Mom and I have fun with the 1870 US Census

Mom, who was 96 years old just last month, has been doing genealogy since the early 1970s, only recently announced to me that she was retiring from it. She might have trouble seeing the computer screen due to eye issues, but you can't dampen her interest. We were talking about the copies of death certificates I'd received in the mail from my guy at Maryland State Archive that were for Mom's mother and father and Dad's birth certificate. We had such a good time exploring every line and wringing every last drop of meaning out of it! You get that, don't you? "He died of what???"

The only great grandparent I now don't have a death cert for is Dad's paternal grandfather, Gustav Zeller (1858-1927) and that request is in. He was born and died in Frostburg, Allegany, Maryland, a small mountain town in Western Maryland as so many other of my ancestors. In fact my parents, grandparents, and six of my eight great grands were all born and died there.  If I want to find out who was doing what about 1870 I check out the census for good old District 5 in Allegany County, that's Frostburg.

US Census 1870, District 5, Allegany, Maryland; Roll: M593-566; Page: 148A; Image: 299.

My Zeller family.

After Mom and I had some fun with death certificates we went on and chatted about how much we like just browsing census pages before and after the page on which our ancestor appears. We agreed that for us the most fun census to browse is the 1870. You see, Frostburg was on the upswing then. Coal mining, the railroad, ironworks, and brickworks all fed the main pipeline of prosperity. And merchants followed and built strong businesses. The region drew immigrants like a great big magnate from the British Isles and Germany especially. Hard work and great promise drew my own ancestors from Ireland, Germany and Wales about 1840. The head of household in the 1870 census was often listed as having a surprising amount of personal wealth.

The first thing that struck me was the uncommon names for the German states. My great great grandfather Charles Wm. Zeller (1829-1901) had immigrated from Wurtemburg in 1851. He returned a year later and married Anna Mary Bruening. They were back in Frostburg in time for the 1860 census and he was listed as a confectioner and she a milliner or hat maker. Doesn't that sound like a fun couple? His son and my direct ancestor and great grandfather was Gustav. But what of all these different German states? Look at part of the census page to see, below.

When I look at the 1870 census the families listed right before my Zeller family are from Hesse and  from Prussia. My Zellers are listed as born in Wurtemburg. Where was that? I had to know and German history is not my strength. So off to Wikipedia which you can see here. I won't take time to explore here what the unification was all about but you can go see for yourself. Here's a map from that page showing where everything was after unification. You might have to go to the Wikipedia page to see the full map. Look at the golden color area. That's where the Zellers came from and where Charles returned to marry Anna Mary Bruening.

Thanks, Wikipedia!

The neighbors listed past the Zeller family were also from the German states as well as Ireland, Wales and England. It seems to me that every-other head of household was not from Maryland or the adjoining states of Pennsylvania or even West Virginia but were immigrants. The churches in town served the diverse population and my own ancestors worshiped at St. Michael's Catholic Church (Irish), the Welsh Shiloh Congregational Church, and the Lutheran Church. My Zeller people, you might think, could have worshiped at the Lutheran Church but they were Catholic. It was the old-line Revolutionary War families who were Lutheran.

And what of local prosperity? There was plenty of work to go around and pay day brought locals and those living in adjacent town to Frostburg to shop. Saturday night downtown was a busy place!

 

Frostburg, Allegany, Maryland. Main Street, about 1900.

Charles Zeller's confectionery and sweets shop prospered and his family grew too. Here they are in the 1870 census and look, he owns $2000 in real estate.

 

 

Other families are doing well and buying up real estate too. George W. McCulloh living three residences away has $30,000 in real estate and his wife has $5000 in her own name. He's a banker. Edward Hoffman a brewer from Saxony had no real estate holdings but his neighbor Albert Holly from Hanover, also a brewer, is holding $9000 worth of real property. Their neighbor Thomas H. Paul from New York is a machinist and has $16,000 worth of real estate holdings and $7000 of personal property. Yes, it sure looks like a prosperous little mountain town. Opportunity abounded!

 

Mom and I had a real good time on the phone reviewing the Frostburg 1870 census. We just don't get people who don't get us;) Imagine, not enjoying looking at the census!

