Searching for the Michael Delaney Family

 

I have been wondering how I can further my search on my Delaney ancestors.  My great grandmother was Margaret/Maggie Delaney.  Her father was Michael Delaney and her mother was Mary A. Malloy.  I have found the family in the 1880 census in Brooklyn, New York.

I have also found the family in the 1870 census in Brooklyn, New York.  But could not find them in earlier census records in Brooklyn.

One of the family stories that I have heard is that Maggie was born in Newburgh, NY.  I never could find anything to suggest that except her death certificate.  So I started looking in the census in Newburgh, Orange County, New York.  It will take some time because the 1865 state census is not indexed. I believe Maggie was born about 1858 so she should be in that census.  I do have an 1860 census for Michael Delaney, wife Mary and daughter Maggie 7/12 mo. in Newburgh, NY that I believe is the family.

I have two other documents that might be Michael Delaney.  The first is the 1855 New York State Census of Newburgh.  It is a family with mother Catherine, Alie age 20, Michael aged 18, Patrick aged 17, and John aged 14.  It is the only family in Newburgh with a Michael and mother Catherine.  On Michael's death certificate it says his mother is Catherine, so I'm hoping it is right.  His wife gave the information so I think she would know but it is still questionable.

Another item I found is an index for Naturalization records.  It is for Orange County, New York stating Michael Delaney applied 26 February 1866 and finalized 18 March 1868.  I am trying to get that document and hope there is other information that will help confirm that it is the right Michael Delaney.

In all the census records he had all different occupations mostly involving labor work so that has not been any help.  In the 1900 census it indicates the family consisted of 6 children all together but only 2 living Catherine and Michael.  Maggie died in early 1900 so there are 3 others.  In one census I find a John in another I see an Alice so I will see if I can find any birth records going back into the 1860's and 1870's.  I haven't so far but new records are being put on-line all the time so I keep checking.

Driving and Automobiles

Two of our grandsons are 16 years old this year. Actually Ryan turned 16 in April and Shawn will be 16 in July. When teenagers turn 16 their plan is to get their drivers permit. I think my grandsons would probably not believe that I can remember when I turned 16 and got my driving permit. Some things just stick in your head very clearly. My father started teaching me in his car. It was a little hard because it was a standard shift so you had to learn that first and then you could concentrate on the road. This was in my Junior year of high school. During my Senior year I took Drivers Ed. After finishing the course I took my drivers test, and failed. When you took the test it wasn't like today where they tell you right away whether you passed or failed. You had to wait a week or two until they mailed you the results. So back to practicing. During one of my practice driving sessions with my father we had a incident. I believe I showed my father I could handle myself in an emergency. There was smoke and flames coming out from under the hood. I very calmly pulled the car over and we all got out. At this time there were no cell phones. On the light poles on corners there were fire alarms that you pulled. My father did that and very shortly the fire department showed and put out the fire. I' m sure my brothers, who were 7and 5 at the time and with us in the car, thought it was the most fun drive they ever went on. There was a time period before you could apply again, so it was after I graduated that I could take the test again . When that day came my Father had to work and Tom had to work so my future father-in-law offered to take me. He worked nights so was available in the afternoon. When we got there he got out of the car and I started my test driving down the road and around the corner. It then started to rain, I didn't panic just pulled over to turn the wipers on. This was a very new 1960 Pontaic Ventura and I had no idea where the wiper knob would be found. The inspector had no clue either so we hunted around until we found it. Meanwhile Tom's father is waiting in the pouring rain. I had a very short test and returned to pick him up. I thought for sure I failed again, you really should know your car very well. I did pass!! So some tips for the new drivers. First practice, practice, practice. Try to take the test with a car you have driven many times. Do not text or talk on the phone while driving. Always keep two hands on the wheel.

Memorial Day 2012

Today we remember all who have served in the Armed Forces to keep our country free.

Our family has many who served -

The most recent Kevin M. Mathews, my brother, in the 1970's in the Marines.

Before him in World War 11 were his father James R. Mathews who was in the Navy (1941-1945) out of the Brooklyn Navy Yard in Brooklyn.
Two brothers of James, Thomas and William Mathews also served in WW11.
Thomas was in the Army and mustered out from Camp Upton in Yaphank, NY.  His brother William also served in the Army out of Fort Totten in Bayside, Queens, NY.  I am sure many of their cousins in the Mathews line also served in WW11.

The Mathews family came to America in the late 1860's and were not involved with the Civil War and were too old or too young to participate in WW1.

