Mystery Monday: Aunt Moe and ? - June 1953

This photograph is of my aunt, Rose Mary "Moe" Pape Dietz (1931-2007) and a mystery man, shortly after her wedding to my uncle, Ronald Joseph "Das" Dietz (1931-1994), on June 13, 1953. 

The photo was taken in the backyard of the home of my grandparents, Elizabeth Florence Massmann Pape (1902-2000) and Paul Robert Pape (1896-1970), at 2093 West Lunt in the West Ridge neighborhood of Chicago.  It was taken at the same time as another photo of the newlyweds.

I think the man in this photo might be Uncle Das' younger brother, Gerald R. "Gerry" Dietz (1932-2017), whose obituary notes he was a Korean War veteran (like my dad).  Here is a photo of Gerry from that obituary - I think it is the same man:

The image with Moe is from a Kodachrome slide I found in the study of my late father, Frederick Henry Pape (1929-2017), and was most likely taken by him.

© Amanda Pape - 2019 - e-mail me!

Mystery Monday: A Mis-Attribution - Ewald Pape's design at 3257 NE U. S. Grant Place, Portland, Oregon

Two articles in the June 7, 1931, Portland Oregonian mention a house that my architect first-cousin-twice-removed, Ewald Theodore Pape (1894-1976), designed.  One article, called "Church Gets Permit," says:

"The [city] bureau [of buildings] also issued a permit for a $12,000 residence, to be erected by J. H. Cleland at 985 U. S. Grant place. E. T. Pape prepared the plans."

The second article, called "Six Houses Under Way," said:

"For John H. Cleland, he [E. T. Pape] has designed a two-story colonial of nine rooms, also for U. S. Grant place, that will cost approximately $12,000.  It will contain three baths."

Using PastPortland.com, I determined that the address after the 1932 renumbering was 3257 NE U. S. Grant Place, and this is the house:




So in doing my research, I checked the Oregon Historic Sites Database.  The house is described in the attached City of Portland Historic Resource Inventory form as being a Twentieth Century Colonial, with "gable roof, boxed cornice with return, brick end-wall chimney, pedimented entry with modillioned cornice supported by two sets of double-columns, double doors with elliptical fan light above, round arched window with keystones, and louvered shutters."

A real estate listing from 2013 notes a "gracious formal entry with open staircase is flanked by spacious living and dining rooms with hardwood floors, [period light fixtures, original] leaded [glass] windows and built-ins [like a china hutch in the dining room]. Four large bedrooms up includes grand master suite" with three closets.   "Period baths" have "original tile."

However, I was surprised to find some discrepancies in the City of Portland's Historic Resource Inventory form.  Here's a snippet from the first page for this property:

Architectural plans by Edward J. Green?

This had to be a mistake.  Note that Cleland is also spelled wrong.  Also, on the next page of the form, the wrong address is given as the old address of the property:

I decided to double-check the City of Portland's 1933 index for house and street renumbering. Here's the relevant section from page 90:

As can be seen, the old 991 U. S. Grant Place is today's 3265 NE U. S. Grant Place, which happens to be the house next door, also owned by John Cleland.  Perhaps that is the one designed by Edward J. Green.  If you look at the plumbing permit available on PortlandMaps.com, you can see why the error might have happened:

The card shows 991 crossed out and 985 written just above it, as well as the renumbered/renamed address, 3257 NE.  Other details correspond:  Cleland as the owner, 2 story, 3 baths (water closets or toilets).  The date of the permit is July 11, 1931, just a month after the newspaper articles.  The house next door, today's 3265, was also owned by Cleland, but its plumbing permit is dated September 26, 1931.

Here's a photo of the house at 3257 NE U. S. Grant Place from sometime around May 1981, the date the ownership at that time was noted.  Since then, door and window shutters on the first floor have been removed, as have storm doors on the front:

I'll be contacting the City of Portland and sharing my research, in hopes that the incorrect information can be corrected in the Oregon Historic Sites database immediately as well as when the City of Portland Historic Resource Inventory is updated, as there are plans to do that.

© Amanda Pape - 2018 - click here to e-mail me.

Mystery Monday: What Happened to One of Ewald's Houses?

