My great grandfather Daniel Patrick Coleman had an older brother John James Coleman who also emigrated from Ireland to the United States. I first encountered John Coleman living in San Francisco in the 1900 US Census while looking for Daniel. According to the 1900 Census record, John arrived in the United States in 1877. I am still working on determining when and where John arrived in the US, but I do have some idea of what happened to him afterwards.
In about 1895, John married Sarah (Sadie) Myers, probably in San Francisco. By the 1900 census, Sadie had given birth to three children, but only two had survived -- Gladys Mae (b. 1896) and John James, Jr. (Jack, b. 1899). By the 1910 census John and Sadie had moved to Alameda and Sadie had given birth to four more children, again of which only two had survived -- Aileen Gertrude (b. 1904) and Marion (b. 1906.) John and Sadie's eighth child Noel Margaret Coleman was born in 1914. According to both the 1900 and 1910 censuses, John was a sailor. The 1910 census indicates he was a mate on a fishing vessel. By the 1920 census, Sadie turns up as a widow. I haven't been able to find a death notice for John, but based on the California Death Index, I believe he died in 1919. Sadie lived in Alameda County, mostly in Oakland, until her death in 1956.
John and Sadie's children have been challenging to
follow in the records as three of their four daughters were married more
than once, which means lots of name changes. The fourth daughter,
Marion, I haven't been able to find any records for past 1933 as yet, so
it's possible she too will prove to have challenging name changes. I've gotten some information on all five of John and Sadie's children, and will follow up with what I've found in later posts.
I am also planning to spend a bit of time looking in to Sadie's family. As I noted in an earlier post, Sadie's younger sister Gertrude Myers Alexander was a witness to my great grandparents' wedding in 1904, so while she is not a direct relative, she did play a role in the family history.
Showing posts with label Sarah Myers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sarah Myers. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 15, 2016
Tuesday, March 1, 2016
Crossing Paths with Cousins
Most of the research I've done to date has been on the Murray/Mullane side, so this year, I've decided to spend more time looking into the Coleman side of the family tree. One of the first things I'm looking in to is my great grandfather Daniel Coleman's brother John Coleman and his family. John Coleman married a woman named Sarah (Sadie) Myers and had five children that lived to adulthood. I've been working out who each of the children were, who they married, and if they had any children. It's been a bit complicated as it appears each of John's children were married multiple times, so I've had to go very slowly through their records. However, in doing so, I found an item that had me quite amused.
John and Sadie Coleman's oldest child was Gladys Mae Coleman. Gladys's first husband was named Frank Patrick Elliott and they married in 1917. Gladys and Frank had two sons, John and Robert. In 1929, Gladys married a man named Gordon Ernest Kerley. I haven't discovered what happened to her first husband Frank, but it appears that Gordon Kerley adopted her two sons as they appear in the 1940 Census as John and Robert Kerley.
I haven't found out much yet about John Kerley, but I was able to find quite a bit about his younger brother Robert. After serving in World War II, Robert received his bachelor's degree in business administration from the University of California, Berkeley and began a career in university administration. After stints at the University of Kentucky and Johns Hopkins University, Robert Kerley was appointed Vice Chancellor for Administration at UC Berkeley in 1970.
This is where I stumbled on one of those weird small-world occurrences. I found a copy of the University Bulletin for the Staff of the University of California on Google Books that detailed his appointment. The Bulletin read, in part:
"The appointment of Kerley to fill the important executive position on the campus was announced by President Hitch and Chancellor Roger W. Heyns following approval by the Regents."
[University Bulletin: A Weekly Bulletin for the Staff of the University of California, Volume 18, Number 37, 29 Jun 1970]
That sentence gave me a moment to pause and wonder because it contained the name of someone I knew. Roger W. Heyns was a founding board member of the SETI Institute where I have worked for 25 years. While I didn't know Roger well, I did get to know him a bit during his time on the board until his death in 1995. It was yet another reminder that the world is smaller than we would imagine it is.
Robert Kerley died in 2006 and was survived by his wife and six children. I'm still following up on them, and hope to discover more about this part of the Coleman family tree.
John and Sadie Coleman's oldest child was Gladys Mae Coleman. Gladys's first husband was named Frank Patrick Elliott and they married in 1917. Gladys and Frank had two sons, John and Robert. In 1929, Gladys married a man named Gordon Ernest Kerley. I haven't discovered what happened to her first husband Frank, but it appears that Gordon Kerley adopted her two sons as they appear in the 1940 Census as John and Robert Kerley.
I haven't found out much yet about John Kerley, but I was able to find quite a bit about his younger brother Robert. After serving in World War II, Robert received his bachelor's degree in business administration from the University of California, Berkeley and began a career in university administration. After stints at the University of Kentucky and Johns Hopkins University, Robert Kerley was appointed Vice Chancellor for Administration at UC Berkeley in 1970.
