Wendelin, we hardly knew ya!

OMG, look what Larry found on Ancestry.com regarding grandpa's brother Wendelin:

Whew--we have NO family stories about this.

(Grand Larceny--(Law) (in some states of the US) the theft of property of which the value is above a specified figure, varying from state to state but usually being between $25 and $60).
  
At first glance, you might say, "Wait, UTAH?"  But Wendelin worked for the Santa Fe railroad, which went thru Salt Lake City.  He was listed in directories as a freight handler--on a moving train, perhaps?
I suspect it was an accusation that was recorded, dealt with, and never removed once they found the missing freight envelope behind the file cabinet.  But wow, unassuming ol' Wendelin seems to be chuck fulla SECRETS, huh?

Daniel's newspaper ad, 1853

Johannes Janson's family historian and genealogist (Carrie) took the time to scan almost 30 pages of an application prepared in Horrenberg, Germany, in 1853, when Johannes' parents wanted to emigrate to America.  They were Daniel Janson and his wife Maria Anna (Helfinger) Janson and six children.

Here's the newspaper page from 1853 Horrenberg, with lots of ads concerning 'auswanderen', the people who wanted to leave Europe.  Click the page and look for this little ship--Daniel's ad is to the right of it, in the 4th column.

     

OK, here's my attempt to transcribe the ad to Google Translate.  This is what I came up with, but you should be a little skeptical:

A.468 Nr. 4794.  Wiesloch.  (Schulden liquidation.)  Daniel Janson Eheleute von Horrenberg vollen nach Amerika auswandern. Zur Anmeldung etwaiger Forderungen wird Tagfahrt auf Freitag, den 11. d. M., Morgens, 10 11 hr auf diesseitiger Amtskanzlei anberaumt.  

Weisloch den 1 Marz 1853

Grossb. bad. Bezirksamt 

Frohlich

A 468. Number 4794.  Weisloch.  (Debt liquidation.)  Daniel Janson of Horrenberg with his wife and family to emigrate to America.  For any claims of debt he owes, please show up on Friday the 11th between 10 and 11 in the morning.  

Weisloch, 1 March 1853

By the authority of

District officer Froelich

A huge THANK YOU to Carrie for sharing her research and these pages.  

See, there ARE Janson Angels!

Daniel Janson Papers, part 5

Johannes Janson's family historian and genealogist (Carrie) took the time to scan almost 30 pages of an application prepared in Horrenberg, Germany, in 1853, when Johannes' parents wanted to emigrate to America.  They were Daniel Janson and his wife Maria Anna (Helfinger) Janson and six children.


According to Google Translate, "Vollmacht" means "authority"; "Sachen" means "property"...but  Vollmacht in Sachen translates to "Full power in terms of", or, I suppose, "This is the official authoritative page"...

This is the end of the handwritten document that Carrie found in the archives in Horrenberg, Germany.  

Additional pages were from the local 1853 newspaper with notices about local people who wanted to emigrate.  That'll be another post ☺.

Odds and Ends

This little screen cap is from the LA city directory in 1916.  I saved it because Wendelin Janson (grandpa's brother) was listed as "Wm", but we know it was him--"Freight handler, residence: 852 Stephenson Ave."
Interesting too that there were 6 other Jansons in town then.  




Janson, Elizabeth, dressmaker residence: 537 So Fremont Ave
Janson, Gustaf,  harnessmaker with John Janson, residence: Long Beach
Janson, Gustav, vice president & manager of California Show Case Company; home: 863 Wall
Janson, Henry, ironworker, residence: 1626 Maltman Ave
Janson, Henry, laborer, home 1429 Elk Ave
Janson, John, harnessmaker, Exposition Park, residence Long Beach

 Oh, look--a "Gustav Janson", also from Baden:

(I just like this quote, for what it's worth)

Ann Druyan, talking about her husband Carl Sagan:  

“When my husband died, because he was so famous and known for not being a believer, many people would come up to me-it still sometimes happens-and ask me if Carl changed at the end and converted to a belief in an afterlife. They also frequently ask me if I think I will see him again. Carl faced his death with unflagging courage and never sought refuge in illusions. The tragedy was that we knew we would never see each other again. I don’t ever expect to be reunited with Carl. But, the great thing is that when we were together, for nearly twenty years, we lived with a vivid appreciation of how brief and precious life is. We never trivialized the meaning of death by pretending it was anything other than a final parting. Every single moment that we were alive and we were together was miraculous-not miraculous in the sense of inexplicable or supernatural. We knew we were beneficiaries of chance… . That pure chance could be so generous and so kind… . That we could find each other, as Carl wrote so beautifully in Cosmos, you know, in the vastness of space and the immensity of time… . That we could be together for twenty years. That is something which sustains me and it’s much more meaningful… . The way he treated me and the way I treated him, the way we took care of each other and our family, while he lived. That is so much more important than the idea I will see him someday. I don’t think I’ll ever see Carl again. But I saw him. We saw each other. We found each other in the cosmos, and that was wonderful.”