Our Moore family was in Mobile, Alabama at the time of the Civil War.  Horatio N. Moore was part of the British Brigade.  This company of foreigners policed the docks on Mobile Bay during the Civil War and didn't have any battles.

Another line in the Moore family, the grandfather of Thankful Foster Moore, Benjamin Foster of East Machias, Maine. was involved with The Battle of Machias (also known as the Battle of the Margaretta). It was the first naval engagement of the American Revolutionary War. It took place on June 11–12, 1775, in and around the port of Machias in what is now eastern Maine, and resulted in the capture by Patriot militia of a British schooner.

The Murphy family arrived here in the 1870's and didn't to my knowledge have any military members early on.  During WW1and WW11 grandfather Thomas was too old as shown in the draft cards.  His son, Thomas had insufficient eyesight to become a service man but spent his time during WW11 working in the Brooklyn Navy shipyard.

Remember all who served and gave their all for this country.

Getting Ready for the 1940 Census

I am still getting ready to view the 1940 census that will come out on April 2, 2012.  The census will not be indexed by name for awhile so to find a family you will have to have the Enumeration District number.  To find the ED district I have to look through all my files to find address' for 1940 or anything close before  and after.

I was looking at the family history of our Murphy's in Brooklyn and found that Thomas J. Murphy and his wife Florence (McDonald) lived a block away from her sister and her husband.  My next plan is to map all of these addresses.  I hope it will give some insight to how families interacted with each other and possibly how the children met their spouses.

My love of the history of families has me ask one of my favorite questions  "how did you meet your husband/wife"? 

Tom and I met in High School and my parents met at work.  I'm not sure how Tom's parents met, I never asked that of them.  I think they lived and hung out in the same neighborhood.  I should be able to see if I'm right when I map out their addresses.

I did ask Tom's Aunt Florrie (Florence Glessoff).  I was surprised to find out she met her husband Frank Wipf through an ad in the personals section of the newspaper.  Before the 1970's the classified section of the newspaper was divided into different sections, help wanted male, help wanted female, personal, real estate etc.

The way Aunt Florrie told me started out with her telling me where she worked.  She worked in a travel agency, she would sign people up for train and cruise ship travel.  This was in the late 1920's.  They would check the newspapers everyday because there was a section that listed people who had just arrived on ships to the New York harbor.  It also listed people leaving.  I don't know if her office supplied names of people or not but it was part of their business to know what ships had come in.

One day while checking the newspapers her boss saw ads in the personal section for people asking for dates and he dared her to put one in because she was still single at 26 years old.  So she did and went on a blind date.  The two of them (Florence and Frank) both took measures to be safe by meeting in a public park.  Frank got there very early to be able to see Florence before they met.  I guess he liked what he saw because they married soon after and were married for 58 years when he died. 

So I guess there is nothing new about meeting new people it started a long while ago just different ways for different times.

A NEW YEAR 2012

It is a new year and I hope to have more news on the genealogy of our family.  This year the 1940 census will be available for all to see.  This is great news for all of us searching for information on our families.  The census is the one document that puts complete families together at a particular time in history.  This census for me will be very interesting because it will have many of my relatives that I personally knew and know now.

There are always some people in a family that no one remembers what happen to them.  I have several but one in particular that I would love to find more about.  His name was William (Willy) Mathews, he was a first cousin of my father.  He supposedly was a dancer on Broadway and spent most of his time around the stage in front and behind.  I found him in the 1930 census and hope to find him in this 1940 census with a more definite occupation and residence so I can research him further, possibly in newspapers.

Most of the big research databases on line are with Ancestry.com, Familysearch.org and a couple of other small sites.  They are planning on indexing every name in the 1940 census but they can’t start until April 2, when it will be released by the government.  So, those of us who can’t wait until it is indexed can used a method created by Steve Morse at his web site stevemorse.org using the address in the 1940’s.

All genealogists should be making a list of all the address’ of people they want to find in the census and using Steve Morse’ site find the Enumeration District for the address. An Enumeration District is a defined area in a town over which a person, the enumerator, collects information for the census. When the census is available they will be able to go right to the correct Enumeration District for either the city or town and page through to find the right family.

Using the census records is very helpful in learning when people might have died, married, had more children, changed occupations and moved.  When looking at the census pages you should look not just at your family but the families who lived in their neighborhood.  You might find other family members.  When immigrants travel to other countries they would most likely settle in an area already settle by members of their nationality and even members of their town in the old country.  If you follow the family in several census records and find the next door neighbor is always the same family, it is a good bet they are related in some way, or came from the same area of the old country.

