Florence Martin and Research Rabbit Holes

While researching, particularly when it comes to building histories or genealogies, I often get side tracked and end up down what I call a research rabbit hole. Today I want to share the findings of one of these trips down a Belle Plaine research rabbit hole I recently took.

As someone who is new to the community, one way I enjoy learning about the past is simply going down Main Street and seeing how things have changed. When asked, my favorite research tool is hands-down the Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps. Belle Plaine is one of the communities in Scott County which had these maps completed. You can find them on the Library of Congress’ website, if you feel like nerding out like I did.

The Triangle Motor Company in 1923. Scott County Historical Society.

I noticed that a business located on the southwest corner of East Main Street and South Chestnut Street had been a livery and then later the Triangle Motor Company. This sparked my interest as it had changed from one mode of transportation to another. That’s another story for another day. Next I wondered who owned this livery and what was their story?

Wilson Martin grew up in St. Lawrence and then Jordan. His father was a farmer and he had many siblings. In 1889, Wilson married Elvira Irwin (the daughter of a local attorney) and the couple lived in Belle Plaine. By the 1900 census, Wilson and Elvira had two daughters; Florence and Frances. Wilson listed his occupation as liveryman. In 1905 his occupation changed to Vet Surgeon and then in 1910 he listed his occupation as veterinarian. In 1920, the family had moved to the Snelling Hamline neighborhood of St. Paul, where Wilson was working in Real Estate and Frances was listed under the name Frances Snow, married (though no husband was on the census record).        

Photograph of Frances Martin in 1896. The little girl standing behind Frances may be her sister, Florence. Scott County Historical Society.

Although there were two daughters, we are going to focus on Florence for this story. Florence was born in 1892 and grew up in Belle Plaine. The 1910 census lists Florence’s occupation as a teacher at the public school. We have a few photographs of Florence in the collection, including one of her as part of the Hiker’s Club.

Later census records note that Florence completed three years of college. she likely was in college at the time of the 1920 census when the family lived in St. Paul, as no occupation was listed. Florence married Joseph Houck in 1922. Here’s where the story gets exciting.

Four generations of women. They are, from left to right, Eunice Chatfield, Elvira Martin, and Cecilia Chatfield Irwin. Elvira holds baby Florence in her lap. Scott County Historical Society.

By 1930, the couple had moved out to Los Angeles where Joseph owned an advertising agency and was known as a pioneer in public utility car advertising. The couple lived at 1825 N. Kingsley Dr., which is still there today (you can search the address online and be able to do a street view of the building). It was near Hollywood Boulevard. Other residents in the apartment building included actors and actresses, directors, and musicians for motion pictures. In 1937, Florence found work as a hotel clerk and by 1942 according to Joseph’s draft card, they were living in what is today known as Castle Argyle in Los Angeles (another apartment building).

Joseph died in 1949 and was buried in Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Los Angeles. Although Florence and Joseph never had children together, Joseph had a son from a first marriage. His son, who went by his middle name of Curtis, found work as a musician in a dance orchestra and then followed his father’s footsteps and worked in advertising in Los Angeles.

In 1950, Florence married William Crawford. William died in 1960, but beyond that we lose Florence’s trail. From growing up in rural Minnesota, the daughter of a liveryman to becoming a public school teacher and then getting married and moving out to an apartment off Hollywood Boulevard to then disappearing in the records….what a story! If you know the rest of Florence’s story we would love to know!

By Lindsay Marshall, Executive Director

This is My Life: Beatrice Zweber Remembers Getting Married in 1919

This blog series is adapted from a memoir by Beatrice Zweber Mahowald of New Market. Her grandson, Pat Mahowald, compiled her autobiography with photographs and family research. Beatrice took over the household management on her family’s farm at age 15, after the death of her mother and the marriages of her older sisters. It has been slightly edited from the original for clarity. Part I can be read here ,Part II is here, and Part III is here.