I recently returned from a trip to Portland, Oregon, where I spent some time driving around and taking photographs of houses, apartment buildings, and other structures designed by my architect first-cousin-twice removed Ewald Theodore Pape (1894-1976).

So what did I photograph?  In some cases, I started with an article in the Portland Oregonian, found a few years back when I won a one-year subscription to GenealogyBank.

An article in the October 20, 1929 issue entitled "Turner Will Build Home" states "E. T. Pape, designer, has completed plans for a new house for F. B. Turner on Varnell drive in Burlingame.  It will cost approximately $15,000.

The building will be 30x56 in dimensions, and because of the sloping terrain it will be two stories in front and three stories high in the rear.  Stucco, brick, and shingles will be used for exterior finish.  It will contain ten rooms."

I searched for a Varnell Drive in Burlingame, but couldn't find it.  This told me the street name had changed.  I consulted a spreadsheet produced by the Portland Department of Transportation that told me Varnell had been changed to SW Burlingame Place in May 1933, after the construction of this house.

Burlingame Place is a pretty small street, so I started looking at historical records for houses on this street at PortlandMaps.com, also a City product.  I was looking for houses with a 1929 or 1930 Year Built with a plumbing permit from 1929 listing F. B. Turner as the owner.  I used Google Maps Street View to help me narrow down the search to houses that seemed to fit the description in the news article, as well as Ewald's style.

Six houses on the street were built in 1929 or 1930, but only two of those were originally owned by builder F. B. Turner.  One house (at 6476) had a plumbing permit dated in May 1928, too early to be the house referenced in this article, I felt.  The house is listed in the Oregon Historic Sites Database, and may very well have been designed by Ewald (it looks like his style), it's just not the one in the article.

So I looked at the other house, at 6438 SW Burlingame Place.  Its plumbing permit is dated November 18, 1929, so the timing is right for the newspaper article:

But I was disappointed to see, both on PortlandMaps.com and on Google Map Street View, that the property was now vacant land (click on the map below to make it larger - the property is outlined in blue):

So I started doing a little more research, and discovered that the house slid down the hill in October 2008!  It took out the house just below it, that used to be on the now-vacant 6305 SW Terwilliger Boulevard, and heavily damaged a house next to that one.  Here's an article about and photos of the landslide, as well as the aftermath.  The theory in the latter is "that broken sprinkler pipes saturated the earth trapped behind concrete retaining walls," evidenced by "huge spikes in water use," that "pulled the home down."

Google Map Street View now has a historical view feature, and I was able to find the views below of the house at 6438 SW Burlingame Place in August 2007, about 14 months before it slid away.  Unfortunately I haven't been able to find any other photographs of the inside or the outside of the house.

Views above and below from Google Maps Street View as of August 2007.

The PortlandMaps website recorded 13 permits for various types of work on the home (alterations, additions, electrical, mechanical, and plumbing) from 2004 through 2007.  The drawing below, from a project in October 2004, shows most of the footprint of the home.

I also found a reference to the house on the Vintage Portland website.  Below is an enlargement of the upper left corner of the photo at the beginning of that post, which dates from 1932 or 1933.  In the image below (click on it to make it larger), there is a group of three houses on the right side, in the center of that edge.  The middle house of that three is the one Ewald designed.  That's SW Burlingame Place just above the three, looping around to SW Burlingame Avenue behind it, running along the top of the photo, and SW Terwilliger Boulevard below it, running along the bottom edge of this photo.

City of Portland (OR) Archives, A1999-004.535

© Amanda Pape - 2018 - click here to e-mail me.

Advent Calendar of Christmas Memories - Mystery Monday

It's the annual Advent Calendar of Christmas Memories!  I've participated the past six years (2009 through 2014), and this year, the prompts and their sequence are the same as the last two years.  Due to some pressing needs to get some other projects done (like gift books for my parents made out of the previous years' blog posts), I'm going to link to the appropriate post from 2014 (which also links to older posts, when applicable) in the prompt title, and add a relevant photo - if possible.  Today is one of those days when I'm going to add a Christmas-themed photo totally unrelated to the prompt - just because it's an old photo from my family history!

The prompt for December 7 – Christmas Television and Movies

Awkward family photo from Christmas 1965 at 8015 Sharpview in Houston, Texas.  From left, siblings Brian, Mark, and Mary standing in front of Mom (Geraldine Guokas Pape), Dad (Frederick Henry Pape) holding baby sister Mary, and me.  The mystery - why are we all making faces?