This is where I stumbled on one of those weird small-world occurrences. I found a copy of the University Bulletin for the Staff of the University of California on Google Books that detailed his appointment. The Bulletin read, in part:
"The appointment of Kerley to fill the important executive position on the campus was announced by President Hitch and Chancellor Roger W. Heyns following approval by the Regents."
[University Bulletin: A Weekly Bulletin for the Staff of the University of California, Volume 18, Number 37, 29 Jun 1970]
That sentence gave me a moment to pause and wonder because it contained the name of someone I knew. Roger W. Heyns was a founding board member of the SETI Institute where I have worked for 25 years. While I didn't know Roger well, I did get to know him a bit during his time on the board until his death in 1995. It was yet another reminder that the world is smaller than we would imagine it is.
Robert Kerley died in 2006 and was survived by his wife and six children. I'm still following up on them, and hope to discover more about this part of the Coleman family tree.
Tuesday, December 1, 2015
Answering and Reviewing Some Questions, Part 3
A continuation of answering and following up on some of the
questions I have discussed in earlier posts on this blog.
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I started looking at the O'Leary side of my family tree in O'Learys and O'Looneys -- Oh My! and started digging around in what I could learn from cousins on that side of the family. Unlike my Murray/Mullane side of the family, there are relatives I know on the Coleman/O'Leary side. My grandmother Elizabeth Coleman was one of five children (including an older brother who died in childhood) and there are cousins in my father's generation that I've grown up around. While I've only been in intermittent contact with them recently, the leads I got from them when I started out were invaluable. Among the information I received were some family photos that I never knew existed, but I also received a copy of a marriage certificate of my great-grandparents from one cousin. This corrected one error I had originally. The family lore I was told had my great-grandparents married at St. Phillip's Church. In actuality, they were married at Most Holy Redeemer. The witnesses to their marriage were an Alexander Christiansen and Gertrude Alexander. According to my cousin, Alexander Christiansen was a doctor friend of my great grandfather's. I haven't looked in to him much, but he's on the list of friends and neighbors to learn a little bit about. Gertrude Alexander was a name I knew when I received the copy of the marriage certificate.
When I found my great grandfather Daniel Coleman in the 1900 census, he was living with his brother John Coleman and wife Sadie (Sarah.) There were two other families living with them at the time. Joseph Myers and his daughter Lillian were one family. The other were Jesse and Gertrude Alexander. When I saw Gertrude's name on the marriage certificate, I decided to go back and take a closer look at who she might be and how she was connected. I knew from the 1900 census record that Joesph Myers was Sadie Coleman's father, so I tried to look for Joseph and Sarah in the 1880 census. When I found them, I discovered that in addition to her sister Lillian, who appears in the 1900 record, she had three older brothers and two more sisters. One of the sisters was named Gertrude. A-ha! Gertrude Alexander was Gertrude Myers, so she was connected through marriage. In the collection of photos I recieved, there is a picture of my great grandparents on their wedding day and standing in the photo beside my great grandparents are Alexander Christiansen and Gertrude Alexander!
I also found some of my O'Leary relatives through looking at the partial invitation list to my parents wedding in 1965. After quickly identifying a few people and tracking them down, I never followed up with Mom and Dad about some of the other names on the list. I suspect most of them are family friends on my father's side rather than relatives, but since I never asked I don't know for certain. I need to sit down with Mom & Dad soon to do that. Perhaps over the holidays!
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As I went Onward with the O'Learys, I was able to identify several of my grandmother's first cousins and their children. The difficulty was in identifying some of their spouses. The first unidentified spouse was for Arthur Patrick Ford. I've learned since my initial investigations that he went by "Pat" which was a huge help in finding him in the records and helped me identify his wife as Kathleen Fee. Pat and Kathleen Ford had a daughter named Mary Catherine who died in 1999.
The curious spouse was that of Catherine Ford Dwyer. Since my mother's family is Dwyer, Catherine has always been a bit of a curiosity over the years. A big part of the problem I had initially looking for Catherine and her husband was that I kept looking for them in San Francisco. It wasn't until I found Catherine living in Washington D.C. in the 1940 census that I was able to break through the wall. I found a 1940 marriage record for Catherine Hanora Ford and Edward Ambrose Dwyer in Washington, D.C. Edward Dwyer was born in Syracuse, New York and died in 1956 in Maryland. Catherine had him buried with her parents in Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, CA. Catherine died in 1987 and I can't find any record of them having any children.