 

 

Gustav Zeller in the white barber's coat standing on the front steps of the first electric trolley that came to Frostburg. Notice his hand touching his hair... to signify that he was a barber? He was a super promoter!

 

Gustav Zeller again, this time close-up so we can see his grooming.

 

Gustav's father, Charles Wm. Zeller.

 

 

The URL for this post is: http://nutsfromthefamilytree.blogspot.com/2014/08/mom-and-i-have-fun-with-1870-us-census.html 

50th Anniversary for J. Lee Kelly and his lovely wife Helen Zeller Kelly

Evening Times (Cumberland, Maryland), October 2, 1963.

So, my new absolutely favorite activity on Ancestry.com is to do a "search records" (you can find it right under the picture box on the person page, in the left, top) and then select Newspapers & Publications from the list. I recently posted about my good fortune in finding the fuller story of the house fire at the Joseph Hampton Whetstone (1858 - 1939) family home in 1906 and their quick rebuild in 1907. He was my great grandfather on my mother's mother's side and I heard about the fire from Grandma Williams and then from Mom. So I went looking for newspaper articles about other grandparent and great grandparents. What fun!!

Searching like this is a real treat because I'm not looking for a critical or missing bit of record to solve a problem or puzzle, but filling out what's recorded about the ancestors and building a richer page for each person. It helps me have a deeper understanding of the personalities involved. I'm having fun doing it and hope that it will give others who find what we've added to our Ancestry Member Tree, a better feel for these individuals.

I remembered that Dad's parents were married on September 30, 1913 because the hubby and I were also married on September 30th. When we got married I didn't know that the Kelly grandparents got married on that same date, but only found out later!

We even have some charming wedding portraits taken then. Here's the lovely couple, below. A framed copy of this photo hung in the Kelly home entryway, and I remember it well. Didn't know that it was their wedding portrait until recently when I added up the evidence!

Helen (Zeller) Kelly 1894-1985 and John Lee Kelly 1892 - 1969.
Photo taken in 1913.

 

They had six children and that was a big family to raise during the Great Depression. They endured through thick and thin, living in the house on Main Street in the little Western Maryland mountain town of Frostburg. Lee worked in the coal mines and later learned the barbering trade from his father-in-law, Gus Zeller who owned a booming barber shop in the main business district. There was a very small one chair barber shop out behind the house where Pop Kelly cut the miner's hair on Saturdays and it's still standing today.

We were living in Ohio in 1963 and I don't remember that we went to Frostburg for the anniversary party, but maybe we did. I was in high school and you know how that goes... all a blur now. I should go back and look at Mom's photo archive to see if there are any photos of the anniversary party.

The only new tid-bit that the article reveals are the names of the attendants or witnesses at the wedding: Mrs. Charles Newman and John Blake. Mrs. Charles Newman was Lee's sister Dora who was two years older than her brother. I checked Mom's Family Tree Maker file and it looks like Dora was still single when Lee and Helen married in 1913. She didn't wed Charles Newman until 1920. I have no idea who the mysterious Mr. Blake is. Guess I'll check the 1910 census for Eckhart, Allegany, Maryland to see if he pops up.

See what fun it is to sift through old newspaper articles?

About 1942.

With one of their grandchildren, my brother playing "got your nose", 1956.

The URL for this post is: http://nutsfromthefamilytree.blogspot.com/2014/07/50th-anniversary-for-j-lee-kelly-and.html

Stories Mom Told Me: Part 2, Their first car and my coal miner grandpop

Here's what I'm doing with this little project, copied from the longer explanation on yesterday's post:
I'll share some more stories Mom told me. You see I call Mom almost every morning and we do go on about family history. I keep notes on what she tells me in spiral notebooks. Now I have three fat ones brimming over with what Mom knows. Sometimes it's just a detail about our ancestors, a small event, or a note about what happened to whom and when. It's the kind of stuff that can easily get lost if a person doesn't write it down then and there.

That will serve as an introduction to each of these posts so you don't have to repeat read it all:) Then we can get right down to business. Today's story is about Mom and Dad's first car and some of the many things they did with it.

Their first car and my coal miner Grandpop.