The Advent Calendar of Christmas Memories (ACCM) allows you to share your family’s holiday history twenty-four different ways during December! Learn more at http://adventcalendar.geneabloggers.com.


© Amanda Pape - 2015 - click here to e-mail me.

Mystery Monday Photo - SOLVED with Social Media!

Sometimes we find interesting things in the "old stuff" people give us to consider adding to our special collections or our archives in the library where I work.  This originally-a-mystery photo fell in that category.

It has the following information on the back, handwritten in what appears to be ballpoint pen.  Therefore, it's likely the information was written well after the photograph was taken, and therefore it is possible that it is not accurate:

Katherine Mitchell Preston
taken in Dublin, Texas

Trouble is, I didn't have much luck initially searching in the genealogical research sites I typically use:  HeritageQuest, FamilySearch, the Portal to Texas History, FindAGrave, and Ancestry.com.

So I posted the photo in a few groups I'm in on Facebook, including the Erath County Genealogical Society.  I'm involved in this one because my university is the repository for its old county records.

A helpful member of that group located seven-month-old Katherine living with her parents, Holcombe Lightfoot Preston (8 May 1862 or 1863 - 3 October 1944) and Julia Mitchell Preston (13 September 1866 or 1867 - 25 June 1948), on Patrick Street in Dublin on the 1900 Census.  Also living with them was Julia's widowed mother, Julia K. Browning Mitchell (13 September 1828 - 25 August 1901, and buried in the Live Oak Cemetery in Dublin).  I'd missed the record because the census enumerator had misspelled her name as Kathrine, and because I was treating Mitchell as a maiden name rather than a middle name.

Holcombe was originally from Virginia, born of Virginian parents.  On the 1900 Census, his occupation was listed as "Superintendent - Compressor," and I found a couple newspaper articles referring to that as well.  A compress was used by the railroads to, literally, compress ginned cotton bales to about half their original size to "facilitate shipment."

Julia was born in Matagorda, Texas; her father was from New York and her mother from Germany.  Holcombe and Julia married 6 December 1893 at the Church of the Holy Comforter in Cleburne, Johnson County, Texas.

Katherine was born on 7 October 1899 in Texas, probably in Dublin.  She was an only child.  By Friday, November 10, 1899, her family was living in Dublin, as the Dublin Progress of that date reported on page 5 that  "H. R. Preston, superintendent of the compressor at Cisco, spent Sunday with his family here."  However, in the Friday, March 13, 1903 edition of that paper, a classified ad on page 4 said the house was for sale.  The January 22, 1904, Dublin Progress stated the family had moved to Vernon, while the February 5, 1904 edition corrected that, saying "H. L. Preston write us to change his post office address from Vernon to Cleburne, Texas."

On the 1910 Census, taken April 18, Katherine and her family were living at 804 Main Street in Cleburne.  Holcombe's occupation is railroad office clerk.  By 1912, though, the family had moved to Austin, as Holcombe is listed on page 249 of the 1912-13 city directory living at 1915 San Antonio and working as a rate clerk for the Houston and Central Texas Railroad freight depot.  The listing is the same for 1914 (page 651) and 1916 (page 352), but by the latter year, Katherine has her own listing as a student.

Katherine Preston in the 1918 Cactus yearbook
 of the University of Texas - Austin, page 274

By 1918, according to page 359 of that year's Austin city directory, Holcombe and Julia are now living at 2502 Wichita, and he is now chief clerk of the depot.  Katherine has a separate listing on the same page; she is living with her parents and is a student at the University of Texas.  I found her in the 1918 and 1919 Cactus yearbooks.  In 1917-1918, her freshman year, she was vice-president of her class in the spring term. She headed up the decoration committee for the freshmen reception on February 15 and was the female lead in the grand march at that event.  In the 1919 Cactus, she is a member of Kappa Kappa Gamma.

The family is still living at the same address in 1920, according to page 341 of the city directory and the 1920 Census, and the Census shows Holcombe has the same job.  Katherine, however, is listed as a public school teacher.

