor being Charlie King (mid-1800s).  I have only recently made contact with male King relatives (2nd cousins), and this provides an opportunity to test their Y-chromosome to make further progress on this common surname.

My other lines of immediate interest involve either relatively unusual surnames or lines that have already been traced back many generations, so DNA is not a high priority in those lines.

The birth of Alta Corene Martin

When my mother approached retirement age, she sent off for a copy of her birth certificate so that she could apply for Social Security benefits. The resulting certificate provided a few surprises:

1. Her "real" birth name was Alta Corene Martin (not Altha Corinne Martin, the name she actually went by her entire life). The "Alta" part was not as surprising as it might seem, given that the story was that Mom's cousin was the person given the honor of naming Mom, and the cousin had a mother named "Alta".
2. Mom was born in "Moons Township" in Newberry County. This township was named for a family by the name of "Moon", who lived in the southwestern corner of Newberry County, in the area where Chappells and Silverstreet are.
3. Mom's mother, my grandmother Elizabeth Estelle King, was listed as "Lizzie" King. Not much of a surprise, as she always went by the name "Lizzie".
4. Lizzie King wasn't really born in "Lawrence", as there is no such place in South Carolina. The place is actually spelled "Laurens".
5. Mom was born in the P.M., and was delivered by a midwife named "Bulah Coleman". I will have to look for Ms. Coleman in the 1920 census to learn more about her.
6. The certificate was not filed until 8 days after Mom was born.

I'm fortunate to have this document at all, given that South Carolina had only been requiring birth certificates for a few years prior to 1920!

Home-grown obituaries and online newspaper databases

When my mother passed away last June, my brother asked if I would write her obituary. After my having read and used countless obituaries as part of my genealogical research, this was my first time in writing one, and I was certainly aware that I needed to include all of the most useful information for future genealogists and family historians. This obituary is preserved in the archives of my hometown's local newspaper, the Newberry Observer. Fortunately, the contents of the Observer are available going back to the beginning of 2006 in the Access World News database (a NewsBank product), which I can access from home thru my local public library or thru the academic library at the university where I work. Here is the text of Mom's obituary:

Newberry Observer, The (SC) - June 18, 2007

NEWBERRY - Corinne Martin Smith, 86, of Newberry, widow of George Smith, died Saturday, June 16, 2007. Altha Corinne Martin was born on Dec. 19, 1920, in Newberry County in Moon Township near Chappells. Youngest of seven children, she was the daughter of George Washington Martin and Elizabeth Estelle King. She grew up in the Mollohon Village neighborhood of Newberry and graduated from Newberry High School in 1938. She married George Thomas Smith of Newark, N.J. on Jan. 31, 1943, at Epting Memorial Methodist Church in Newberry. After World War II, she and her husband established their home in East Orange, N.J., but in 1960 the Smiths returned to Newberry, where they lived the remainder of their lives. For many years, Mrs. Smith was employed as a ward secretary at Newberry County Memorial Hospital. Her husband, George, passed away in 1999.

Mrs. Smith was an avid reader of mysteries, and was well known throughout Newberry for her annual Christmas tradition of making cookies to be distributed to friends and local businesses. She was a longtime member of the Mt. Bethel-Garmany Home Demonstration Club, and of Epting Memorial United Methodist Church and its Mary Addison Circle.

Mrs. Smith is survived by her sons William Jeffrey "Jeff" Smith of Newberry and Andrew Martin "Drew" Smith of Tampa, Fla. and by many nieces and nephews.

Graveside services will be held at 11 a.m. Tuesday at Newberry Memorial Gardens. Memorials may be made to the Newberry County Library, 1300 Friend St., Newberry, SC 29108.

Starting points, family photos, scanning, and Paint.NET

One of my favorite family photos is the last picture (to my knowledge) taken of my maternal grandparents and all 7 of their children (including my mother, the youngest of the 7). I was present at the time this picture was taken, and it was taken in the home of my grandparents in Newberry, South Carolina. Because Granddaddy Martin died on 12 November 1964, I know that the photo was taken before then, but I don't know the exact date on which it was taken.

I have scanned a copy of this photo (which had been printed onto an 8.5x11-inch sheet of photo paper) using my HP PSC 950 multifunction printer, and then used Paint.NET (free imaging software) to crop the actual image.

To Do: Preserve the printed copy of the photo using archivally safe storage.

In the photo, seated left to right are Mattie Cleo Martin McLeod (Aunt Cleo), Elizabeth Estelle King Martin (Grandmother Martin), George Washington Martin (Granddaddy Martin), and Altha Corinne Martin Smith (Mom). Standing behind them, left to right, are Walter Lee Martin (Uncle Walter), Anna Naomi Martin Tollison (Aunt Naomi), George Ernest Martin (Uncle Ernest), Marion Virginia Martin LeValley (Aunt Jenny), and Robert Ansel Martin (Uncle Ansel). My mother, who passed away last June, was the last surviving member of this family.