Our Bev & Glenn on an Alaskan cruise ☺

Here's who great grandmother Franziska Fuchs came from:

 And here's who Wendelin  Janson was named after--Fran's brother Wendelin Fuchs:

                                                                           

Joseph and Franziska

Daniel Janson Papers, part 4

Johannes Janson's family historian and genealogist (Carrie) took the time to scan almost 30 pages of an application prepared in Horrenberg, Germany, in 1853, when Johannes' parents wanted to emigrate to America.  They were Daniel Janson and his wife Maria Anna (Helfinger) Janson and six children.

 I'm particularly curious about page 19 from this batch--with its official stamp marks, over-writing and (angry-looking) circled sections.  Like some official was pissed off and lost his temper, ya know?


I wonder, too, if Daniel and family ever got to see the finished, rejected application?  With all the different handwriting involved, were some of these pages slanderous?






WHAT would make the town say "NO, you have to stay"?

Monkey Ward Tombstones 1929

Honest--you could order a 'monument' from Montgomery Wards, the Chicago catalog house. The link is a twenty-eight page booklet showing Vermont Marble monuments shipped from Barre, Vermont.  There's a page of directions so you can save money by setting it yourself, too.  

I'm often surprised to find out where normal things came from years ago.  I'm sure there were other sources for monuments (especially here in the Cold Spring Granite homeland), and I'm still curious about where the ubiquitous white engraved slabs (left) came from.  They're the oldest stones in most cemeteries, at least around here.  
(These two are Sand family monuments from the cemetery here in St Joe--one from 1900 and the other from 1909.  They've lasted pretty well, I think).

Daniel Janson papers, part 3

 

Johannes Janson's family historian and genealogist Carrie took the time to scan almost 30 pages of an application prepared in Horrenberg, Germany, in 1853, when Johannes' parents wanted to emigrate to America.  They were Daniel Janson and his wife Maria Anna (Helfinger) Janson and six children.




I know--but just skip these posts if you're not interested in puzzling the script out.  We're just thinking someone ELSE might care, and I want them all here before I start to study them.

Das Gasthaus zum wilden Mann

Ha--evidently, our Janson ancestors weren't always farmers.  (For what it's worth, Mom said the "original" Janson was a tailor). More concretely, we know  Jansons owned a pub called the Wild Man, which is still there in Horrenberg.  
Carrie found info about it from Manfred Fuchs:

The Janson family owned the inn "for the Wild Man," in Horrenberg which still exists today. The municipality of Horrenberg, in 1843, decided to build a town hall in front of the gasthaus. It was a fight between Janson and the community. After lengthy court proceedings, the municipality finally allowed construction of theTown Hall (1845);  Janson the owner was safe but in the processes was almost ruined, so little by little emigrated (after 1852) almost the whole family. Today there are no longer in Horrenberg Jansons. (Google translated and I re-arranged words).

She sent the website address of the Wilden Mann, and provided this additional info:

"From the website's history page it looks as though our ancestor Johann Ludwig Hamberger took ownership in 1688 and then it must have passed through to the Jansons. In 1850, the Knopf family bought it. So that's kind of making sense if they were used to running the inn & suddenly didn't have that anymore, didn't have much money that just 3 years later, Daniel would try to emigrate. I don't know who exactly of the Jansons fought the city or if it was a group but based on occupations, I have it being run by:
After Johann Ludwig Hamberger it went to his son:
Andreas Johann Caspar Hamberger, Wirt zum Wilden Mann 1710-1741 to his son-in-law:
Johann Adam Janson, Wirt zum Wilden Mann 1748-1749
Georg Adam Janson, Wirt zum Wilden Mann 1772-1791
Georg Valentin Janson Wirt zum Wilden Mann 1805-1825
I don't know who had it in those missing gaps, other brothers, cousins? And who had it after 1825. I wish there was more on the website. These men were also mayors, customs officials, farmers, etc".

To the left is a photo of "The old town hall" from the Wild Man website...and below is a random photo taken in Horrenberg by a visitor.  A little zooming reveals the words on the sign: "Wilden Mann".  Yeah, it looks like our ancestors had a legitimate beef, huh?  But, I can imagine, too, a festering long-term Janson vendetta against that "unfairness".  Sigh.

MORE thanks to Carrie ☺!