Holcombe and Julia are in the 1924 Austin city directory, on page 372, but Katherine is not listed.  Holcombe is a division passenger and freight agent with Southern Pacific [rail] Lines, and they still live at 2502 Wichita.

In the 1927 city directory (page 390), they are living at the same address.  Holcombe is now working as a railroad rate clerk for the state highway department, and Katherine is an assistant "trouble clerk" with the city water and light department.  In the 1929 directory (page 402), same address, same employers, simply listed as clerks though.

The 1930 city directory (page 428), and 1930 Census show no changes.  However, according to the 1932-33 Austin city directory (page 385), the family now lives at 207 W. 32nd.  No changes for Holcombe in the 1935 city directory (page 447), but Katherine is now working as a clerk for the Acme Life Insurance Company.  By 1937 (city directory page 522), Katherine has changed jobs again, working as a certifier for the Texas Old Age Assistance Commission.  That was still the case in 1939 (city directory, page 491).

According to the 1940 Census, Katherine was a typist with the Texas Board of Public Welfare.  Holcombe was still working for the state highway department, but now as a traffic manager.  He's listed as Howard in the 1940 city directory (page 496).  No changes in the 1941 (page 513) or 1942 (page 502) directories for either, but in 1944 (page 392), "Howard" is listed as a "rate expert" with the highway department.  He died of cardiovascular problems on October 3 of that year at St. David's Hospital, according to his death certificate.

By 1947, according to page 571 of the Austin city directory, Katherine has risen to the position of auditor with the state Department of Public Welfare, and is still living at 207 W. 32nd with her widowed mother Julia, who died at home on June 25, 1948.

The 1949 Austin city directory (page 550) gives Katherine's occupation as accountant with the same employer.  There are no changes in employment nor address for the 1952 (page 506), 1953 (page 583), 1954 (page 525), 1955 (page 629), 1957 (page 682), or 1958-59 (page 716) city directories.

Apparently Katherine never married.  She died February 11, 1986, and is buried in the Oakwood Cemetery Annex in Austin, as are her father and mother.

I was able to contact the person who gave us the photograph through her cousin, who is employed by my university.  She does not remember exactly how she got them, but I suspect it was at an estate sale or antique shop.  Katherine had no children or siblings, so there was no one to give or leave the photo to.

Comments on Facebook indicate that the decorated baby carriage might have been for a May Day or May Fete celebration, common in small Texas towns in the early 1900s.


© Amanda Pape - 2015 - click here to e-mail me.

Mystery Monday: What Happened to John Fordham?

The Dick Smith Library (where I work) serves as a Regional Historical Resources Depository for original and microfilmed records for a number of Texas counties, including Coleman.  Two years ago, another library transferred to us a fascinating Coleman County Sheriff's ledger from 1887 to 1892 that contained notices about stolen and stray animals, and wanted and missing persons.  This one caught my eye:

John Fordham's mother apparently hired a Wichita, Kansas, detective agency to look for him when John left home just before turning 15.  Since John had "a fancy for horses" and "may be found around cattle ranches," it makes sense that the detective agency might have sent this notice to sheriffs in Texas counties.

This missing person notice had a good clue about the missing boy - John Fordham was or would be age 15 on May 9, 1890, meaning he was born on May 9, 1875.  I conducted a search in FindAGrave.com for a John Fordham born in 1875, and found a record with a matching date of birth for a burial in a Wichita, Kansas, cemetery for a John Chafin Fordham.  That young man died on June 2, 1896, at just 21 years of age, which made me wonder - what happened between the 1890 missing person notice, and his death just six years later?

A search in the Library of Congress Chronicling America website for "John Fordham" between 1875 and 1896 brought up some results from June 1896 issues of the Wichita Daily Eagle.  The first article ("Killed by a Train:  John Fordham Leaves Home to Return a Corpse") was from June 3:

from The Wichita Daily Eagle, June 3, 1896, Page 5, via Chronicling America

John's mangled body had been found near the train tracks in White City, Kansas, which is about 100 miles northeast of Wichita.  He'd been traveling with another young man named T. T. Kell (who does not appear in any later articles) to the Dakotas, and they'd decided to hop the train rather than buy tickets (even though John certainly had the money).  Speculation in the article was that John fell asleep and fell out of the train and was run over.