One funny story about this photo worth preserving: Aunt Jenny (my favorite aunt) was not wearing a dress that day (she was likely wearing shorts), so when it came time for the family photo, she needed to borrow the black dress and white plastic belt from her niece (Aunt Naomi's daughter, Billy Jean Tollison Goss). When Aunt Jenny passed away in early 1992, it was then that I first began doing serious genealogical research.

50 years since a significant Bodie publication

It has been more than a year since I last updated my genealogical research site. Today, I noticed that it was 50 years ago (1956) that Eytive Long Evans published A Documented History of the Long Family, 1578-1956. That particular book was one of the first books that got me started on working on the Bodie family line. Evans especially covers them on pages 230 through 249. She references another source I have frequently used regarding the family: John Bennett Boddie's Seventeenth Century Isle of Wight County, Virginia, which was published in 1938. So far as I'm aware, the two books constitute the only significant published genealogies of the South Carolina branch of the Boddie/Bodie families.

J.B. Boddie refers, on page 389 of his book, to Jane (born 1845), who married Wyley Long. Evans, on page 237, also refers to Jane in a list of the children of Nathan Bodie and Mary Edna Eidson.

It is this same Jane Bodie who appears on my grandfather's SS-5 as his mother ("Janie Belle Body"), and who, according to members of my family still living at the time I began working on genealogical research, was the wife first of Wiley (Wyley, Wylie) Long, then Edmund (Edmond) Manley Martin, and then John C. Farmer. The descendants of Jane by her first two husbands (she had no children by Farmer, who she married much later in life), together with the descendants of Edmund Martin by his wife, often held joint reunions near Lake Greenwood in upstate South Carolina at least until the late 1950s.

Perhaps someday, when my work on this line is complete and is published, it will be cause for a new reunion.

Jane Belle Bodie in 1880

The gravestone says 1848. The 1900 census says 1852. When does the 1880 census say Jane was born? It gives her age as 32, which matches the gravestone.

Tomorrow, I'll follow the family back to 1870.

Jane Belle Bodie in 1900

Jane married her third husband, John C. Farmer, sometime after the death of her second husband (my great-grandfather) and prior to 1900. I was able to find the household in the 1900 census using my grandfather, George Martin, as the index term. Most things match, but there are some discrepancies. John Farmer and his wife Jane appear in the household with his step-children George Martin, Cora Martin, Jannie Bell Martin, and Hammitt Martin. I clearly remember my great-uncle Hammitt. Cora is the same as the Chicorah Lee Asbill who is buried next to Jane.

The discrepancies relate to Jane's age and the number of children. Jane's gravestone says that she was born in 1848, but the 1900 census indicates 1852. Vanity? Also, the census indicates that she has had a total of 7 children, with 5 still alive. She certainly had 5 living children from her second marriage to my great-grandfather, Edmund Manley Martin, and it's certainly possible that she lost 2 children at an early age for them (who would fit gaps in the calendar).

But the count should have included her children by her first husband, Wiley Long. Perhaps this situation is more complicated than it looks.

Jane Belle Bodie's grave

Jane Belle Bodie (whose name appears as Janie Belle Body on my grandfather's SS-5) was married three times, first to a man named Long, then to my great-grandfather (a Martin), and then to a man named Farmer. She had children with the first two husbands, but not the third, and she was also helping to raise her Martin husband's children from his previous marriage. My mother remembers attending several Martin-Long reunions, held at a park near Lake Greenwood in South Carolina.

One of the high points in my genealogical research was finding Jane Belle Boddie's grave. Fortunately, I was aided by an extremely helpful librarian at the Laurens County public library, who was actively working on a second volume of the cemeteries of that county. She allowed me to view her notes, which included the listing for Jane's grave, located in the Laurens Mill (Northview) Cemetery. Buried next to Jane are her third husband, John C. Farmer, and a daughter, Chicorah Lee Martin (who had married an Asbill).

Next, I'll trace Jane backwards in time using census records.

Starting with ... who?

The first connection I have to the Boddie family is through my mother's father, George W. Martin. Granddaddy Martin died when I was 8, and so I have clear memories of him. It was interesting to obtain a copy of his SS-5 (his application for Social Security). The spelling of my greatgrandmother's name on the application certainly points out that the name was pronounced "body", even though it is spelled "Bodie" by most branches of the family in upstate and central South Carolina.

I'll next focus on my greatgrandmother.