Therese and Emil Hofmann from Vienna, Austria. I bought this photo online in the hopes that despite such a common German/Austrian surname I might find this couple in the records. But before we dig into my findings, let’s just take a moment and enjoy this close-up of handsome Emil. Doesn’t he look like he just stepped off the cover of a glossy fashion magazine in 2023? So Emil and Therese. My best match is one Emil Luther Hofmann, who was born on December 1, 1874, in Brünn (Brno in today’s Czech Rep) to parents Johann Hofmann and Genovefa née Christ. Emil’s family was Catholic. Emil who worked as a coachman married maid Theresia Wanderer on February 27, 1900 in the St. Leopold’s Church in Vienna. Theresia was 3 year younger than Emil, she was born on August 15, 1878, in Steinbach, Ernstbrunn. Theresia’s parents Franz and Antonia Wanderer owned real estate in the area. Emil and Theresia’s daughter Josefine Emilie Hofmann was born on January 3, 1902, in Vienna. Perhaps she met her future husband Josef Karl Benkö at the work place. Both of their profession listed int heir marriage record reads “clerk”. Their church wedding took place on May 31, 1925 in Vienna, and in front of the state registry in August 1941 (I assume in order to fulfil some formalities during WWII?). I don't know if the couple had any children or what happened to Karl. Josefine passed away on November 21, 1979, in Vienna. Emil and Therese also had a son they called Josef Emil who was born on November 24, 1904, in Vienna. Unfortunately I have nothing else on him. Therese passed away on January 22, 1935, in Vösendorf, at just 56 years of age of tuberculosis and cardiac paralysis. At the time she was already widowed, but I don’t know what happened to Emil or when he died. Maybe she died of a broken heart... I can't get over how handsome they looked in their wedding photo. I hope their marriage was filled with love, respect and passion for eah other.

This little guy was Uno Hamberg, photographed on his first birthday on January 20th, 1932. The photo was dedicated to Uno’s godfather in March 1932. Uno Hamberg was born on January 8th, 1931 (or January 20th according to the new calendar) in Tallinn, Estonia, to parents Karl Eduard Hamberg and Hilda née Ehmann. The couple had got married in 1926 and Uno was their only child. Strangely, the birth record in the churchbook gives him the name Udo instead of Uno. Perhaps whoever filled out the churchbook had a bad hearing and spellt the name wrong. Regarding the godfather this photo was originally gifted to, baby Uno had two: an actor (ballet dancer and choreographer Artur Koit, and a locksmith August Soo. Uno’s father Karl Eduard Hamberg was a locksmith by profession too. I’ve mentioned this in my blogposts before that in the 1930s a law was adopted in Estonia, enabling anyone who so wished to change their German-sounding surname into a more Estonian-sounding one. Surnames had been given to Estonian families by their Baltic German masters at the beginning of the 19th century when Estonians were serfs. Some masters gave their people poetic names in Estonian, others didn’t bother at all and just gave them something random in German, and others let their people choose their own surnames. I didn’t realise how many Estonians applied for a new surname in the 1930s! So the Hambergs were not happy with their German-sounding surname either and applied for it to be changed into Haavsalu. Since 1937, I find them in the records under this surname. There is not that much to be found about the Haavsalus, though. They moved to Türi in Järva county, perhaps to be closer to Uno’s grandparents. I find nothing else on little Uno either. Except a mention in a newspaper Uus-Eesti of May 1940 that a 7-year-old boy with the name Uno Haavsalu had died. I don’t know for sure if he was the same boy cause in 1940 he would have been 9 years old. But perhaps whoever recorded it for the newspaper made a typo. That would be a tragic end to our story about Uno (Hamberg) Haavsalu. I will try to make contact with relatives of the other branches of the family and share this photo with them and find out what became of little Udo.

