Census Sunday: amusing and odd census errors

I have, over the years, found interesting errors in censuses for people within and outside of my family.  Many of these errors can be attributed to careless or misinformed informants, likely to be outside the family (neighbors, neighbor's child, or someone else unrelated), or to language difficulties on the part of the informant or the enumerator.

Spelling errors can be amusing.  My father-in-law's name was Leonard Marshall Rhodes.  Everyone, in and out of the family, knew him as Marshall.  He was born in Tampa, Hillsborough County, Florida, 16 October 1919, according to his baptism certificate. In 1920, the family was still living in Tampa, and the young (less than one year old) Marshall was recorded as Lennon M. Rhodes.  In those days of the Red Scares, it is probably a good thing the enumerator did not spell it "Lenin."

In the 1930 census, it was Marshall's sister's turn.  Her name was Della Mae Rhodes, and she was named for her mother, whose name was also Della Mae.  I wonder if it ever got confusing in that household.

Anyway, in 1930, young Della, five years old, was recorded as Kellie A. Rhodes.  How that happened, I can't be sure.  It seems a bit of a stretch.

My grandparents, Perry W. and Mary L. Reed, do not appear at all, as far as I have been able to determine, in the 1920 census.  That may be because they were en route from Indiana to Pensacola, Florida.

My father, Arden Packard, born 29 April 1911 in Los Angeles, California, shows up twice in the 1930 census, either because the enumerator did not follow the rules, or because the informant did not have all the information.  In 1930, according to the instructions to enumerators, if an individual in a household was in the military and not living at home, he or she would be recorded where they were stationed, and not at their home of record.  But in Pasadena, California, in the household of my grandfather Walter H. Packard, my father was enumerated as being there.  He was, however, in the United States Navy at the time, in training in San Diego, and was recorded there -- correctly -- as well.

My great-grandfather Charles Reed was also recorded twice, in the 1860 census.  He was first recorded in the home of his father, Harvey Reed.  A month or so later, it taking time for the census-takers to get around on horseback, Charles Reed was recorded in the home of a Vinson Nidey, who I believe was his boss.  I am fairly certain this is the same Charles Reed, because the other data match up, and because in that same block where the Nidey family lived, there was the family of Francis Marion Wright, whose daughter, Clarissa Haney Wright, was very soon to become Mrs. Charles Reed.

There is one item in the Florida State census for 1935 that is probably less of an error than it is a function of the small spaces in which the enumerators recorded their data.  The space for occupation was less than an inch long, and one fellow, who was probably a certain type of fisherman, was recorded as being by occupation a lobster.

Finally, I come to the most amusing error I have yet found, not in my family, but in the subject of study I do because I'm just intrigued with this guy.  There was a family in Chicago, in the household of a baker named Peter Ness, the youngest child, a son.  He was misrecorded in the 1920 census as Ella, daughter, 16 years old.  Most likely, this individual never knew he, actually the son of Peter Ness, was so misidentified, and the mistake is probably attributable to either language difficulties between the enumerator and the informant (the parents were Norwegian immigrants), or a less-than-accurate informant from outside the family.  Either way, this error would probably have been quite embarrassing to Eliot Ness, the prohibition agent famed in legend and history.

"It ain't over 'til it's over:" Some Thoughts on the Passing of Yogi Berra

There are a number of amusingly grammatically incorrect, yet somehow profound, quotations associated with the name of Yogi Berra, the celebrated catcher for the New York Yankees, who died this week at the age of 90. 

"We made too many wrong mistakes," he is supposed to have said.  What is a right mistake?  One may ask.  Well, I would suppose a right mistake is one that turns out well in the end, after all.

Baseball was his life and his joy.  I grew up in the 1950s and 1960s, in a time when baseball was still the game of summer.  I would go over to the next street, cutting through back yards, to my grandmother's house.  She'd be sitting in the living room, in her easy chair with the matching ottoman.  I'd walk in the back door, calling out our universal greeting and identification, "Yoo-hoo!"  I'd grab a Coca-cola out of the fridge and go into the living room.

My grandma's dog, a large black-and-tan dachshund named Peanuts, would be lying beside the ottoman, and the television would be on.  In the mid 1950s, when we moved to Florida from California after my father died, we had only one television station in Jacksonville.  On a summer afternoon, there was most likely a baseball game on.