More detail appeared in an article in the next day's Daily Eagle:

from The Wichita Daily Eagle, June 4, 1896, Page 5, via Chronicling America

John's body had letters addressed to a J. C. Fordham of 522 S. Lawrence Avenue in Wichita, a note for $350 from a Helen Fordham, and a March 12, 1896, deposit slip for a bank in Wichita, all of which helped identify him.

John's father Charles R. Fordham, his mother Helen Nancy Chafin Fordham, John, and a younger brother, Reigh, can be found in an 1880 U.S. Census record in Caldwell, Sumner County, Kansas.  By the 1885 Kansas State Census, the family is living in Wichita.

John's parents were active socially, based on articles in earlier Wichita newspapers, with his mother particularly active in the Degree of Honor, which was originally organized as a female auxiliary to the Ancient Order of United Workmen.  That group, as well as the Daily Eagle reporter, were full of praise for young John:

from The Wichita Daily Eagle, June 5, 1896, Page 5,

via Chronicling America

But just what happened in 1890?  Young John apparently had some wanderlust - the letters found on his body indicated he owned mines in the Cripple Creek, Colorado area, and he was on his way to Dakota when he died.  He appeared to have a mind of his own, even at a young age, and was rather successful financially, based on his clothing, the contents of his pockets, and the references in the articles.  Obviously, he came back home to Wichita sometime between the early 1890 "missing" poster and his death in 1896.  So far I haven't been able to determine what he was doing all those years.

© Amanda Pape - 2015 - click here to e-mail me.

Mystery Monday, Part 6: What Happened to H. Jay Hanchette? - continued

This is part 6 of my series on the mysterious disappearance of H. Jay Hanchette in 1891.  Parts 2, 3, 4, and 5 addressed the tragedies befalling Hanchette's  father, wife, brother-in-law, and son respectively.  Now it's time to revisit H. Jay's story.

News about his disappearance in May 1891 pretty much dried up by October of that year.  A Los Angeles newspaperman, Robert J. Farrell, claimed to have seen Hanchette in 1894 and 1897, but nothing came of those reports.  (Farrell committed suicide just a few weeks later in 1897.)

from the Omaha [NE} Morning World-Herald, August 25, 1897, page 2, via GenealogyBank.com

Charles Dwight Willard, a longtime associate of Hanchette and friend of his family, who took over as secretary of the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce after Hanchette's disappearance, wrote A History of the Chamber of Commerce of Los Angeles, California: From Its Foundation, September, 1888, to the Year 1900 in 1899.  In it, Willard stated  (pages 187-188):

From that day [of his disappearance] to this, there has never been a clue to his whereabouts, nor has any adequate explanation ever been offered as to the cause of his disappearance.  Not the slightest suspicion of anything discreditable was ever attached to him, for he was a man of sterling character and correct habits.  His domestic relations were of the happiest.  Various individuals have since claimed to see Mr. Hanchette, but their testimony when sifted down has been found to be frivolous.  The theory now most generally accepted is that he was killed by thugs and his body destroyed.

However, privately Willard thought differently.  According to Suffering in the Land of Sunshine: A Los Angeles Illness Narrative by Emily Abel (Rutgers University Press, 2006), in a July 12, 1891, letter to his father, Willard said (page 49):

Hanchette had been "in secret a spend thrift and a fool about money matters."  Although not "exactly dishonest," he conducted his affairs in a "dishonorable" way.  "When he went away things were in a hopeless snarl with him and he had not the courage to come back and face them."

According to Donald Ray Culton's dissertation Charles Dwight Willard: Los Angeles City Booster and Professional Reformer, 1888-1914 (University of Southern California, via ProQuest, UMI Dissertations Publishing, 1971, pages 46-47), when Willard took over as Chamber of Commerce secretary after Hanchette's disappearance,

Minutes of the [chamber of commerce] directors' meetings taken by Hanchette were brief and careless; financial records were snarled; the bank account was overdrawn by $500; membership dues had not been collected; and ... two chamber employees ... had been spoiled hopelessly by the carefree attitude of the inefficient administrator.  Capping the problems was a debt amounting to approximately $2300.