Doesn’t your heart just melt when you look at these darlings? They were sisters Ruby and Gladys Niel from Midland in Michigan. Can’t the world just stop and stay as happy and innocent as the faces of these angels? Brace yourselves and make sure you have some hankies closeby, this will be a sad one... Life started out happy for our siblings. Their father George Adelbert Niel had a steady job with the Pere Marquette Railway Company, he could afford a morgage-free house in Ionia, Michigan. In 1890, he married the sisters’ mum Emma née Lane. Ruby Louvisa was born on November 28, 1896, and little Gladys on October 15, 1900. But in the Census of 1910, the father was missing from the household, and one census further, in 1920, Gladys was missing as well. What was going on here? By the 1910 Census, mum Emma was widowed and she had moved her daughters to Midland, some 100 km from Ionia. For income, she was renting rooms to lodgers in her house in Rodd Street which she owned morgage-free. But what had happened to the children’s father George Niel? I was in for a tragic surprise. At Christmas 1903, on a snowy evening of December 26, two Pere Marquette trains collided heads-on near East Paris, Michigan, due to a missing stop-sign. George had been one of the conductors of the trains. He initially survived the accident with a fractured leg and some other injuries and was improving, but his condition worsened a few days later and he died from a nervous shock on December 30 in the hospital. Link: www.newspapers.com Link: FindaGrave.com Newspapers reported horrific details about the train wreck. Body parts of unidentifiable victims together with Christmas presents lying at the scene next to the demolished train wagons. Apparently George was not supposed to be on the train, but he relieved a fellow conductor who needed a lay-off. George died before his 40th birthday. And as if that was not enough sorrow for one family, in January 1913 Gladys came down with meningitis which led to her death at just 12 years of age. She was buried at the Midland City Cemetery. I don’t know where mum Emma took the strength to carry on. By 1920, she had sold her house in Midland and moved to Flint where she continued to rent rooms to lodgers. Ruby was 23 and working as a stenographer. Ruby married Willard Fuller on October 30, 1923, in Flint. Willard was 2 years older, worked at an automobile factory, and he was a WWI veteran. He was originally from Ruby’s childhood town of Ionia, Michigan. I wonder if they knew each other from their childhood? In the next decades, Ruby and Willard moved around quite a bit. The 1930 Census lists them in Clayton, the 1940 Census in Swartz Creek and the 1950 Census had them in Genesee near Flint. And each Census has Willard working in an automobile factory, as a straightener or a press operator. This was hard manual labour and I’m afraid Willard worked himself into his grave. He passed away way before his time in 1953, at the age of 59. As a WWI veteran (also drafted for WWII), he was laid to rest at the Sunset Hills Cemetery in Flint. Five years later, in 1958, Ruby also lost her mother Emma who had been living with her since the 1940s. I wish I knew what became of Ruby after this, where she lived and who kept an eye on her as she came into old age, I suppose the cousins mentioned in her obituary in The Journal of April 23, 1989. She and Willard never had any children. She passed away in April 1989 in Durand, Shiawassee in Michigan. I believe that the photo of the sisters was taken around the time their father died. Just heart-breaking that their daddy was taken from them way too soon. Rest in peace, both Ruby and Gladys, I hope you are reunited with your dear daddy on the other side of the rainbow.

Just your typical Victorian era image of a cute baby, right? I look at this little darling with the biggest and brightest eyes and would never have imagined all the incredible information I would find about how life turned out for C. A. Palmer from Omaha! My first question: Omaha where? The photo studio Heyn was located in Omaha, Nebraska. The Heyn brothers were immigrants of Jewish heritage from Germany, who had moved to Omaha in the mid-19th century and set up their photo studio in the So. 15th Street in Omaha. They are mostly known for their photographs of Native Americans which they took in the late 1890s. My next question: was this baby a boy or a girl? And question no. 3: was the date April 18, 1874 the date of birth or when this photo was taken? I think I found the answers! Clara Agnes Palmer was born on December 20, 1873, in Plattsmouth, Nebraska, just 20 miles from Omaha. This would make her 5 months old in the photo. Her family was very prominent in Omaha. Her father Henry Emerson Palmer was a Civil War veteran, a pioneer, and a business man. Henry Emerson Palmer established an insurance company in Omaha in 1870. His obituary (including the photo above) spread on two pages of the Omaha Daily Bee of April 3, 1911, and went into detail about all the honorary positions he held, charity and pioneer work he had done. Clara’s older brother George Henry Palmer studied in the best schools and joined his father in the insurance business as the youngest commissioned insurance agent at just 15 years of age. Clara’s brother (newspapers.com) So it was no wonder that Clara’s future husband would have to show some credentials too. Her beau was Herman D. Kountze Jr., the son of a prominent Omaha family and banker Herman Kountze Sr. The future lovers moved in the same circles already in August 1896: Link: newspapers.com After Clara returned from a long trip to Europe in August 1899, the couple got engaged! Link: newspapers.com Nine months later, on April 18, 1900 (exactly 26 years after our photo was taken!), Clara and Herman were married in Omaha. Link: newspapers.com By then, Herman had joined the family business in New York, so that was where the newly-weds set up home. In 1908, tragegy struck the Palmer family. Clara’s brother George