My husband’s father [Nicholas Mahowald] died December 1911. He was the first person to be buried from our new church at New Market on December 22, 1911, so in 1912 the Mahowald family moved to New Market. My husband was seventeen years old then. George used to work with his father when he wasn’t in school. His father did cement work, so George went on with his father’s trade.

George supported his widowed mother, sisters, and brothers till two weeks before we were married. His mother said he could keep the last two weeks wages before the wedding, and I’m sure that wasn’t a big check. There were nine living children in the Mahowald family. George was the second oldest.

A few weeks before the wedding, I went to Holm and Olson’s in St. Paul and ordered all my flowers. My bride’s bouquet, the bridesmaid bouquets, the men’s flowers, the lily for the ringbearer, and the basket of flowers for the flower girl. I paid for them and told them to mail them on the noon train to Elko, Minn. on June 16th, the day before my wedding. My brother went to meet the train, but there weren’t any flowers left off. We thought they would come on the evening train, so my brother Alex went back to the depot. That train arrived at 7:30 PM and there were still no flowers. He came back and he was really afraid to tell me, so we telephoned to Holm and Olson’s. I don’t know how we even go ahold of them at night, but they said they had mailed out the flowers on the noon train on June 16th. They said if someone would come to St. Paul and get the flowers they would make up a new order and have them ready at midnight. I would have to sign a paper saying that I didn’t get the flowers. because they were going to trace them.

I went to bed but I didn’t sleep. I cried all night. The next morning when I came downstairs my cousin was already working in the dining room, and she said look at the beautiful carnations they sent along extra because they knew you felt bad. Holm and Olson wrote me a letter after the wedding and they said the flowers went to Ecko, Minn. instead of Elko, Minn. I never did find out if the flower shop put on the wrong address or if the railroad made the mistake.

Beatrice and George’s wedding party. Image courtesy of Pat Mahowald.

On June 17, 1919 I was married in New Market Catholic Church by Father Siebert. My cousin Margaret Zweber was bridesmaid, my cousin Sue Zweber was maid of honor, my brother Alex and Anton Mahowald were best men. My niece Helen Hauer was flower girl and my nephew Wilfred Zweber was ring bearer. I was twenty-one years old and my husband was twenty-four when we married.

It was on a Tuesday, a nice sunny day. In the afternoon there was a storm all around us, but it didn’t rain at New Market. We had a very small wedding, we only invited my husband’s mother, his brothers and sisters, my brothers and sisters and their families for dinner and supper at the house. There waere also three uncles and five aunts. My friends waited on table.

In the evening we had a very large crowd at the free wedding dance. The Metropolitan Band from Minneapolis played for our dance from nine o’clock in the evening till four o’clock in the morning. This band cost us sixty dollars. The dance was in the New Market town hall. Most of the crowd stayed till the band went home. So, it was almost morning when we got home. I got about an hour and a half of sleep before I had to get up and make breakfast and get the house cleaned up after the wedding. There was a lot to clean.

We didn’t go on a honeymoon. People didn’t go on a honeymoon those days. We didn’t even have time to have our wedding picture taken until the second day. We had our picture taken at St. Paul. We drove with two cars because there were quite a few of us.

The third day after my wedding I washed clothes all day. The boys took my pictures while I was hanging up the wash. I had sheets, tablecloths, and lines and lines of clothes and such large pieces. I have pictures of my wash in my album.

A short time before my wedding, Dad said, “Why don’t you stay here and work for us? We have to get someone and you might as well stay.” He offered me a dollar a day. I stayed and worked just like I always did, canning, cooking for threshers and silo fillers, for company, and everything that came along. George did cement work in summer but in winter 1919 he sawed wood with a man, they would saw fire wood for farmers. I’m sure he didn’t earn much money for that.

Beatrice and Aelred. Image courtesy of Pat Mahowald.