In a June 15, 1899 article about Hanchette's son Earl murdering his wife, the Los Angeles Herald discussed the elder's disappearance on page 5:

Two theories concernlng the fate of Hanchette have had, and still have, adherents. The first is that he was murdered in Chicago for the purpose of robbery and his body sunk in the lake; the second, that the missing man carefully disguised himself, and, having dropped his identity and destroyed all traces by which he might be followed up, went to South America, foot loose and free, to recommence existence again under an assumed name. This theory is not an improbable one, as Hanchette's day dreams invariably took that form, and he would harp upon that sole subject with his intimates at any time.

I thought it interesting that an unnamed source - maybe Willard? - speculated the same thing in an article on page 6 in the same newspaper on June 12, 1891 (via Chronicling America):




































copyright © Amanda Pape - 2013 - click here to e-mail me.

Mystery Monday / Tombstone Tuesday, part 5: H. Jay Hanchette's son Earl

This is part 5 of my series on the  mysterious disappearance of H. Jay Hanchette in 1891.  Tragedy continues to dog this family.  Besides his father, wife, and brother-in-law, Hanchette's youngest son Earl E. (1879-1899) was not immune from the seeming family curse.

Many newspapers in the western half of the county had stories similar to this one on page 1 of the Sacramento [CA] Daily Union on June 15, 1899 (via the California Digital Newspaper Collection):

Earl E. Hanchette was born in 1879 in California, the second son of Henry Jay Hanchette and his wife Emma Griffith.   According to a longer article on page 5 of the Los Angeles Herald that same date, he met  the former Georgia Elliott the previous summer in Los Angeles.  They eloped to San Francisco and married there in late August, 1898.  The 18-year-old Georgia had given birth just four weeks before she was murdered.  Hanchette said he did it because Georgia's mother wanted her daughter and grandchild to move back to Denver with her, and Hanchette did not want them to go.

Earl Hanchette apparently used chloroform on his wife before shooting her - I have to wonder if he got that from his uncle, Dr. Edgar M. Griffith, who was practicing medicine in Los Angeles at that time.  Hanchette shot himself in the stomach in a suicide attempt.  He was described as a "dudish masher," and

"The young man was always wayward, and grief over his ways of living may have hastened the death of his mother, Mrs. Emma J. Hanchette, for many years a highly respected public school principal in this city, whose demise occurred only a few months ago. He sought no employment. Remittances from his grandmother in San Francisco to himself and from his mother-in-law to his wife were wasted upon himself."

He'd apparently also resorted to forgery.

While Hanchette lingered in the hospital, the Los Angeles coroner and an undertaker squabbled over poor Georgia's body prior to the inquest.  Her body was shipped to Denver, and her child either sent there to live with its grandmother, or to Des Moines, Iowa, to live with its aunt, Georgia's sister, a Mrs. Meredith.  I don't know (yet) where Georgia is buried or what ultimately happened to her child.

Earl Hanchette died on June 17, 1899.  He is apparently buried at Angelus Rosedale Cemetery in Los Angeles, and shares a marker with his uncle Edgar Milton Griffith and his enabling grandmother, Aurelia Conant Griffith:

photo courtesy Don Lynch via FindAGrave.com

© Amanda Pape - 2013 - click here to e-mail me.

Mystery Monday, Part 4: H. Jay Hanchette's Brother-in-Law, Dr. Edgar M. Griffith

This is part 4 of my series on the mysterious disappearance of H. Jay Hanchette in 1891.  My research uncovered some - interesting - things about his brother-in-law, Dr. Edgar Milton Griffith.

According to the 1900 Census, Edgar Milton Griffith was born in September 1855 in California, the son of Milton Griffith, who had died by 1880, and of Aurelia Conant Griffith, a highly respected educator in San Francisco public schools. The 1860 and 1870 Censuses indicate he was born in 1858 or 1859, but by the 1880 Census, he is indicating that he is 25.  He may have aged himself in order to graduate at age 21 from the Medical College of the Pacific in 1876:

from the November 3, 1876, San Francisco Bulletin, page 2, via Archive of Americana