Henry Palmer passed away of pneumonia at just 27 years of age. The heir of their father’s insurance business was gone. With modern medicine that young life could probably have been saved, but back then it was a matter of days. He left behind a young wife and two children under the age of 5. Perhaps it was the broken heart that caused their father’s fatal heart failure just a year later. In 1912, also Clara’s mother died of pneumonia. In just 4 years Clara lost her stronghold back home in Omaha. Now she had to build a new stronghold in New York. And she thrived at that. By 1910, Clara had given birth to two children, Palmer and Elizabeth, and together with their many servants they resided in the East 56th Street in Manhattan. In 1912, daughter Natalie was born, and in 1916 Herman and Clara had their youngest, Mimi. By 1920, the family of six and their servants had moved to their residence in Park Avenue. And by 1930, their home was located at 8, 5th Avenue in Manhattan. In 1922, Herman applied for a passport for travels to Europe on his banking business. Clara joined him on this trip to France, England, Italy, Germany and Belgium. Herman’s application includes photos of them both. What a pity that I can’t make out much of Clara’s face in the photo! The Palmer-Kountze family often made headlines on the society pages of New York newspapers. They had standing, and they had money. They moved in the same circles with the likes of the Vanderbilts and the Rockefellers. And then the Wall Street crashed. 1931 was a dark year for the Kountze businesses. The Kountze brothers lost their banking license and had to file for insolvency. Link: newspapers.com The Palmer-Kountze family did not lose the roof over their heads, and continued to reside in Manhattan as well as travel internationally. I’m sure Clara and Herman could have done without any mention of their financial misfortune, so it didn’t help when their younger daughters Natalie and Mimi both got married in private ceremonies in 1933 and “excluded New York society on the whole”. Link: newspapers.com Now a few lines about Clara’s four children, since I could find photos for three of them on the Internet: –Palmer Davis Kountze (1901-1963), Clara and Herman’s oldest, was a handsome fellow. He had a son, Hallett P. Kountze. Palmer Davis Kountze FindaGrave.com –Clara’s oldest daughter, Elizabeth Kountze (1902-1979) married Murray Leonard Hoffmann and they had a son Lindley Hoffmann, and a daughter Catherine Phyllis Hoffmann, later Taylor/Baron (1931-1997). –Clara’s third child, Natalie Bliss Kountze (1911-1987) married Duncan Sterling Jr. in 1933, and they had a son, Duncan Sterling III (1934-1996). I found this beautiful photo of Natalie in The Brooklyn Daily Eagle of June 19, 1933. Link: newspapers.com –Clara’s youngest, Marie Clare “Mimi” Kountze (1915-2005), was the one with the most mentions in newspapers. She was featured as a fashion model in several newspapers across the US. She surely had the same beautiful eyes like her mother. She married John Bigelow Clark in 1933, but the marriage ended in divorce just 4 years later. Daughter Cynthia was born in 1934, when Mimi was 19. In 1940, Mimi and her daughter were living in Oyster Bay, Nassau, New York. By 1950, she had moved to St. Paul, Ramsey, in Minnesota, where she worked as a store clerk in a retail candy store. Her second husband was Robert J. Davidson. Link: newspapers.com Link: newspapers.com But now back to Clara. Clara passed away on April 27, 1951, in Manhattan, 4 years after she had been widowed. The press were eager to paint the picture of a lonely overdosing diva, addicted to sedatives, who left a junky estate. I wish instead more was said about her character and accomplishments after so many years of being featured by the same newspapers on their society pages. May she rest in peace, far away from all the yellow noise! Link: newspapers.com Link: newspapers.com At least this one mentions the more important information about all the survivors, rather than speculations about her death: Link: newspapers.com I wish I had a photo of Clara as a grown-up. I’ve reached out to the Kountze Family Archive, but unfortunately they had no photos of her. Her children were all so beautiful. I’m sure Clara was a stunning woman too!

Here's a random identified photo amongst a blind lot of wedding photos I purchased from German ebay a few months ago. It reads: "Wife of Alfred v. O., Dia von Osterroth with daughter Marion“ (Frau von Alfred v. O., Dia von Osterroth mit Tochter Marion). Dia was short for Lydia; Lydia Mathilde Margareta Frenz was born on January 4, 1890. On July 20, 1911 she married lieutenant Friedrich Alfred von Osterroth in Düsseldorf. On November 11, 1913, they welcomed their daughter Marion von Osterroth. So this photo was taken during WWI. Marion’s godparents included one Mrs. Julie Siebel from Coblenz, one Mrs. Maria von Osterroth from Oberwesel, one Arthur von Osterroth and one Arthur Frenz from Düsseldorf. Arthur von Osterroth might have been little Marion’s grandfather Hermann Arthur or her uncle, her father’s twin brother Wilhelm Arthur. Arthur Frenz might have been Marion’s maternal uncle Wilhelm Arthur Frenz. Marion's father Alfred and his twin brother Wilhelm Arthur had been born on August 9, 1884 in Elberfeld. The von Osterroths were a noble family who resided in the manor of Schönberg in Oberwesel. Marion's uncle Arthur von Osterroth is considered the pioneer of bobsleigh sports in Germany. He won medals at the German Bobsleigh Championships in 1912, 1914 and 1920. According to a public MyHeritage family tree, Marion's parents Alfred and Dia got divorced in 1921. Dad Alfred died in August 1957, and mum Dia in 1970. Marion married Alfred von Othegraven, and the couple had 4 children. According to a family tree on MyHeritage, Marion passed away in 1975. The same tree lists her children, so I’ll try to make contact. Hopefully we can return this beautiful photo! I’ve added Dia and Marion’s photo to FamilySearch.