This morning when I chatted with Mom by phone it was 14 degrees and there was snow on the ground... and it's only November. Just what you might expect of a place named Frostburg (although the naming was for a citizen named Frost) located in the mountains of Western Maryland. It gets cold in winter and can stay that way for weeks on end. I remember just a couple of years ago when a snow and ice storm blew through and everyone lost power for ten days. Folks plan ahead for such emergencies and stock up on staples that can be cooked on a gas stove. As you drive around and look at back porches, they invariably contain a BBQ grill fueled by a propane tank that can be used when electrical service goes out due to an ice storm that takes down power lines. So too might you find that a lot of homes have wood burning fireplaces or furnaces that are relied on in just such an eventuality. Heck, Aunty Betty's house has three (yes, you read that right) furnaces: an old coal furnace, and an oil and an electric furnace... just in case. These people know what they are dealing with!

So, all that by way of saying that winters can get very nasty in Frostburg. It's just a fact of life. I know this and when I read Mom's stories - which were posted here recently - and she talks about walking everywhere, I remember how cold it gets and what it means to walk the three miles or so from her parent's home down to Eckhart Flats to go dancing. Brrr!

Now I do know for a fact that Grandpop Kelly (Dad's father) hated the cold. I know that it's not quite PC today to use the "h" word, but I have to tell you, he HATED the cold! He was a thin man and had health issues and could never seem to get warm. In the 1950s Mom and Dad sent him to Miami on the train to spend time with his sister Edith and her family. He loved that trip and when he returned he told Grandma that they were going to sell the house and move down with Edith. It was only then that Grandma - who hated the heat - told him that the house her father, Gus Zeller (1858 - 1927), left to her when he died was only in HER name! Mom thinks Grandpop didn't speak to Grandma for like a month! They did finally make peace and returned to being the love birds they always were.

Well, long about 1940, Dad bought a car. A 1930-something Chevy with a rumble seat. I don't have a photo of it but here's an image from Wikimedia Commons of a 1931 Ford with a rumble seat, just so that all you kids who aren't familiar with such a thing can see it. Looks comfortable, doesn't it? Or not! Especially in ice and snow.

Grandpop Kelly worked in the coal mines during those years, and there were many in and around the Frostburg area. Grandpop had been a brakeman on the electric railroad or trolley in the 1910 US Census, when he was 18 and still living with his parents, Frank Kelly (1854-1923), then a conductor on the same electric railroad, and Cristiana (Eckhart) Kelly (1861-1932), then residing in Eckhart, Maryland. His brother Frank Jr. was already working in the coal mines. He married Grandma, Helen (Zeller) Kelly (1894-1985) on 30 September 1913.

By time of the 1920 census they were living at 230 Mechanic Street in Frostburg proper, and Grandpop was working as an electrician in the coal mines. Dad was just three years old then and his young brother Bernie was a bit over two years old.

The 1930 US Census finds the Kelly family living at 93 N. Union Street (the old name for West Main Street... yeah, confusing, right) next door to the Zeller matriarch, Moretta, who lived at 95. Her house was worth $5500 and Grandpop was paying $15 a month rent to live in the house next door that she owned. Now he's working as a motorman in the coal mine.

The 1940 US Census finds them living at 89 West Main Street (which was remaned and renumbered from Union Street) and Grandpop is simply listed as a "laborer" in the coal mine. Dad is working at the "silk mill", or the Celanese fibers company. It was his first real job. So it's just about this time that Dad bought his first car. (And, you should know, he was living with his parents and Mom was living with hers and no one knew they were married.)

So I'm chatting with Mom and she mentions that when they got their first car they would pick up Grandpop from the coal mine and drive him home. She also says he worked at a mine locally called "Shaft".

I am guessing here, but after consulting the coal fields map online,  here, and based on what Mom said, that he must have worked at a mine near Frostburg, about 5 or 6 miles away called "Shaft". I find Borden Shaft and that's too far away to be the one he worked in, but no other named shaft mines, per se. But you see that can be confusing because most of the coal mines in the area were slope or drift mines, in other words the mine tunnel was built on a slant into the hillside. Shaft mines were dug straight down with tunnels off to the side, were not the norm, so if the typical shaft tunnel mine was dug it got called "shaft."