I have a friend who is looking for the place of origin in Ireland of her Grandmother.  All of the documents found already for her and her family just say Ireland.  We are now looking at a family she lived with when she first came to New York City.  One family member was also a witness when she married, all indications that they were very close.  The questions we now have are; are they related and are they from the same area? 

We have found the family she stayed with in several later census’ noting when the parents are not present anymore, indicating when they might have died.

We have found death dates in the indexes that might be her and her husband.  After sending for them and reviewing all the information to confirm that they are the correct people, we hope it might indicate where in Ireland.

We have also decided to send for the birth certificates of their children who are listed in the census at the time the Grandmother lived with the family.  We hope on their birth certificates there is mention of a place of origin for their mother or father.

So with these two research problems you can see how helpful the census records are and why the genealogy world is very excited to have another being released to the public.

Tools of the Trade

I have been thinking about the occupations of our ancestors and what tools that might have used. 

William Mathers came to America from Ireland about 1865. He had a shoe and bootmaking business in  New York City. Here are a few of the tools he might have used.

John Murphy was in Brooklyn in the 1870's.  He came from Ireland and probably had several different jobs because on a couple of listings in City Directories he was just listed as a Laborer.  Several years after that in the 1880 census he indicates he is a plasterer.  Here are some tools he would have used.

Another ancestor John Nelson Moore was born in Savannah, Georgia and became a telegraph operator for the Rail Road.  Around 1917 he brought his Mother and family up to New York City.  He work as a telegraph operator for newspapers, Western Union, and retired from Paine Webber Jackson and Curtis Brokerage Firm as their manager of the Telegraph/Ticker Tape room.  Below is a picture of an early machine that he would have used.

John Moore's wife Isabel Tierney worked  before she got married in 1918.  I believe that is how the two of them met.  She was a telephone operator on Wall Street.  Also her daughter Ruth, my mother, also worked as a telephone operator and met my father down in the Wall Street area.  Here is what they probably worked on.

James R. Mathews, my Dad, was an editor, and a ghost writer (he wrote articles and speeches for other people).  These were his tools.







The Hunt for Grandpa Thomas J. Murphy's Sister

I have researched the Murphy family and have an amazing amount of information.  One of the problems I have is finding information on Thomas' sister Mary.

Thomas was born in 1877 in Brooklyn, NY.  His parents were Honora (Nora) Quinlan and John Murphy.  They also had 2 other sons, Patrick and Michael both died very young.  They had two daughters, Mary and Margaret (Maggie).

In researching I had found Maggie living with her Mother and brother Thomas in the 1900 census.  She was married to James Coyne and had a son John.  I was able to get documents on her family because I had her married name.  The sister, Mary, was not living with them in 1900 so I assumed she either died or got married.  I was going to  check for a death record but it was a daunting task.  I would have had to look from 1880 when I find her with the family  (the last census before the 1900 census) to 1900 when I don't find her.  There were just too many Mary Murphy's.  I would have to see every death certificate to see who the parents of the Mary was to confirm I had the right Mary.  The other document, marriage, was just as impossible because I had no married name.

I have the family tree on Ancestry for all to see.  When someone sees a name they think might be connected to their family they contact the owner of the tree.  I was contacted by someone looking for Honora and John Murphy and their daughter Mary.  It has happened before but this time a lot of things look like it could be a connection.  They have a death certificate for Mary Murphy McEvoy saying her parents were Honora Quinlan and John Murphy.  One of the first things I asked was did they have a marriage certificate?  No they couldn't find one.  Since that time I have looked and found nothing either.  Looking under Mary Murphy is not the way to go.  Looking under McEvoy is a better chance of finding the certificate, you would think.  I have found there are several ways of spelling McEvoy and then spelling it by sound adds a few more.  We do have the first name, Edward A.  But I still have not been able to locate the document.

I thought if I got every document for the family there might be some clues.  The women looking for information said that the grandson of her Mary is John McEvoy born in 1934 and his father was John born in 1898. They also had a daughter name Mary born in 1902. So I got the birth certificate for John born 1898.  It lists his parents as Mary Murphy and Edward A. McEvoy. I have found this Mary and Edward McEvoy in the 1900 and 1910 census. In the census they indicate they were married in 1897. 

I found all this information but none of it helps confirm that this is the same Mary Murphy that was the sister to Thomas Joseph Murphy. 

I really feel the only way I'm going to find confirmation is to find the marriage document.  They ask for the bride and groom's parents names.  Since I have not found anything in the index for the New York Cities five boroughs, I'm going to look at the area that they were living and find the churches.  Possible they were married in church and the information was never sent to the city.