I found this labelled photograph at my local antique market this month. It says: “Georg Christoph Schrage born 27.11.1837 in Hevensen, Hannover died 4.4.1916 in Leipzig This photograph was taken in London in about 1860” So Georg was born and died in Germany, but spent some time in London in between. Oooh, how I love an international genealogy treasure hunt! I assumed his birth place Hevensen was actually located in Hardegsen, 110 km South of Hannover in the state of Niedersachsen. Hannover was/is the largest city in the area. St.Lambert was/is the church of the Hevensen Lutheran congregation. I reached out to the church administration and am so grateful they could give me the information that Georg had indeed been born on that day into the family of pastor Karl Emil Schrage and Johanne Charlotte Antoinette née Rabies. This was the village that Georg grew up in: Hardegser Fotomuseum His story’s next chapter unfolded in London. Wow, that must have been quite the contrast for young Georg – out of the idyllic village of Hevensen into the buzzing life of London! London’s population was about 3 million in 1860! I wonder how this came about? I mean, any city in Germany, like Berlin or Cologne or Hamburg, would have been a big change for a small town boy. His father was a pastor, and somehow he could finance his son’s move overseas. Or had Georg done some training in a renowned export company in one of those cities I mention above, and collected enough means to end up in London in his early 20s. I find a Geo C. Schrage in the 1861 Census, living in the “Airly (or “Aisly”) House” at what today is 1a Cleveland Road in East Islington, London. The Census marks 1839 as his birth year. It could have easily been a mistake by the census taker, or his landlord listed him and didn’t know the exact date. Georg was said to have been born in Hannover, and his occupation was a “commercial traveller of fancy goods”. Oooh, fancy goods – what were they, I wonder? China, jewellery, perhaps? It’s not too often that I need to find UK records, so I’m not that familiar with all the different ways to access them. But mentions of one George Christopher Schrage in The London Gazette between 1863-1868 showed up on FindMyPast. The London Gazette was/is one of the official public records where certain statutory notices, like bankrupcies, are published. I was too curious, I had to get access to that, so I signed up for a one-month-subscription of the platform. Had I only known that the online Archive of The London Gazette lets you access the same records for free…. Oh well, you live and learn. Note to self: don’t forget to always google first. My curiosity paid off, though. In 1863, Georg split up from his business partner Charles August Renninger from Schrage & Renninger to continue the business on his own. The London Gazette I find his former business partner, presumably a fellow-German, in the 1891 Census, listed as a china merchant. I wonder if that was their joint venture of “fancy goods” in the 1860s as well? Georg did not thrive on his own. In 1866, Georg owed money to his creditors. The London Gazette In October 1868, he filed for bankrupcy and the final hearing in Georg’s bankrupcy case was to take place in front of the court in March that year. The London Gazette Georg was living at No. 1, Monkwell Street in Cripplegate at the time. If Georg was broke at the time, I wonder who took him in for several years? I think pretty much right after his last bankrupcy hearing, Georg packed up his belongings and left London. I cannot find him in the 1871 UK Census. My next clue was Leipzig in Germany where Georg apparently died in 1916. The churchbooks of Leipzig are not available online either, so I couldn’t access his death record. But I was hoping that George made Leipzig his home for a while. And there he was, I found him in the Leipzig city directories! He was listed in 1877 for the first time, a tradesman of raw tobacco. He set up his business in Leipzig in the same year. This might have been his office building at No. 3, Wintergartenstr.: I wish I knew what Georg did after he left London. Did he go into hiding from his creditors? Where did he live between 1868 and 1877? Did he recover from his London ordeal and try his hand at business somewhere else in the world, before showing up in Leipzig in 1877. Spoiler alert – this time he was going to make it! While his business remained in the same address until 1892, he moved around at least 5 times in the next years, living at different addresses around the city of Leipzig. Unfortunately, the city directories only name the head of the household – that was Georg – so I cannot say who else might have lived with him. In 1913, Georg moved to No. 23 Kaiser-Friedrich-Str. in Gohlis-Leipzig where he lived until his dying day on April 4, 1916. It worked out well for Georg after all. He stayed in Leipzig for 30 years! And indeed, I don’t find his name in the 1917 city directory for the first time. Instead, his widow Margarete Schrage is listed living in the same address. Yeii, Georg had found time and means to get married and I now knew a family member by name! Georg’s wife Margarete must have passed away in 1932/33 cause in 1933, a new head of household appears in the city directory: Elisabeth Schrage, a teacher, living in the same address at Kaiser-Friedrich-Str. 23. Was Elisabeth Georg and Margarete’s daughter? A year later in 1934, Elisabeth is gone (perhaps married?) and instead one Margarete Schrage, a bank clerk, is listed. Perhaps she was the second daughter of Georg and Margarete? In 1948, Margarete Schrage was still living in the same building (at the time known as the Viktor-Adler-Str.), but I don’t know anything else about her. Thank you, Georg, for taking us on your journery back in time! Georg, the trooper, the man of second chances, the small town adventurer who fell flat on his nose in the metropolis of London in the 1860s, and picked himself up and started anew in Leipzig. Someone kept his photo for 160 years! Perhaps it belonged to one of his daughters, Elisabeth or Margarete, or his family back home in Hevensen? I feel sad that it has got lost in history now. But at least Georg got to tell us about his exciting adventures one more time.

