Who Is Lizzie Quinlivan?

In writing my posts on Julia Manning, I realized I had never posted anything about the other name mentioned in my great-great grandmother Mary Manning Mullane's obituary in the San Francisco Call -- Elizabeth (Lizzie) Quinlivan of Oakland.

Having poor luck in my initial research into the mysterious "J. Manning," I turned my attention to Lizzie. Lizzie never married and worked for a number of Catholic parishes in Alameda County. Based on the 1880 Census, Lizzie is about five years younger than my great-great grandmother Mary and according to the 1920 census, she arrived in the US in 1860. The 1920 census also lists her as age 70 which would have made her 10 years old when she arrived in the US. However, when she died two years later both the California Death Index and her obituaries list her as 80 years old, which would mean she was born in 1842 and so was 18 when she arrived in the US.

So far, I'm having a problem finding any records for Lizzie in the 1900 or 1910 censuses. She is living at 1317 then 1267 16th Avenue in Oakland from 1879-1899 based on what I've been able to find in the city directories and is working as a housekeeper for a Rev. William Gleeson, who is the pastor of St. Anthony's Church. I couldn't find a listing for her in 1900, but she appears again in 1901 in the Alameda city directory living on San Antonio Avenue as "Mrs. Lizzie Quinlan" and working as a domestic. Checking that address against Google maps to see where it is today, and there, a few blocks away is St. Joseph's Basilica, so despite the name not quite being exactly correct, I am fairly confident this is Lizzie Quinlivan. 

Using both the 1899 and 1901 addresses, I went back and looked more closely at the 1900 census and was unable locate her. The "family" listed at 1267 16th Avenue in 1900 is headed by a priest named Charles O'Neil, and there is no sign of Lizzie or Rev. Gleeson. When I looked for the 1901 address in Alameda, I couldn't find the house counted, so it may have been missed. So, back to the directories to see if I can find Lizzie in 1910.

In 1902, Lizzie is back in Oakland, but disappears from the Oakland/Alameda/Berkeley city directories between 1903 and 1909. In 1910 and 1911 I find an "Ellie Quinlan" working as a domestic at 2644 Etna St. in Berkeley. It's a few blocks from the University of California campus, and the closest Catholic facility I can find on Google maps is Newman Hall-Holy Spirit Parish, so I saved that file to cross reference, and keep looking further. Nothing again between 1912-1922. I know Lizzie is living in Berkeley in 1920, since she shows up as a housekeeper in the census at 2101 California Street, which appears to be a convent of Catholic nuns led by a Sister M. Consilia Fenton, alas there isn't a 1919 or 1920 city directory available on line for Berkeley that I've found, and I can't find Sr. Consilia in the 1921 city directory nor any listing of a convent. 

Time to go back to "Ellie Quinlan" in 1910 and see if I can find her in the US Census. I do. Alas, Ellie Quinlan is 23 years old, far too young to be Lizzie who would have been about 62 by 1910. Great, that means I've got a twenty-year gap between residences for Lizzie and a forty-year gap in census records!

Still, this information is a good lead on my great-great grandmother's family. While I don't have additional verification at this point, I suspect Lizzie is a cousin on Mary's maternal side, thus giving me at least last names to search for to try to identify Mary's parents. One of the other reasons I believe this to be true is found in a record from the Ganter-Felder-Kenny mortuary records for Mary's son Timothy Joseph Mullane which lists Mary's name as Mary Quinlan. I still have much more research to do on that supposition.

The First Attempt to Find J Manning

While preparing posts on my search for Julia Manning, I found an early draft tracking my first attempts to find "J. Manning." The post is incomplete, but shows where my thinking was circa 2018 when I worked up the draft. Notice I eliminated Julia pretty quickly. Stay tuned to find out what I've learned since.

My great-great grandmother Mary Manning Mullane died in February 1892 and her death notice mentions she is the "niece of J. Manning." Mary was born around 1845 making her about 46 when she died, so that would mean J. Manning was likely in his or her sixties or early seventies in 1892. It is possible he or she was older or younger than that, but it's a safe age range to start searching. That would mean J. Manning would have been born sometime in the 1820s or 1830s, though the range from 1810-1840 isn't totally out of the question. My great-great grandmother was born in Ireland, so again it is likely that J. Manning was also born in Ireland. Since the death notice appears in the San Francisco Call, and also references a cousin living in Oakland, I believe J. Manning also lived in San Francisco in 1892.

Great, that's a start, right? I need to find someone with a first name that starts with J and was born between about 1820-1835 in Ireland. Now the trick is to identify exactly who this J. Manning is. I was able to find my great-great grandmother "B. Murray" easily enough, so it's off to the San Francisco city directories to see what I'm up against. I first checked the 1892 city directory where I found the following:

• J.J. Manning living at 1115 Castro Street.
• Julia Manning, music teacher, living at 7th and Railroad Avenues
• 9 different James Mannings
• 3 different Jeremiah Mannings, though one is a Jr. and at the same residence as one of the others, so probably someone I can eliminate.
• 5 different John Mannings
•  2 different Joseph Mannings

So that is a total of 20 possibilities (21 if Jeremiah, Jr. is included.) I save the page from the 1892 directory and then go take a look at the 1891 directory. From there I found the following:

• 12 different James Mannings
• 6 different John Mannings
• 1 Joseph Manning living at 612 Taylor Street.

That's still 19 possibilities that I need to compare to the 1892 directory, but I may be able to eliminate the Jeremiahs and Julia Manning. I decided to step back one more year to 1890 and see what I would find there:

• 8 different James Mannings
• 1 Jeremiah Manning living at 1120 Elm Avenue.
• 7 different John Mannings
• 1 Joseph Manning living at 1212 Howard Street.

