LOTS More about Otto Janson

WOW--we still don't know if Otto was related to us, but Larry found information and pictures online, some of which Bev pointed out.  (Scroll two posts down ☺ )
We found that Otto's parents were Carl (Charles) Janson and Anna Amling, and he had a sister named Elsa.  Here they are, in San Francisco c 1892.  Isn't that a cool house?

"From left to right: Anna Janson, Frida Janson, Elisabeth Amling, Ernestine Amling, Elsa Janson & Otto Janson. Taken in Berlin, Germany in 1897 when Anna & the kids went back to bring her sisters over to the USA".  


Otto was seven...can you imagine that trip?  Traveling from California by train, then a long ocean voyage from NY to Hamburg, then train again to Berlin.  As a little boy, it must have been fascinating, but terribly long for Anna.  Still, you know she didn't travel without a nanny or two to help with the kids and luggage.  I love the elegance of this pic, right down to the hoop Otto's holding.

We assume this photo was taken sometime after his run-in with the judicial system, possibly when he was 29, and about to get married.  This is based on the next time we found him, in the 1930 federal census from Berkley, Ca.  He's listed with his wife Evelyn (nee Connolly) and six year old son Richard.  That census asked for "age at first marriage", which for him was 29.  Otto was listed there as a "Manufacturer" with the product being "Steel".
Evidently, he didn't serve the whole five years in prison, but I bet he was pretty introspective about speaking out ever after.  What a shame for America.

These pictures come from a family album online depicting the Coates-Janson-Bertelsen relationship.  It's interesting to click thru to get an idea of how those families connected. 
This photo is Howie Coates, with his cousin Richie Janson and Uncle Otto Janson.  


Otto and Evelyn had another son they named Thomas, but there are no pics of him in the online album, as far as I can see.

Now, WHY, you ask, are we all that interested in this family, since we have no documentation that they were connected to us?  Well, we're pretty sure the name JANSON, in that form and spelling, was Danish, not German.  Yeah, our immigrant Jansons hailed from Deilheim and Horrenberg in southern Germany, while Carl's family came here from farther south still, along the Swiss boarder, but they were only "German" for a few generations, we think. 


So, perhaps Otto's sons Richie or Thom could be the father of that west coast Glenn we mentioned here...that is, if he isn't Dan Janson's grandson.


Hey, that makes sense to me, even if it just confuses you. This is one of the places you need to TRUST us, ok?  LOL!

Added a few days later:  There's an interesting wide-ranging blog I follow called the History Blog, and the topic on June 12th was the invention of the Zeppelin in Friedrichschafen, in southern Germany.  That's the city Carl Janson was from!  (I've read about the Zeppelin before but never knew there was any connection for us--even a tentative one.  Cool, huh?)

BTW, the History Blog is well worth bookmarking.