Well the point of this story is not the various coal mines in the area and how they were worked but about the difficulty of the work itself. Mom said that Grandpop walked the 5 or 6 miles to work in the morning and then walked those same 5 or 6 miles back at night, rain or snow. Yeah, think about that: rain or snow... even in 14 degree weather. He'd get home soaked to the skin or practically frozen. And all after working in the coal mine all day.

In 1940 he was 48 years of age, and still working those long hours, feeling lucky I suppose, to have the work. The Great Depression years were very hard on this area and work was scarce, but Grandpop and his boys always found worked. And none of his sons ended up working in the mines. They went on to better things.

Because he had been a brakeman on the electric railroad, it's not too large a leap to him working as an electrician for a shaft mine operation where electricians were needed to keep the lifts running. Then in 1930 he's listed as a motorman. That sounds OK to me too because I've found that electricians and motormen earned a per hour wage whereas the laborers who dug the mines were paid by the ton of coal they dug, and that was hard dirty work. I'm a bit concerned for him when I read him listed as a "laborer" in the 1940 census. What did that mean? Was the enumerator simply following some guidelines that weren't very specific? Or was he a common laborer digging coal in the mine? That would have been the hardest work of all.

So when Dad got his first car one of the first things he did with it was go pick his father up after work at the coal mines. Nice.

Grandpop Kelly, John Lee Kelly, about 1913, with his family.

Probably a wedding portrait.

Grandpop Kelly with his kids, about 1920.

 

With daughter Louise, about 1930.

 

1942: Family pictures before the boys leave for WWII.

Grandpop is on the right.

 

On the Miami trip, mid 1950s.\

 

Also on the Miami trip.

1956, with my brother, Cleveland Ohio.

 

 
In Frostburg, about 1960.

 

The URL for this post is: http://nutsfromthefamilytree.blogspot.com/2013/11/stories-mom-told-me-part-2-their-first.html

Treasure Chest Thursday: Frostburg Mining Journal

Let's see what's in the Olde Treasure Chest this week. So much to choose from... I'm such a lucky girl! Oh, here's a goodie. The Frostburg Mining Journal published in that Western Maryland town from 1871 to 1913. You can find it at the Maryland State Archives here. Here's what the MSA has to say about this publication:

The Frostburg Mining Journal was published September 30, 1871 [v. 1, no. 1] to April 17, 1880 [v. 9, no. 31]; April 24, 1880 [9th year, no. 32] to 1913. It was published weekly. It was also published as the Frostburg Journal and the Mining Journal. "Mining" appears in masthead ornament, September 29, 1883-December 1889. "Frostburg" appears in masthead ornament, January 1890-[1913]. The newspaper was continued by the Frostburg Spirit (Frostburg: 1913).

Mom and I were on a crusade to get the FMJ available online and then discovered that the Maryland State Archives was already doing just that. We sent them donations, and when they put up rolls of the microfilm they sent us a down loadable file of those rolls as a nice thank you gift for sponsoring that roll. Good all around.

The FMJ is the kind of thing you can spend hours browsing, and Mom and I do. I keep it as a reward for completing some particularly distasteful but necessary task. It whisks you back in time and gives you a real peek into the lives of the miners and their community of 15,000 strong by 1900 surrounding the market town of Frostburg in Western Maryland. Chickens gone missing, the mayor speaking to a ladies group, who wed whom, and which naughty married lady had run off with which fellow. It's all there. Life lived on Main Street in 10 point lead type.

So today I want to post a couple of items from the paper. The first is an ad for corsets. There were
plenty of ads and the income from them likely made the whole effort profitable for the paper's owner, J. B. Order.

 

 

Corsets not your thing? How about a cocktail?

 



 



 Christmas time was a boom time for J. B. Order when all the merchants ran ads!

 

Obits were common too and I like them because they went into depth and gave a feel for the lost beloved. This one below is for my great grand aunt, Elizabeth Jane Whetstone Clise. Enoch Clise, her husband, was mayor of Frostburg twice.