In 1878 and 1880, he was practicing in San Francisco, according to voter registration records, the city directory, and the 1880 Census.  According to an entry on his mother on pages 196-197 of Daniel Webster's The Bay of San Francisco: The Metropolis of the Pacific Coast and its Suburban Cities: A History (Chicago: Lewis Pub. Co., 1892, found in the HeritageQuest Online subscription database), Edgar was a "surgeon in the United States Army, then for three years surgeon in charge of St. John's Hospital, Shanghai, China," (not St. Paul's Hospital as indicated below) with that three years ended by January 1888, with his settling in Los Angeles:

from the January 15, 1888, Los Angeles Daily Herald, page 12, via Chronicling America

Dr. Griffith bounced between Los Angeles and San Francisco over the next few years.  His 1888 voter registration puts him in Los Angeles, as does entries in the Los Angeles city directories for 1888 and 1890.  However, his voter registrations for 1890, 1892, and 1896 put him back in San Francisco, as does an 1896 entry in the San Francisco city directory.

In between, though, in October 1894, the doctor gets some very negative publicity:

from the October 13, 1894,  Sacramento [CA] Record-Union, page 1, via Chronicling America

from the October 13, 1894, San Francisco Morning Call, Page 12, via Chronicling America

from the October 13, 1894, San Francisco Morning Call,
page 12, via Chronicling America

According to a story (excerpts above and left) in the October 13, 1894, San Francisco Morning Call, Edgar Griffith was married at one time and had a child, but I could find no record of these anywhere else but this newspaper.  (He was, however, listed as single in the 1880 Census, divorced on the 1900 Census, and widowed on 1910.)

Stories in this newspaper also indicated that the abandoned baby was adopted by the matron of the foundling home where she was taken, and named Phoebe Hearst Henderson.  Despite knowing her date of birth (October 1, 1894), I could find no further information about her, either.

As the story was picked up by other newspapers, such as in The Dalles, Oregon (below), it seemed to be embellished, turning Dr. Griffith into a monster.

from the October 15, 1894, The Dalles [OR} Daily Chronicle, page 1, via Chronicling America

from the October 15, 1894, Los Angeles Herald, Page 8, via Chronicling America

As can be seen from the story above, the Los Angeles newspaper sort of remembered H. Jay Hanchette (mistakenly referred to as Charles in this article) and Dr. Griffith's relationship to his sister, Hanchette's wife Emma.  More pain for her, especially since the story was apparently exaggerated.

Despite the accusations of addiction to morphine and cocaine, it came out in court that Griffith was actually tattooing the baby with gunpowder, apparently so it could be identified later, perhaps if the birth mother had second thoughts.  On October 23, Dr. Griffith was acquitted of the charges of cruelty, and there was no news of any further charges against him.

from the October 24, 1894, Los Angeles Herald, Page 2, via Chronicling America

Poor Dr. Griffith just couldn't seem to escape being involved in scandals, though.  Less than a year later, in May 1895, he treated the victim in the Jennie Matthews murder case in San Francisco.  A Mr. Winthrop was accused of poisoning her:

Both illustrations above, and the excerpts below, are from the May 20, 1895, San Francisco Call, page 5, via Chronicling America.

from the June 2, 1895, San Francisco Call, page 11,
via Chronicling America

Perhaps because of the baby branding case, the police were quick to suspect Dr. Griffith of being responsible for Jennie Matthews' death, even inadvertently. However, later testimony in the case, as reported in the June 2, 1895, San Francisco Call, showed that there was enough strychnine in her stomach to kill her.  However, there was not enough proof that Mr. Winthrop had given her the poison, and he was acquitted of her murder.

By 1897, Dr. Edgar M. Griffith has moved back to Los Angeles, based on listings in city directories and the 1900 and 1910 Censuses.

His name appears once more in the newspapers, in connection with the case of the wealthy Griffith Jenkins Griffith (no apparent relation) shooting his wife.  Apparently the two Griffiths were friends, and G. J. "spent the day at the residence of Dr. E..M. Griffith," according to a story in the September 7, 1903 Call (page 3, via Chronicling America., below):

from the March 19, 1904, San Francisco Call, page 16, via Chronicling America 

Edgar also provided an affadavit on Griffith's mental state at a hearing in June, 1904.  Although G. J. Griffith was acquitted of attempted murder due to "alcoholic insanity," he was convicted on a lesser charge of assault with a deadly weapon, and spent two years in prison.

Dr. Edgar Milton Griffith died on September 11, 1911, in Los Angeles, according to the Directory of Deceased American Physicians, 1804-1929 (Arthur Wayne Hafner, editor, Chicago: American Medical Association, 1993).