One of the other items I found while looking at the Ford family was that Ellen O'Leary Ford had died of second and third degree burns. I recently discovered a coroner's report on her death and it was quite awful. The report said her clothing caught fire from a "lighted gas plate" while she was preparing dinner. She ran into the yard screaming and was aided by a neighbor before being sent to the hospital where she later died. One interesting bit of information from the coroner's report was a note that the San Francisco Fire Department was represented by a Captain Tenebsky of the "truck company on Waller near Stanyan." That quickly caught my attention. My father is a retired SF firefighter and one of the places he was stationed was 12 Truck on Stanyan Street. I haven't been there since I was a kid, so I wasn't sure of the cross streets and took to Google Maps to locate the intersection. Waller and Stanyan is closer to Golden Gate Park than the current location of Station 12, so I asked my father if the station had moved up Stanyan. He told me it had, which means about 40 years after Ellen Ford died my father worked at the same fire station that had responded to the fire that killed her. Another weird coincidence in the winding path through my family's history!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
I started looking at the O'Leary side of my family tree in O'Learys and O'Looneys -- Oh My! and started digging around in what I could learn from cousins on that side of the family. Unlike my Murray/Mullane side of the family, there are relatives I know on the Coleman/O'Leary side. My grandmother Elizabeth Coleman was one of five children (including an older brother who died in childhood) and there are cousins in my father's generation that I've grown up around. While I've only been in intermittent contact with them recently, the leads I got from them when I started out were invaluable. Among the information I received were some family photos that I never knew existed, but I also received a copy of a marriage certificate of my great-grandparents from one cousin. This corrected one error I had originally. The family lore I was told had my great-grandparents married at St. Phillip's Church. In actuality, they were married at Most Holy Redeemer. The witnesses to their marriage were an Alexander Christiansen and Gertrude Alexander. According to my cousin, Alexander Christiansen was a doctor friend of my great grandfather's. I haven't looked in to him much, but he's on the list of friends and neighbors to learn a little bit about. Gertrude Alexander was a name I knew when I received the copy of the marriage certificate.
When I found my great grandfather Daniel Coleman in the 1900 census, he was living with his brother John Coleman and wife Sadie (Sarah.) There were two other families living with them at the time. Joseph Myers and his daughter Lillian were one family. The other were Jesse and Gertrude Alexander. When I saw Gertrude's name on the marriage certificate, I decided to go back and take a closer look at who she might be and how she was connected. I knew from the 1900 census record that Joesph Myers was Sadie Coleman's father, so I tried to look for Joseph and Sarah in the 1880 census. When I found them, I discovered that in addition to her sister Lillian, who appears in the 1900 record, she had three older brothers and two more sisters. One of the sisters was named Gertrude. A-ha! Gertrude Alexander was Gertrude Myers, so she was connected through marriage. In the collection of photos I recieved, there is a picture of my great grandparents on their wedding day and standing in the photo beside my great grandparents are Alexander Christiansen and Gertrude Alexander!
I also found some of my O'Leary relatives through looking at the partial invitation list to my parents wedding in 1965. After quickly identifying a few people and tracking them down, I never followed up with Mom and Dad about some of the other names on the list. I suspect most of them are family friends on my father's side rather than relatives, but since I never asked I don't know for certain. I need to sit down with Mom & Dad soon to do that. Perhaps over the holidays!
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*
As I went Onward with the O'Learys, I was able to identify several of my grandmother's first cousins and their children. The difficulty was in identifying some of their spouses. The first unidentified spouse was for Arthur Patrick Ford. I've learned since my initial investigations that he went by "Pat" which was a huge help in finding him in the records and helped me identify his wife as Kathleen Fee. Pat and Kathleen Ford had a daughter named Mary Catherine who died in 1999.
The curious spouse was that of Catherine Ford Dwyer. Since my mother's family is Dwyer, Catherine has always been a bit of a curiosity over the years. A big part of the problem I had initially looking for Catherine and her husband was that I kept looking for them in San Francisco. It wasn't until I found Catherine living in Washington D.C. in the 1940 census that I was able to break through the wall. I found a 1940 marriage record for Catherine Hanora Ford and Edward Ambrose Dwyer in Washington, D.C. Edward Dwyer was born in Syracuse, New York and died in 1956 in Maryland. Catherine had him buried with her parents in Holy Cross Cemetery in Colma, CA. Catherine died in 1987 and I can't find any record of them having any children.
One of the other items I found while looking at the Ford family was that Ellen O'Leary Ford had died of second and third degree burns. I recently discovered a coroner's report on her death and it was quite awful. The report said her clothing caught fire from a "lighted gas plate" while she was preparing dinner. She ran into the yard screaming and was aided by a neighbor before being sent to the hospital where she later died. One interesting bit of information from the coroner's report was a note that the San Francisco Fire Department was represented by a Captain Tenebsky of the "truck company on Waller near Stanyan." That quickly caught my attention. My father is a retired SF firefighter and one of the places he was stationed was 12 Truck on Stanyan Street. I haven't been there since I was a kid, so I wasn't sure of the cross streets and took to Google Maps to locate the intersection. Waller and Stanyan is closer to Golden Gate Park than the current location of Station 12, so I asked my father if the station had moved up Stanyan. He told me it had, which means about 40 years after Ellen Ford died my father worked at the same fire station that had responded to the fire that killed her. Another weird coincidence in the winding path through my family's history!
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