 

 

My favorite section is called Breveties. Here you'll find short mentions of all manner of information that didn't fit elsewhere. The one below is a story about my GGF Gus Zeller, owner of a very popular barbershop, receiving a shipment of 63 fancy goldfish. Some went in the big fish tank in the window of his establishment and others went into a pond on a property he owned. Mom has speculated that the reason he's mentioned so often in the Frostburg Mining Journal is that the publisher, J. Benjamin Order, must have gotten free services from Gus.

 

News to the left, ads on right. Entertaining stories of length (a substitute for TV) occupied the entire front page. My guess would be that mats (used in letterpress printing) were probably subscribed to and shipped in to newspaper printers because the stories on the front page were of general interest and not timely. Mr. Order was then left to typeset the rest and fill the four page paper with local ads and news. Here are some typical pages. Enjoy:)

May you find your own version of the Frostburg Mining Journal online containing the daily news of a town some of your ancestors lived in... that you can browse in your pajamas and fuzzy bunny slippers:)

Treasure Chest Thursday is a blogging prompt of GeneaBloggers.

The URL for this post is: http://nutsfromthefamilytree.blogspot.com/2013/03/treasure-chest-thursday-frostburg.html

Treasure Chest Thursday: What We Found In The Hall Closet

During the Great Depression my Kelly grandparents lived on Main Street in the little town of Frostburg in Western Maryland. They had six kids and times were hard. Everyone worked and did what they could to bring in money to support the family.

Great grandmother Moretta Workman Zeller, grandmother Kelly's mother who everyone called Ma, provided rents from the three houses her husband great grandfather Gustav Zeller owned and left to her. Grandpa Lee Kelly had worked as a miner when he was young but the mines were having financial difficulties and few jobs and too many ready workers meant painfully low wages. And he was developing the symptoms of black lung disease so physical labor was practically impossible for him. He learned to cut hair from his father-in-law, the impresario of tonsorial skills, Gustav Zeller, and made some money by cutting the miner's hair on Saturday in a tiny barbershop behind the house. By 1930 all nine of them - six kids, the Kelly couple and Ma - lived in the house on West Main Street, except for Gus who passed on in 1927.

Grandma Helen Zeller Kelly (1894-1985) was born and died in that house in the very same room. For me and all of us grand kids, she gave it life. After she passed we purchased the house from the estate. It was an emotional buy and I'd come to have second and third thoughts about the wisdom of it many times in the next couple of years. The thing was, the foundation was sinking, the walls were old cracked horse hair plaster, the floors were tilted, and the plumbing and electrical needed replacing. The worst day was when my brother who was acting as general contractor for it all called and said, "We need to gut it."

So we, or rather he and his team, did. The house lost some of its charm, but for safety alone, it had to be done. During the renovation the ancient linoleum in the hall closet was pulled up and revealed some old magazines. Dusty, water spotted, and dirty, they remained there from about 1931 until the mid 1980s. They were magazines for traveling salesmen.

Every page promised a scheme for great wealth and prosperity. Ideas, products, systems for making money fill the publications from front to back. "Opportunity" and "Modern Salesology" from 1931 are the two that were hidden under the linoleum and that I still have. They are a step back into a difficult time full of people, mostly men, who wanted and needed to earn, and plenty of offerings about how to do so, if the men had a few dollars for samples or a book telling them of some scheme. There is a palpable sense of desperation and promised greed that drifts off the pages.

How these magazines got under the linoleum in Grandma's front hall I really don't know. The placement seems to be such that one could easily think they were hidden, but who hid them and why? Dad seemed to remember that his family took in salesmen borders at some point during the Depression so possibly they were left behind. But why hide them? They remain a mystery.

 

Treasure Chest Thursday is a blogging prompt of GeneaBloggers.


The URL for this post is: http://nutsfromthefamilytree.blogspot.com/2013/03/treasure-chest-thursday-what-we-found.html

Surname Saturday: The Zellers from Germany

Off we go on another Surname Saturday, a dandy blogging prompt from GeneaBloggers! I blogged a bit this week on Treasure Chest Thursday about some of this family's members, Grandma Kelly's brother's family, and the Zeller Family Ensemble. That was fun! So here comes the line-up for Grandma Kelly and her ancestors, the Zellers from Germany.