Updated! The photo is on its way to be reunited with its family. Sweet child, believe in yourself, your future looks very promising! I asked my Instagram community their opinion about the surname – they suggested Ormsbee, and they were right once again! Meet Thomas “Tom” Hamilton Ormsbee from Brooklyn, N.Y., 2 years old in this diamond shaped cabinet card photo. Tom was born on August 25th, 1890 in Brooklyn, NYC, to reporter and editor Hamilton Ormsbee and Agnes née Bailey. Tom had two older sisters Helen and Mary. In 1900, 1905,1910 and 1915 the Ormsbees were all living together at 435 Macon Street in Brooklyn (the brown house). Source: GoogleMaps In 1913, Tom was drafted to military service to regiment 2nd Co 9th CAC NYG. And as many from his generation, as if one war was not enough, he would later be drafted to serve in WWII as well. On November 16th, 1918, Tom married Renee Richmond Huntley in Middlebury, Addison in Vermont. According to their marriage announcement, they were both graduates of Middlebury College, perhaps college sweethearts? I love the detail in wedding announcements – we know by name who served refreshments, the choice of flower decorations, the selection of wedding gifts. It also says that Thomas was writer on foreign business with an office in New York. The wedding must have been quite an event as I’ve found their wedding announcement in at least 6 different newspapers :). They all report the same, so I’ll share only one of them with you below. Source: newspapers.com In 1920, the newly-weds were still living with Tom’s parents and sister Helen in 435 Macon Street. Tom is not listed as a writer this time, but instead as a salesman for woodenware. Perhaps they meant wooden antique furniture, he became a specialist in that. But about that a bit later. Tom’s wife Renee worked as a private music teacher. By 1930, the couple had finally moved into a place of their own at 182 Congress Street in Brooklyn. Looks like the couple didn’t have any children, none are listed in the censuses. Tom had returned to writing. He wrote a feature called “Antiques: Questions and Answers” for “House and Garden Magazine” at the time. Census 1940 has them living in Pound Ridge, Westchester, New York. Like mentioned above, in 1942 at 52 years of age, Tom was drafted once again. I doubt at his age he was sent out overseas. The draft card reveals that he was 5 8 tall, 135 pounds, had blue eyes and gray hair. Tom was widowed in September 1965. Perhaps this broke him as he fell ill shortly after and spent the last two years of his life in a Veteran’s Hospital. He passed away on August 4th, 1969 in Pound Ridge, Westchester. He was buried at Saint Matthew’s Episcopal Churchyard next to his wife. He lived to be 78 years old. The Ormsbees all loved writing, and were apparently were talented at that. Father Hamilton Ormsbee had been a veteran member of The Brooklyn Eagle of more than 30 years as an editorial writer. Sister Helen Ormsbee (1893-1975) was first an actress on Broadway and later wrote for The Herald Tribune as a stage specialist; she also published a book called “Backstage with Actors, from the time of Shakespeare to the present day”. Sister Mary Whitton née Ormsbee (1887-1971) wrote “First First Ladies” and other books about women in American history, also “short stories and poems for newspapers and magazines, she also contributed several articles to The New York Times. One of her books, “The New Servant,” published in 1927, described the growing use of electrical appliances in the home” (quoted from The New York Times). Tom wrote a dozen books, newspaper articles and features on antique furniture, heirlooms and collecting. He founded the magazine “The American Collector” in 1933. All the obituaries published in his honour in several newspapers praise him and his contribution to American antiques. Source: newspapers.com Source: newspapers.com Source: newspapers.com I’ve found the covers of some of his books on the Internet: I am ever amazed over and over again about the stories found photos tell me! Never did I expect to find such a family history hidden behind the smile of this darling boy from Brooklyn. Without his name, handwritten on the reverse, I would never have known his story. I just love the journeys my found photos take me on. Especially in these troubled times when my heart and thoughts are so often with the families suffering because of the ongoing war in Ukraine. Genealogy is such a needed escape from the daily devastating news, I am grateful for this hobby now more than ever.

This photo shows the four Sibul brothers from Estonia: Karl, Heino, Ilo and Ago Sibul. Don’t you just love their adorable matching sailor outfits! The boys were born in 1904, 1905, 1908 and 1911, so I guess the photo was taken during the WWI years. My first go-to search for Estonian genealogy is through Geni.com since many Estonians build their family trees there. In addition, I found quite a bit about them on the internet. The four boys were the sons of Karl Eduard Sibul (1878-1945) and Rosalie née Mihkelson (1877-1954). Karl Eduard Sibul Their father Karl Eduard was a medical doctor and quite a renowned one. He became the first Estonian CMD of a major hospital in the Estonian capital in the 1920s. It was under his management that the Central Hospital of Tallinn became a state-of-the-art medical institution. Education was valued in the Sibul family, and at least 3 of the four brothers graduated from university: Karl with a degree in engineering, Ago in business management, and Ilo with a medical degree like his father. Heino Sibul Heino Sibul (born in 1905) is the only one I have barely found anything on. According to a newspaper article about their father, he married a Russian woman and moved to Russia. But I don’t know when that happened, where they settled down or if they had any children. Karl Sibul Karl Sibul, the oldest brother and the engineer, was born on December 27, 1904, in Tartu. He fled in 1944 as Estonia had become the battlefield of the Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union and the latter was firming its grip on Estonia. He ended up in a refugee camp in northern Germany. With his wife Johanna he emigrated as displaced persons to Detroit in the United States. He passed away in December 1973, and his obituary in the expat Estonians’ newspaper Free Estonian Word mentioned that he and his wife had moved to New Orleans after retirement. Karl had been widowed for a year and was planning to move back to Detroit to be closer to friends and family. Such a pity that the obituary fails to mention the names of his sons. Ilo Sibul While Karl was eager to get out of Soviet Estonia, his brother Ilo Sibul repatriated to Soviet Estonia in 1947. Ilo had graduated from Tartu Univeristy with a degree in medical science in 1932 and a PhD in 1936. He was a born academic, soon lecturing in the universities in Estonia and Thübingen, Germany. Whether it was his (or his wife’s) political views (as was rumoured), or Ilo’s dream of professorship in science, or both, that prompted him to return, we’ll never know. He definitely made his dream career come true in Soviet Estonia and has been celebrated as one of the most important scientists in biochemistry and sport medicine in Estonia. Ilo Sibul Ilo Sibul He even has his Wikipedia page. He passed away in January 1979. Ago Sibul The youngest brother Ago Sibul was born on September 16, 1911, in Tartu. I could find his photo in the Estonian online Archives from when he was studying economics and business administration at the Tartu University. Ago Sibul He married Leida née Anderson in the 1940s and they had three children, one of them, Lembit Sibul, was a known humorist and actor. Ago passed away in October 2002. I have uploaded the boys’ photo to Geni.com and hope to make contact with their descendants.