It's likely Dr. Griffith had nothing to do with the death of his sister, Emma Griffith Hanchette, during surgery in San Francisco in 1898.  He was living in Los Angeles at the time.  However, the private hospital where it happened was Lane Hospital, a successor to his medical school alma mater and precursor to Stanford Medical School.  


© Amanda Pape - 2013 - click here to e-mail me.

Mystery Monday, Part 3: H. Jay Hanchette's Wife Emma Griffith - and Her Brother

Harry Jay Hanchette married Emma A. Griffith in Marin County, California, on March 25, 1876.  He was 20 and she gave her age as 23 in the marriage record, but census records indicate she was actually 25 or 26.  She was born in Ohio, the daughter of Milton Griffith, who may have been related to H. Jay's mother Nancy Griffith, and of Aurelia Conant Griffith, a highly respected educator in San Francisco public schools.

According to an entry on Aurelia on pages 196-197 of Daniel Webster's The Bay of San Francisco: The Metropolis of the Pacific Coast and its Suburban Cities: A History (Chicago: Lewis Pub. Co., 1892, found in the HeritageQuest Online subscription database), Milton had gone west in 1853 (when Emma was age 4) to try his luck in the gold rush on the Klamath River.  The 1860 Census shows the family (now with Emma's brother Edgar Milton, ten years her junior) at Yreka Post Office, Humbug Township, Siskiyou County, California.  By 1863, they had settled in San Francisco.

It's not clear exactly when H. Jay moved to California, but he and Emma and their two children, Rex (born 1877) and Earl (born 1879) are living at 824 Lombard in San Francisco on the 1880 Census, with the widowed Aurelia and Edgar Milton, now a surgeon.  "Henry" is the proprietor of a stationery store.  He was at this address through at least October 16, 1886 (according to his voter registration in the California, Great Registers, 1866-1910, collection at FamilySearch.org), and by then edited the commercial columns of the San Francisco Examiner.

Two years later, his voter registration of March 17, 1888, indicates he is living in Los Angeles' Fourth Ward, and his September 22, 1890 voter registration gives an address of 425 South Broadway, an apartment building in that city.  Hanchette had been serving as the city editor for the Los Angeles Herald, but in late 1890, he became secretary of the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce.

Meanwhile, Emma had followed her mother's footsteps and become a teacher (Zimena Conant in the article below is Emma Hanchette's grandmother):

from the Los Angeles Daily Herald, June 25, 1887,
page 10, via Chronicling America

A little over a month after arriving in Los Angeles from San Francisco, Emma had secured an assistant principalship at the Garey Street school:

from the Los Angeles Daily Herald, August 3, 1887,
page 9, via Chronicling America

And just a month later, a resignation resulted in her promotion to principal at the San Pedro Street school:

from the Los Angeles Daily Herald, September 16, 1887,
page 9, via Chronicling America

The following year, Emma was moved back to the Geary Street school, but this time as principal:

from the Los Angeles Daily Herald, September 12, 1888, page 1, via Chronicling America

The following spring, she was chosen as president of the primary section (the younger grades) for all schools in the Los Angeles district:

from the Los Angeles Daily Herald, March 20, 1889, page 3, via Chronicling America

In 1890, Emma became principal of the (then) new Ninth Street School, where she remained the rest of her life:

from the Los Angeles Herald, July 28, 1890, page 6, via Chronicling America

She continued to serve in other leadership rolls, such as on committees for the School Teachers' Alliance:

from the Los Angeles Herald, March 16, 1898, page 10, via Chronicling America

Sadly, though, just a little over six months after this committee appointment, Emma Hanchette was dead under mysterious circumstances:

from the Los Angeles Herald, September 27, 1898, page 5, via Chronicling America

A memorial to Emma Hanchette appeared in the Annual Report of the Board of Education and the Superintendent of City Schools of Los Angeles for 1897-1898:

What was Emma Hanchette's "last illness," and what kind of surgery was being performed from which her death was "an immediate result," at only age 49?  Could it have had anything to do with her surgeon brother in San Francisco?  Stay tuned for next week's report to see why I'm suspicious!


 © Amanda Pape - 2013 - click here to e-mail me.