It's sort of unusual that we have a lot of information about the known members in this line but it just doesn't go back too far as compared with other lines on Mom's Big Tree. And the other interesting thing, and a project for a day in the future, is that the other children of great great grandfather Charles William Zeller (1829 - 1901) and his wife, Anna Mary (1834 - 1906) are yet to be discovered by us. They disappear in the Chicago area. Mom has some skimpy information but more must be out there and sitting pretty, ready for us to get to.

So here we go: the Zeller family.

1. Diane Kelly Weintraub

2. Francis Patrick " Pat" Kelly (1916 - 2007)
3. Virginia Williams, living and loving it

4. John Lee "Lee" Kelly (1892 - 1969)
5. Helen Gertrude Zeller Kelly ( 1894 - 1985)

10. Gustav William "Gus" Zeller (1858 - 1927)
11. Moretta Workman Zeller (1859 - 1946), everyone called her "Ma"
Gus and Ma, were both born and died in the Frostburg, Allegany County, Maryland area. See below for the good stuff:)
They had these 5 children:
Charles Sample Zeller ( 1880- 1966)
Adelbert  "Burt" Zeller ( 1883 - 1947)
Gustav William "Gus Jr." Zeller Jr. (1884 - 1964)
5. Helen Gertrude Zeller Kelly ( 1894 - 1985), that's Grandma Kelly there:)
Anna M. Zeller ( 1882 - 1882)

20. Charles William Zeller ( 1829 - 1901)
21 Anna Mary (possibly Bruning) Zeller (1834 - 1906)
This couple were both born in Werttemburg, Germany. They immigrated and settled in the little town of Frostburg, Allegany County, Maryland. Mom believes there were relatives in the area and a search of local records turns up a number of other Zeller families, although their exact connection mystifies us.
After 1878 when the last of the children was born in Frostburg, and before 1886 when Henry died in Chicago, the family moved to Chicago, Cook County, Illinois. All the children except Gustav are buried in the Chicago area. The local Cumberland, MD newspaper mentions Anna Mary's death in the issue printed on 17 Sept 1906 and says she and her husband were residents of Frostburg 22 years ago, making their moving date about 1884. Good tip from a local newspaper!
Charles was a confectioner and his wife, Anna Mary, was a diabetic. Go figgure! Charles ran a very popular sweets store in Frostburg until he moved to Chicago. I wonder if he realized the wider potential of his success in Frostburg and decided to move to the larger market Chicago would promise?
In checking the 1870 US Census Mary Ann is listed as being a milliner. Seems to me I remember Grandma Kelly telling a story about a milliner. Maybe Mom remembers better that I do.
They had these 11 children:
Charles Zeller (1855 - ?)
10. Gustav William Zeller (1858 - 1927)
Gotlieb Zeller (1861 - 1889)
George Zeller (1862 - 1931)
Delbert Zeller (1865 - after 1910)
Frederick Zeller (1869 - 1932), he and John are twins
John Zeller (1869 - 1945), he and Frederick are twins
Henry Zeller (1870 - 1886)
William Zeller (1872 - 1906)
Daniel Zeller (1875 - ?)
Annie Mary Zeller (1878 - ?)

Boom! Done. That was short, too short. Maybe after a while Mom and I will dig into those Chicago records and track down this family. Wouldn't it be fun if we could locate living Zeller people... and they had more family photos and stories? And, we'd like to get more knowledgeable about German records so that we might pursue the Zeller family there.

Something I've noticed because of this family is that if the ancestors were in retail, especially in a small town with a local newspaper with booster tendencies, it's possible to find them mentioned. In a previous post this week which you can see here on Treasure Chest Thursday, I talked about Uncle Delbert's researcher, Sharon. Well Sharon dug into the pages of the wonderful Frostburg Mining Journal, published from 1871 - 1913, and a treasure trove for anyone who has ancestors from the area, to find mentions of GGF Gus Zeller and his barber shop, or as it's often described, "tonsorial emporium". There was giant 6 foot barber pole out front, in case anyone had doubts about his business;) He also had a very large and colorful goldfish tank in the window. It was at 14 East Main Street, but burned in a building fire on 14 Dec 1917. He moved his business to 35 East Main Street after the fire. His new location was also a full-service affair with showers and baths.