I worked at home for eleven months till May 1920. Then we moved to Lakeville because we were building a house there. It was to be ready the later part of August, and I was expecting my first child. He was born September 2, 1920. The doctor said he weighed ten pounds, but he guessed that because the doctor didn’t carry a scale. We named him Aelred Alexander.

This is My Life: Beatrice Zweber Remembers Her Brother's Life with Tuberculosis

This blog series is adapted from a memoir by Beatrice Zweber Mahowald of New Market. Her grandson, Pat Mahowald, compiled her autobiography with photographs and family research. Beatrice took over the household management on her family’s farm at age 15, after the death of her mother and the marriages of her older sisters. It has been slightly edited from the original for clarity. Part I can be read here and Part II is here.

My brother Herman went to school all his life. He would spend the summer working on the farm but in fall he would go back to school. When he graduated from St. Thomas College at St. Paul he won a gold medal for being the best chemist in his class.

After college my brother went to Chicago where he entered the university medical school. He was learning to be a doctor. He went to Chicago with Dr. Casey (a local physician) and his family. He stayed at the same apartment house where they stayed.

My brother didn’t feel good that fall, but my dad did take him to our doctor and he was alright when he left. In spring, we had a letter from Dr. Casey and he said Herman was sick and went to a doctor. That doctor said he had tuberculosis and would have to leave school. It was a great shock to all of us.

Zweber family in 1913. Beatrice sits in the carriage. Herman sits in the grass on the far right. Scott County Historical Society

He was a very sick boy when he came home and had a lot of very sick spells during the years he lived. He was very good about it. He knew there wasn’t any cure for him. He was in the doctor’s care all the time. Dr. Kennedy was a good friend of my brother Herman. Well, it was a good thing that he was learning to be a doctor so he knew how to take care of himself and also to take care of us that had to live with and around him. He slept alone and used his own dishes and silver, his own towels and dishtowels, but it was still dangerous for us kids and Herman thought maybe if he would go west it would be better for his health. He went to Mount Angel, Oregon again. He didn’t stay there too long, but was gone long enough that my dad could buy insurance policies for me and my brothers at home. Then Herman came home and he wanted to live alone so he moved in the grainery upstairs (which was once a house) so that he had a big room. He would come in our house for his meals but he always ate alone. He would spread newspapers over the kitchen table, then he would spread out his own dishes and silver. I always kept his food in the kitchen. We ate in the dining room. After he ate his meals he would put his dishes and silver in his dishpan and he would boil his dishes. He would gather the newspaper with the crumbs he ate and he would burn that in the stove. There was always fire in the wood stove.

Then he left again. He went to New Leipzig, North Dakota and worked in the bank for a while with our brother J.P. After that he went to St. Paul and worked for an undertaker for a while. I think he slept in the undertaker parlor - don’t know for sure.

He came home again and Dad built him a house close to our house. He used to wash his own clothes but I ironed them. None of us ever caught the disease from him. He died very suddenly of a hemorrhage on December 5, 1920. He was 29 years old. He was waked in our parlor and buried in the Catholic Cemetery on December 7th at New Market.

This is My Life: Beatrice Zweber Remembers Threshing Crews

This blog series is adapted from a memoir by Beatrice Zweber Mahowald of New Market. Her grandson, Pat Mahowald, compiled her autobiography with photographs and family research. Beatrice took over the household management on her family’s farm at age 15, after the death of her mother and the marriages of her older sisters. Part I can be read here.

What was the worst was when the threshers would come. They were always there for two days, for breakfast, afternoon lunch, and late supper. In those days there weren’t any ice boxes or refrigerators in the county and it was a lot harder to get the food ready. My sisters always came home to help with the cooking for the threshers, otherwise I wouldn’t get the dishes washed. And there were so many to wash.

I would bake fresh pie for dinner, cake for supper, and fresh coffeecake and buns for lunch. The bread I’d bake before the threshers came. We all worked hard all day. We cooked too good, that’s why the threshers ate so much.