Daniel Janson papers part 2

Johannes Janson's family historian and genealogist (Carrie) took the time to scan almost 30 pages of an application prepared in Horrenberg, Germany, in 1853, when Johannes' parents wanted to emigrate to America.  They were Daniel Janson and his wife Maria Anna (Helfinger) Janson and six children.
 A fascinating part of the era when Daniel and Maria Anna Janson were denied permission to leave Horrenberg was that other Jansons did leave that year.
Carrie mentioned information she has from someone named Robert Heimann.   She said "in 1999, he gave me a list of Jansons who emigrated in the 1800s from Horrenberg. Egidius Janson to NJ bef 1873, Joseph b. 1844 to US 1883 (yours), Katharina b. 1831 to US 1852, Valentin to Columbia/USA 1853, Sophie, Theresia, Valentin & Veronika to US 1853".  (NOT a complete list, we know).
But according to him, six Janson individuals left, probably with spouses, that year.  We don't know what generation four of them represented, but one of the Valentins could have been Dan's older brother, born in 1805.  
This calls for more investigatin' ☺, I think!

BTW, it's fun to see how MANY times  you can find "Daniel Janson" in these pages.  (I know, it depends on your idea of "fun"...lol)

Coulda been!

 There's a really cool website called Critical Past where you can "search over 57,000 videos and 7 million images".  It's definitely a fascinating site.


Larry found this short film  there, from 1918.  The occasion was a Ford tractor demo day in a 'farming area of the United States'.  (Can you imagine the amazement that day?  Not only new powerful machines to do the work on the farm, but a moving picture camera was recording it all.  No wonder grandpa Janson had such high hopes for the 20th century!)
The set up is a tug-o-war between a tractor and about 20 men (who lose, of course).  But this gentleman evidently used the megaphone to direct the action.  It struck Larry that he looked like grandpa Anton Janson--small stature, curly hair, glasses, shirt and tie...
Yeah, I CAN hear your skepticism from here.  Ahem. You need to work on hiding it better...☺
BUT, we know some filming was done on farms around  Pierz in those years because we found an archival listing online mentioning Pierz and a farmer named Gau ("A SON OF THE SOIL- TAKEN ON HENRY GAU'S HORSELESS FARM NEAR PIERZ, MINNESOTA, ca. 1920"--National Archives, online).

Anyway, even if you think we're nuts, it's fun to view a few of those old films at Critical Past.  They're listed by decade, and there are quite a few from WWII.  The opening page montage gives you a pretty good idea.


You're welcome.

The Daniel Janson papers from 1853

Johannes Janson's family historian and genealogist Carrie took the time to scan almost 30 pages of an application prepared in Horrenberg, Germany, in 1853, when Johannes' parents wanted to emigrate to America.  They were Daniel Janson and his wife Maria Anna (Helfinger) Janson and six children.
Carrie was able to decipher some of it, and Larry and I have barely begun.  It's almost all handwritten by different people, so some looks legible and other parts look pretty scribbly.  Still, I want to post it so it's available as an historic document, and so maybe someone will be able to read it and see what they were required to document...and perhaps find the reason they were denied.

I think I'll post it five pages at a time cuz thats how Carrie sent it, and cuz it's less overwhelming that way ☺. All the pages should enlarge when you click on them.
From what I copied to Google Translate, the cover sheet says, more or less:

Großherzogl. Badisches
Bezirksamt Wiesloch
Verwaltungssachen
Ort: Horrenberg
Rubrik: Wegzug
Trans:
Grand Ducal. Baden  
District Office Wiesloch
Administrative Cases
Location: Horrenberg
Category: Exit
and then officialese for "Daniel Janson wants to leave with his family ASAP".....



Page 2 pretty much identifies who they're talking about.  Daniel was married twice, so the two children from his deceased wife are listed as tho they're contraband, before the second family. Still, that fussiness gives us all kinds of detail.
Kids from wife I, Regina Schweigert:
1) Magdalena 9 years old
2) Johannes   7    "      " 
Kids from wife II, Maria Anna Hilfinger:
3) Joseph      4 years old
4) Daniel       3   "      "
5) Valentin     2  "      "
6) Christina    1/4 "    "


Towards the bottom of the page theres something about 200.  A fee they had to pay?


 I assume some of this was affidavits from friends or religious docs from the priest, or tentative permission from local officials like the mayor.  
Or it could be documents that say they've paid all the debts they owed in town.


(Click the pages to enlarge)...


I think 4 and 5 is a statement by Daniel and Maria Anna themselves.  Their signatures are mid-page on 5, see?









The script they were taught to write was called Suetterlin. Here's a clear letter-for-letter transcription of their names.  (It's an interesting exercise to ID one letter and go find that same letter in the rest of the pages.  Handwriting really does make a difference!)


 Isn't this COOL?