Guss, my GGF, had a reputation as quite the drinking man. At the end of this paragraph I'll place links to some of the stories about him I've posted to this blog before. Family lore has it that whenever he'd get drinking such that it hampered family life, Ma would insist that they leave town on a "vacation" with the intention of "drying him out." One mention in the Frostburg Mining Journal of 7 Oct 1899 talks of Gus Wm. Zeller, wife, and little daughter (that's Grandma) having gone on an extended tour, eastward, northward and westward to Boston, Montreal, Chicago, and other cities. Getting GGF Gus to Chicago to visit the family there was a strategic mistake on Ma's part as his father Charles was also a drinking man. Poor Ma!

Here are some other stories about GGF Gus Zeller and his barber shop:
http://nutsfromthefamilytree.blogspot.com/2011/07/more-drinking-stories.html
http://nutsfromthefamilytree.blogspot.com/2012/10/he-died-in-outhouse.html
http://nutsfromthefamilytree.blogspot.com/2011/09/those-who-labored.html

Dad and Mom, Grandpop Kelly and Grandma Kelly:

2. Francis Patrick " Pat" Kelly (1916 - 2007)

3. Virginia Williams, living and loving it

4. John Lee "Lee" Kelly (1892 - 1969)

5. Helen Gertrude Zeller Kelly ( 1894 - 1985)

 

The next generation back,

10. Gustav William "Gus" Zeller (1858 - 1927), above

11. Moretta Workman Zeller (1859 - 1946), below 

20. Charles William Zeller ( 1829 - 1901), father of Gustav and confectioner.

Sadly, we do not have a photo of his wife Anna Mary Zeller.

 

 

The URL for this post is: http://nutsfromthefamilytree.blogspot.com/2013/01/surname-saturday-zellers-from-germany.html

Treasure Chest Thursday: The Zeller Ensemble

My Uncle Delbert is Dad's youngest brother. Dad and he weren't as close as Dad was to his other brother, Uncle Bernie. There is a two year difference between Dad and Uncle Bernie and a four year difference between Dad and Uncle Delbert, and just enough to likely make Delbert that pesky younger brother, but I'm only guessing about that.

Uncle Delbert is in his 90s now and has a bit of a memory impairment but can remember the good old days real well. I call him every once in a while and chat but always have to remind him who I am: Pat and Virginia's oldest kid. Last year I made up a big package of Mom's Big Tree on the Kelly side and all the family photos I could muster and thought he might like to see. Took it to the local copy center and had it all bound together. If I do say so, it came out quite impressively. Most important is that Uncle Delbert had a great time with it!

Back in 2006 a woman I only know as Sharon did some genealogy work on the Zeller line for Uncle Delbert. I have a copy of that packet and look at it every once in a while. Sharon did some nice work there and I appreciate having it very much and thank Cousin Cynthia, Uncle Bernie's daughter, for passing it along to me.

The packet included two photos that interest me - as if there's a family photo that doesn't interest me! Here they are below. I'm sad that the quality is what I'd call poor but they have been copied and faxed and emailed ... so I'm just happy to have them at all. Happy wins out.

 

Here is my GGF and GGM,

Gustav Zeller 1858 - 1927 and Moretta Workman Zeller 1859- 1946,

with three of their five children.

Left to right they are:

Adelbert "Bert" Zeller 1883 - 1947,

Gustav WM Zeller 1884 - 1964, Charles S Zeller 1880 - 1966.

Grandma is not there and she was born in 1894.

Might be a clue to dating this picture.

 

Here is a close up of just the family group.

 

Here's a fun find in the packet!

This is a photo of the family of Gus Jr.'s family band, the Zeller Ensemble:

Nellie, Gus Jr.'s wife Nellie Maud Broadwater Zeller 1896 - 1961, their children,

Darrell Zeller, William "Bud" Zeller, and Violet Zeller.

Darrell would be my first cousin once removed, or so Family Tree Maker tells me:)

 

 

Treasure Chest Thursday is a blogging prompt of GeneaBloggers. Find out more here.

 

The URL for this post is: http://nutsfromthefamilytree.blogspot.com/2013/01/treasure-chest-thursday-zeller-family.html