This certain year I knew I would have the threshers for breakfast. They were going to move the machine over early in the morning, so that night before I went to bed, I set the table and I had the potatoes all peeled and cut up so I could put them in the frying pan as soon as I would get downstairs. My sisters didn’t help me with the breakfast. I was alone for that, and here my dad called me about 10 pm and said the threshers are here and they didn’t have any supper. They moved over to our place after dark because they didn’t want to eat another meal at the place they were. They said the food was so terribly bad there, so I got up and fried the potatoes, went in the basement, got up some fried down pork (which I also had planned for our breakfast) and I made them a good supper. Today I would say, “I’m in bed. Let them go home or go hungry.”

I had all those dishes to wash and dry as the whole thresher crew came along. I must have fed a dozen men. It was late when I got to bed, and the next morning I had to be up early. I was really mad at those threshers but it was Dad’s fault. He should have told them I was asleep. Just think of how nice the farmers’ wives have it nowadays. They have combines now, so they only need to feed their own family.

Some of the threshers used to sleep at the farmer’s house and they were so dirty when they slept in the beds two nights the sheets were black dirty, and they would dump the straw from the their clothes on the floor. I was always so glad when we were done with the threshing.

Lead image: Threshing at Augustus Keup Farm, 1896

This Is My Life: Beatrice Zweber Remembers Appendicitis in 1914

This blog series is adapted from a memoir by Beatrice Zweber Mahowald of New Market. Her grandson, Pat Mahowald, compiled her autobiography with photographs and family research. Beatrice took over the household management on her family’s farm at age 15, after the death of her mother and the marriages of her older sisters. The incident she describes below took place in 1914, when she was 16 years old and a primary caretaker for her family. It has been slightly edited from the original for clarity.

After dinner, I wanted to go to bed but I found out I couldn’t lay down. So I sat on the edge of the bed with my elbows on my knees and my face in my hands. I was so tired but I just couldn’t lay down. I had such pain so at four o’clock in the morning I went in my brother Henry’s room and I told him that I sat up all night and that I was very sick. He said he would get up and feed the horse so dad could take me to the doctor.

The horse had to eat first because this was a far trip to Prior Lake, which is about eleven miles from our home [in New Market]. A horse can only walk about three miles in a half hour. It must have been 8:30 when we got there, because the doctor was at his office. When the doctor examined me, he said I had appendicitis. My dad got very excited and he was going to put me on the train at Prior Lake that stops at Shakopee, and then from there he was going to transfer to St. Paul on a train. But Dr. Kennedy said, “Oh no, Mr. Zweber, this child is too sick to operate on now.”

Prior Lake’s train depot in 1908. Scott County Historical Society.

He gave me some medicine in the office and said Dad should take me home, and I should go to the hospital on Monday. So Dad and I started the long trip home.

On Tuesday August 24, 1914 I had my operation. My dad went along into the operating room. When I laid on the table they told me to inhale the ether, but I didn’t do it. [Ether was a liquid anesthesia used in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Physicians dropped ether onto fabric held over a patient’s face by a mask.] I could see my dad sitting there and I felt so bad for him because he really looked sad. I thought of my three younger brothers and I thought now if I die who would take care of them. I wanted to cry but I really couldn’t do that because they said inhale. I just couldn’t inhale that stinky stuff. Anyway they must have poured it on because I went to sleep.

When I woke up I was in my room at St. Joseph’s hospital. Two doctors and some nurses were with me, and I was really sick. In those days an appendicitis operation was serious and dangerous because they didn’t have the medicine to fight infection like they have now. They would keep you in the hospital two weeks. I didn’t like it at St. Joseph’s because they didn’t feed me enough. I remember the first breakfast at home. My cousin brought me a great big plate of hot beef stew and gravy and several pieces of toast made from homemade bread. I ate it all.

Lead Image: Photograph of Beatrice Zweber in 1913. Scott County Historical Society.