Down to 17 possibilities, but we've got a Jeremiah back in the picture. I decided to stop there and cross-reference the three years of names and addresses to see which people appeared most consistently at the same address with the same occupation. That's a lot of people to track down and with out an 1890 census, I have to look for voter registrations to see if I can find any of them close to 1892. I eliminate Julia right off the bat as she only appears once in the three years of directories I looked at and since she is a woman I would not be able to find her in the 1890s voter records.

Fuzzy Findings

I’ve been following several trails through the Murray family trying to figure out some unanswered questions.  Right now, the best I have are suppositions and guesses that need a bit more information to find out if I’m on the right track or if I’ve identified the wrong people.

For starters, one of the unanswered questions I have right now is who was Joseph’s wife?  He shows up in the 1920 census as married, but his wife isn’t living with him.  Who is she?  Where is she?  I’ve done some digging around in the city directories trying to find all of the Murray siblings between 1900 and 1920, and it’s rather hit or miss, especially when I’m trying to track John, Joseph and Mollie (Mary).  I’m never quite sure if the person I’ve found in the directory is the right one.

However, I did find a Joseph S. Murray working as a driver in 1911, which seems a good bet.  I can track him through to 1917, and from 1914-1917 he shows up with a wife named Agnes.  I’ve yet to find any record of their marriage, so I don’t know Agnes’ maiden name.  Despite not being certain this is the right Joseph, I did a search for Agnes Murray in the 1920 census to see if I could find her.  I found two that might fit.  The first Agnes Murray shows up living in San Francisco, but is single.  She is about 45 years old, from Scotland, and working as a cook.  Joseph Murray would have been about 40 years old in 1920, so it’s possible this is the right Agnes, but I don’t think it’s likely.  The second Agnes Murray shows up in Napa.  This Agnes is also about 45 years old, married, and was born in California.  She is also a patient at the Napa State Hospital.  I suspect this is the correct Agnes.  So, if this is the right Agnes and she was married to “my” Joseph S. Murray, what happened between 1917 and 1920 that would put her in the state mental hospital?  Historically, that would be the end of World War I and coincide with the flu epidemic of 1917-1918.  Could something have happened related to those events that would cause some kind of mental breakdown?  I’m not even certain what would cause someone to be hospitalized in the early 1900s when mental illness was no where nearly as well understood as it is today.  I’ve found what I believe is a death record for Agnes in Napa in about 1926, and need to do some more digging to see if I am on the right track.

Another avenue I am exploring is what happened to John Henry and Mollie?  I know that as of 1909, when Nellie died, they are both still living.  Mollie is probably unmarried in 1909, but that is about all I have figured out.  I have no idea where she was living or how she was supporting herself.  John Henry is an equal mystery.  Other than his name appearing in the death notices for Bridget and Nellie, I can’t find a definitive record of him after 1901.  Part of the problem is that by the 1910 census, the four surviving Murray siblings – John Henry, Mollie, Marshall, and Joseph – are all in their 30s and 40s and as best as I can tell unmarried.  Their parents are dead, so I’m looking for four single people living in a city of over 400,000 people.  That’s assuming they stayed living within the city borders.  Talk about a needle in a haystack!  I haven’t been able to find any of them for certain yet in the 1910 census, and the only thing I know for certain is that they are not living together.  The 1920 and 1930 censuses are even less help at least for John Henry and Mollie (and Joseph in 1930) since by then I don't even know if they are still living.

And then there are the McDonoughs.  I still have no idea if Thomas, Betsey, and/or Patrick McDonough are related to Bridget.  There are bits and pieces that point to Thomas and Betsey as possibly being family.  I believe I have found Thomas in Chelsea, Massachusetts in 1858.  Betsey also shows up in Chelsea in 1870, though her name is listed as Beesey.  I know Bridget must have had some family in Chelsea as her death notice in the San Francisco Call asked that Chelsea, MA papers be copied, but I can’t find any definite connection between Thomas, Betsey/Beesey, and Bridget.  It’s also not clear if Betsey is a sister or a sister-in-law of Thomas, but I’m fairly certain that those two, at least, are related.  If they are related to Bridget, I do have Thomas’s parents’ names, which will be a world of help.  Patrick was a bit easier to trace through the records, but there is nothing I’ve found about him that would definitely tie him to any of the others.

I’m still waiting for an answer to my request for my great grandmother Mary Mullane’s death certificate, which I’m hoping will tell me what her parents’ names were.  That might help me unravel some of the Mullane mysteries.  I still can’t figure out if the Mary Mullane I found is my great grandmother and if it is what the heck happened to Edward Hayes.

Finally, there are the things I doubt I’ll ever find out.  In the 1900 and 1910 censuses, women were asked how many children they had and how many survived.  In the 1900 census, Bridget Murray said she had six children, five of whom survived.  Based on the ages of her children, I suspect there was a child born between Mollie and Marshall.  That would have been in about 1872, and since that child does not appear in the 1880 census record he or she would have died before then.  A similar situation exists with Sadie Coleman, my great grandfather Daniel’s sister-in-law.  She had three children who did not survive, one born between 1895-1900, the other two between 1900-1910.  I keep my eyes peeled for any of these lost children while I comb through newspaper records looking for other people, but the odds of me being able to find them are not good.

The more I search, the more I realize there is so much more to learn and that some of the information may be lost to time.  I have many library hours ahead of me as some of the information I’m looking for just isn’t easily found online.  And I’ve barely started on the Coleman/O’Leary side, so it’s about time to start digging further into Irish records to see what I can turn up.