Sylvia Witt was born on January 7, 1900, as the second youngest of altogether 8 children of Henry Witt (1856-1934) and Anna Lyle née Esterline (1863-1939), in Orangeville, Barry County in Michigan. Witt is a common German surname. Sylvia's grandparents had immigrated from Germany. I thought this photo was perhaps taken on Sylvia’s wedding day – she was dressed in white, holding a huge flower bouquet. Someone had added the date 1916 on the back of the photo (perhaps the date in the photo album this photo was taken out of). But Sylvia married Mervil B. Riley on August 24, 1918. So perhaps this was Sylvia’s sweet-16, or graduation or confirmation photo instead. A year after Sylvia married Mervil, their son Gilbert Eugene Riley (1919-1973) was born. The young parents faced a tragedy 2 years later when their second child Myrna was still-born. Soon after, babies no. 3 and 4, Doris Jean (1922-2005) and Roger Leroy (1924-1968) were born. By 1930, Mervil and Sylvia had moved to Grand Rapids in Kent, Michigan. Mervil had specialised in painting work. 1931 was a year of great joy and huge loss for Sylvia. She had her 5th child, Joyce E. in 1931. But in August 1931, at just 31, Sylvia was widowed. Her husband died of perforated ulcer. In 1940, Sylvia rented a house in Umatilla St. in Grand Rapids with her 4 children. Both of her sons were drafted to the US Army as it entered WWII. Both of her boys were discharged from service in 1945. I’m sure she was thrilled to have her family back together. And there was an addition to Sylvia’s family – she had re-married in 1944 and was now Mrs. Edward Oosterhouse. Edward was a WWI veteran, buffer by trade, divorced and 10 years older than Sylvia. They had 18 beautiful years together, until Sylvia was widowed for the second time in 1962. Sylvia herself passed away in 1980 and was buried at the Hillside Cemetery in Plainwell, Allegan (Michigan).

This beautiful person was Lillian Thayer. According to the previous owner of this lost photo, she was a school teacher, to whom they “went several terms”. The sleeves and the collar suggest the fashion of the late 1880s to early 1890s. She could be in her early 20s, so perhaps she was born in the early 1870s. The photo was printed in Trenton, New Jersey, so this is where I began my search. To my disappointment, I came up with nothing. But as I was looking through the search results, I came across a familiar surname – Stoddard. This would become Lillian Thayer’s married name. I had blogged about a Stoddard before – in connection with Rena Hartt who had married Herbert Stoddard. You can read about Rena on my blog (Link HERE). The photos came from the same seller in America. But I had not made the connection until now that I compared the handwritings on both photos. The photos were originally labelled by the same person! Rena and Lillian in our photos both married the Stoddard brothers from East Montpelier, Vermont! Now that I was convinced I’ve found the right Lillian, her story began to reveal itself layer by layer. Make sure you read until the very last layer ;-). Lillian L. Thayer was born on April 3, 1874, in Middlesex, Worcester in Vermont. From what I could find, she was the only child of farmer Selden W. Thayer (1847-1926) and his wife Huldah Ana née Darling (1847-1927). She was a keen learner at school (one without absent marks), and after graduation she worked as a teacher in Worcester, Shady Rill and Middlesex in Vermont: Link: newspapers.com Link: newspapers.com I haven’t been able to find her connection to Trenton in N.J. If only the 1890 Census lists had survived! They probably could have given us some insight as to where Lillian was and what she was up to when she had this photo taken. On June 10, 1896, Lillian married James Ervin Stoddard. James, born in September 1873, was the older brother of Herbert Stoddard. James was a furniture finisher. He restored old furniture and was well respected for his skills. In the 1900 Census, I find the couple sharing the house at 47 Patter Avenue in Barre, Vermont, with several parties. At first, I couldn’t find the couple anywhere in the 1900 Census, because whoever had transcribed the Census lists for Ancestry, had made a mistake with James’ first name in the records. They had listed him as Frank Ira Stoddard. The 1910 Census still remains a mystery. In 1917, James was drafted to the US Army at 43. By 1920, the couple had moved in with Lillian’s parents Selden and Huldah Thayer in Worcester Branch Road in Montpelier, Vermont. By 1930, after Lillian’s parents had passed away in 1926-27, Lillian and James were residing at 500 Elm Street in Montpelier. This could have been their house: Sadly, James passed away in 1935. His obituary praises his life-long dedication to restoring old furniture: Link: newspapers.com Maybe the house got too big for Lillian and it held too many memories, but in 1941, Lillian decided to move to Burlington. Lillian lived a long life of 95 years and passed away on July 22, 1969, at the Pleasant View Nursing Home in Chittenden, Vermont. I’ve added her photo to FamilySearch. Link: newspapers.com I was just about to close the chapter on Lillian, and was pretty sure I had exhausted my research when I came across this poem, published in The Burlington Free Press on February 11, 1936: Link: newspapers.com It was signed by Lillian Stoddard from Montpelier, Vermont. My heart skipped a beat when I read it. Sweet Lillian was in deep mourning at the time. I believe she dedicated this poem to her late husband James, who had passed away a year earlier. I then wondered if the poem was a one-off or if perhaps she had published any others. To me, this poem reeks of so much emotion and longing, hardly beginner’s luck! Now that I knew what to search, I found