We would sit, grandma in her chair and I on the floor, to be closer to the television, and to grandma, so we could talk and cheer for our team.  The doors and windows were all open to let in some air, in those days when people of our economic stratum did not have air conditioning.  We'd watch the game, and when a member of the team we were rooting against that day came up to bat, we would raise our right hands, make a circular clockwise motion with our fingers, and say, "Cat fuzz around that bat."  That was our curse.

Sometimes it worked.  Sometimes it didn't.  But it was still fun.

I never was a Yankees fan.  My team were the Brooklyn Dodgers.  Yes, I started as a Dodgers fan before they left the Big Apple, left Ebbets Field, and moved to Los Angeles and Chavez Ravine.  My affection went with them.

However hostile I may have felt towards the Yankees, everyone admired their star players, who just had so much talent.  Mickey Mantle, Roger Maris.  And Yogi Berra.  Who didn't love Yogi, who loved the game so much.  His name conjures up mid-20th century America, warm summer days, and carefree times in front of the television set with my grandma, watching the national game.

Thanks, Yogi.

A Case of Woeful Neglect

From the fall of 2012 until last May, I was in graduate school at the University of South Florida St. Petersburg, during which time I was working on a Master of Liberal Arts in Florida Studies.  It was a tough program, but I was awarded that degree last May, and now I'm home.  I also had some medical adventures during the summer, which reminded me once again that I am not getting any younger and I am mortal. As a consequence, my blogs have suffered from terrible neglect.

However, this evening while I was on Facebook, my nephew Gary questioned me about my aunt, his grand-aunt, Elizabeth Reed.  I have some posts here about her, but will, mainly for Gary, put up some more very soon.

I am going to resurrect this poor, moribund blog, and post more genealogical adventures.  Some of those adventures are related to a personal-interest project I am working on in my professional capacity as a genealogist and a historian, and that is proving to be very exciting indeed.

As well, I will be posting some blogs concerning my primary project, investigating the social, economic, personal, and family relationships of the citizens and residents (there was a difference) of the city of St. Augustine, Florida, during the second period of Spanish possession, 1784-1821.

My master's thesis was on marriage in St. Augustine during that period, under the Spanish marriage law known as the Real Pragmática de Casamientos, or the Pragmatic Sanction on marriage.  I have posted here about that in the past. 

My goal in studying St. Augustine during this period is to link the general history of St. Augustine with the family histories of St. Augustine. I want to get a look at the broad picture.  Many have written on particular groups in St. Augustine -- the African-Americans, the Minorcans, and others.  No one yet appears to have tackled the broader picture, and I am a very broad-picture historian.

Come along with me as I get my blogs back in action.

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun: If You Could Take it with You

Here are the rules for this week:

1)  Bill West wrote a blog post, If You Could Take It with You, on his West in New England blog that highlighted a post on Facebook by author CJ Cherryh, which asked:

"A thought question, based on an observation about expectations of the afterlife: the ancient Egyptians envisioned the afterlife as a continuance of their lives, and tried to 'pack' for their future, acquiring charms and items that they could take with them, assuring their association with certain persons, and certain pleasures of life. They spent their lives figuring out what they really truly wanted to have. ----So what would you pack for the afterlife, if you could?"

3)  Tell us what you would pack for the afterlife, if you could.

4)  Write about it in your own blog post, in a comment to this blog post, in a status or comment on Facebook, or in Google Plus Stream post.


Well, let's see:

1.  Photographs of family: my mother, father, siblings, husband, children, niece, nephews, friends, and all the people who have meant much to me.

2.  Copies of my books.  

3.  The books I've loved in life and probably will want to read yet again.

4.  Letters, documents, all the genealogy stuff.  I'll be able to gather information in person there!

5.  Favorite music -- maybe I can even meet my favorite composers.  I think that perhaps George Gershwin and Leonard Bernstein would be the most fun!

6.  My computer and its attendant things.  My digital voice recorder.  Both for recording and keeping genealogical information (but I also have games on my computer).

7.  "Joseph's Coat," the colorful afghan my aunt knitted for me.  I'll need to get her to repair some small tears in it.

8.  Some of my collection of frogs, just to have a few around.

9.  I'll want my rolltop desk, too.

10.  Chocolate.  Lots of chocolate.

That's all I can come up with.  I think that would keep me happy.