dozens of poems by her, published in The Burlington Free Press, between the mid-1930s to the late-1950s. I wonder if Lillian discovered her talent as a way of processing her grief after the loss of her husband. Or perhaps she had always been one excellent with words. Perhaps her love for the English language made her want to become a teacher? After combing through the newspaper clippings with her name for the second time, I discovered that she had been a member of the Montpelier Scribbles Club in the late 1930s and later attended poetry classes in Burlington. She was featured in some of the compilations of local Montpelier poets, she won a few poetry awards and was often invited to recite her poems at local events. Her poems are an homage to her home, the State of Vermont and its beautiful nature. She also wrote about her friends and God, about wishes unfulfilled and the little things that make life worthwhile. She was brilliant and I hope one day a book of poems by Lillian Thayer Stoddard will be published in honour of her memory. These are some of my favourite poems by Lillian. Rest in peace, you gentle soul! (1937) (1937) (1938) (1939) (1939) (1939)

I found these three images in a pile of random lost photos in Estonia. At home I made the connection that they had all belonged to the same family. Why they ended up in an antique store in Tallinn, I don’t know. But I am happy that I could save them together. I’ve praised the Estonian archives many times on this blog. Digital (free!) access allows me to do so much research online. So let’s see what the paper trail has left behind on these three photos. The first one could be a kitsch French postcard from the Edwardian era. But this adoring couple was real – they were Mathilda and Aleksander Vehik. That look of love! Aleksander Vehik (or also Vehhik and Wehik in the records) was born on May 27, 1886 in Pandivere, Estonia, to parents Toomas and Anette Vehik. In 1912, he married Mathilde Louise Lepp, born on October 12, 1890 in Rakvere, Estonia. Her parents were Kustu and Anna Lepp. After a personal tragedy of their daughter stillborn in 1913, the global tragedy began a year later. WWI sent the couple to Imperial Russia where Aleksander was drafted into the Imperial Army. Estonia was part of the Russian Empire at the time. It was only the Estonian Independence War of 1918-1920, following WWI, that finally gave birth to the Republic of Estonia. Ethnic Estonians all over the crumbling Russian Empire were invited to come home and apply for the citizenship of the young Republic. Aleksander and Mathilde decided to make use of that invitation. In 1920, they applied for Estonian citizenship as “optants”. His new identification document also included a photograph of Aleksander: Saaga Upon their return to Porkun county in Estonia, Aleksander continued to practice his profession of locksmith. On April 19, 1922, the couple finally welcomed their second child – Uno Vehik. The photo of Uno below was taken in 1928. But the idyllic family life was cut short when father Aleksander drowned in Narva-Jóesuu on August 1, 1923. Through the grief, the widowed Mathilde focused her remaining strength on raising her son Uno on her own. It took Mathilde 10 years before she took another chance on love and re-married. And her new husband was Gustav Urbas, Aleksander’s long-time friend. Gustav was the person who vouched for the reputability of Aleksander Vehik when he applied for Estonian citizenship in 1920! Back in 1920, he said on record that he had known Aleksander and the Vehik family for more than 20 years, as the two attended school together, and had always considered them honourable people. And this is how we arrive at our third photo – of Gustav Urbas! Gustav Urbas had been born on April 30, 1888, in Virumaa, Estonia. He married Pauline Elisabeth Seiboth in 1914 and their son Aksel was born a year later. Gustav and Pauline divorced in 1924 and Aksel lived with his father. And in 1933 Mathilde and Uno joined the patchwork family. When the Soviet Union occupied Estonia in 1940, they occupants were determined to get rid of anyone who challenged the new regime or had been profiting from the old one. So politicians, academics, veterans, clergy, land owners and businessmen were the first to be deported to Siberia on cattle trains. 1941 is one of the most horrific years in the collective memory of Estonians. In June 1941, a wave of arrests and executions took place, mostly at night, and thousands of families were deported to Siberia or murdered on the spot. Mathilde, Gustav and his son Aksel were arrested too. But luckily, they were not deported. Four years later, as the Soviet authorities arrested Aksel again, and this time they charged him with crimes of “treason” (the Soviet regime’s favourite Criminal Code article…) and sentenced to 5 years of imprisonment. Mathilde was widowed again in 1950 when Gustav passed away. Mathilde herself died 25 years later in 1975. If she ever saw her son Uno again, I don’t know. Uno Vehik had escaped the arrests of 1941 and had managed to get out of the country into an American refugee camp in Germany. He fell in love with a fellow refugee from Ukraine and the couple got married in the camp in 1946. With their countries no longer existing (noone wanted to return to the Soviet occupied Estonia or Ukraine after 1945…), there was no way back. They could apply for a passage to Venezuela, the only country still accepting displaced persons at the time. In the 1960s, Uno moved his family to the United States. Uno died in New York in 2004. I’ve added these photos to Geni.com. I’m currently trying to reach out to Uno’s daughter Milvi Vehik but so far have had no success. Keep your fingers crossed that these photos will go home too!

This photo came to me from German ebay as part of a random lot of photos. I was immediately mesmerized by the beauty and tenderness of the sitter. And then I discovered the poem written on the reverse. With a little help from a Facebook group, I could make out the poem and the name of the author: Elly Kuphal, “a poet from Hamburg”. I had never heard that name or come across any of her poems. A google search didn’t reveal anything on the poem or the poet either. Perhaps she was not known to the public for her craft, but her friends and family knew and appreciated her poems. Elly Marie Josepha Brzóska was born today a 148 years ago, on February 5, 1874, in Hamburg, to parents Josef Brzóska and Mathilde Auguste Louise née Kuphal. Elly’s father was a plumber and a mechanic by profession. Elly had (at least) 6 younger brothers: Franz Joseph (born in 1876), Friedrich Wilhelm (born in 1877), Alexander Gottfried (born in 1878), Heinrich Ludwig (born in 1879), Emil Max August (born and died in 1881) and Siegfried (born in 1883). When Elly was 24 years old, she married postal inspector Max Friedrich Julius Kuphal on November 7, 1896. And perhaps you noticed too that the surname of Elly’s husband and the maiden name of Elly’s mother were identical: Kuphal. Max Friedrich Kuphal had been born on January 4, 1871, to parents Carl Kuphal and Bertha née Gildemeister. Elly and Max Kuphal had four children: 1. Friedrich Carl Alexander Johannes Kuphal, born on August 3, 1897. He married Else Bertha Erika née Hagewald on June 6, 1925 in Hamburg. 2. Elfriede Auguste Bertha Alma Kuphal, born on August 21, 1898. Unfortunately, little Elfriede died at just 2 months old. 3. Elisabeth Bertha Carola Kuphal, born on September 24, 1899. She married a postal worker Johannes Adolf Carl Walter Freund on June 18, 1927, in Hamburg. Her father and father-in-law were both postal inspectors too, so perhaps this is how Elfriede was introduced to her future husband Johannes. I don’t know if the couple had any children. 4. Anna Kuphal, born on September 11, 1907. Anna married engineer Valentin Hartmann on November 28, 1931, in Hamburg. Their son Alexander Peter Albert Hartmann was born April 14, 1932. Elly’s family was hit by one tragedy after another… In 1898 Elly lost her daughter Elfriede of just 2 months old. Elly’s son Friedrich Carl was admitted to a mental institution due to schizophrenia sometime after 1925. He died there in April 1943 as a result of tuberculosis. I cannot even begin to imagine what mother Elly was going through, knowing today what the NS-regime did with the mentally challenged and psychiatrically ill… I don’t know exactly when Elly’s husband Max Kuphal died, but by 1943 she was widowed. In 1940, Elly’s daughter Elisabeth’s husband Johannes Freund passed away in 1940 from kidney tuberculosis. And as if that was not enough sorrow for one family to carry, this family story has an absolute tragic ending… Mother Elly, her widowed daughter Elisabeth Bertha Freund, her other daughter Anna Hartmann and her 11-year-old son Alexander, all died during the air raids on Hamburg in the night of July 28, 1943. The series of RAF anf USAAF air raids on Hamburg is known in history as the “operation Gommorah”, a symbolic name for the firestorms in the last week of July 1943 which destroyed most of Hamburg buildings and killed around 40,000 persons while wounding more than 180,000. It was mostly women and children who suffocated in the shelters under the ruins of their once homes. The bombs dropped from the skies hit directly on the house of Elly’s family in O’Swaldstr. 36. Every single one of them dead in an instant… I truly hope that through all the sorrow and hard times, poetry could be Elly’s comfort and companion. I will leave you here with the lines from her poem (see in English below). May she forever rest in peace. “Verbiet dem Veilchen seine Düfte dem Vögelein daß froh es singe dem Sonnenschein daß wenn es dringe zu uns durch Aether und durch Lüfte Umsonst da läßt sich nichts bezwingen wo göttlich wirkt des Menschen Wille Gebiets du auch dem Sänger Stille in seiner Seel wirds dennoch klingen” —————————————————————- (my attempt to translate the original into English so that you get an idea) “Forbid a violet its fragrance, or a little bird its happy song, forbid sunshine to reach us through ether and air You won’t succeed to suppress it, even with the human will so divine order a singer to be silent, but in his soul it still will ring.”