sepia saturday – Page 5

Sepia Saturday 330

By Sheetar 14 May 2016 13 May 2016

The prompt image for this week’s Sepia Saturday featured a man doing type-setter work and came from the collection of the Netherlands National Archives. I don’t have any type-setters in the family, but I do have young men at work, and the photo was taken in the Netherlands! The man standing on the far right, hands behind his back and a grin on his face that makes you wonder what he was up to, is Doede Jaarsma, my husband’s grandfather. Doede went to a technical high school in Friesland, Netherlands and later apprenticed and became a blacksmith which would explain the dirty coveralls and wooden shoes. They certainly look like they just finished working and are showing off some new creation, but what exactly that creation is, I have no idea! It almost looks like a motorized washing machine with the sort of wringer device on the top. There’s a handwritten note on the back that reads, “Douglas at work, Uithuizen, ’43??” which would probably have been written on after they came to the USA since it shows his Americanized name. In 1943, he would’ve been recently married and living near his wife’s family in Uithuizen, so that makes sense. It’s a fantastic photo though, and I just LOVE that grin on Doede’s face – he looks like he’s positively up to no good.

In other news, I have a small update on an older post, Sepia Saturday 325. Apparently the barge from that post is still in operation! The couple who currently own it got in touch with me as a result of that blog post and updated me on what she looks like now and how she’s running. It’s absolutely fantastic that Sepia Saturday has encouraged me and enabled me to post these photos in a blog format where they get a little better exposure than they otherwise would sitting on my hard drive, and that it’s given me an opportunity to connect the past to the present.

Sepia Saturday

Sepia Saturday 329

By Sheetar 7 May 2016 6 May 2016

For this week’s Sepia Saturday, our prompt image featured an old, bearded man holding a sheep with a dog in the background. Well, no shepherds in the family, so I went with the dog. While the dogs here aren’t sheep dogs exactly, the coloring on the one on the left sort of resembles the dog in the prompt photo, so it works for me! This was actually a long-term project – I had gone through the list of upcoming prompts and started sorting out photos for them a few months ago. When I selected this photo, I knew I wanted to spend some time figuring out who these girls were. There was a name on the back of the photo, “Gezina Zomer.” Zomer isn’t a surname that appears in my husband’s family tree at all, so I assumed this was a friend of Hilje (Dijkema) Jaarsma’s, my husband’s grandmother. Gezina, in the photo above, is on the right with her arm draped over a large black dog. This girl also shows up in other photos labelled, “Fam Zomer, Lunteren,” along with Hilje, so I had some frame of reference for time and place since Lunteren is a town in Holland. Zomer also happens to be the Dutch word for summer, so I had first incorrectly assumed that it was just a family photo in summer in Lunteren, but it was actually the Zomer family. I did a little bit of googling for Gezina Zomer since someone HAD to have her in a family tree somewhere, but it turned out the name was common enough that it was getting hard to narrow down exactly who she was. I figured Gezina was born probably around 1930 and the photo above was probably taken late 1940s. I found one person with a website all about the Zomer family, so I sent off an email with this photo and the few details I knew. Many genealogical emails go unanswered, but much to my surprise, I had a response within a day!

After a few emails back and forth we had settled on Gesina Lubert(h)a Zomer, born 10 September 1925 in Franeker and died 8 August 1990 in Ede, and it looks like she didn’t have any children. There’s an extensive family tree (link to Gesina’s entry here) online maintained by my new contact. He had a photo of Gesina as an adult and it definitely matched the girl in my photos! I even shared back a letter I had found with her name printed on the paper, and he was able to translate it from Dutch and share it with me. Pretty incredible! One mystery still remains – how they knew each other. There doesn’t seem to be any biological family overlap between our trees, so my best guess is that when Hilje went to the Tuberculosis Sanatorium at Sonnevanck, she somehow met the family – whether they were visiting a relative at the Sanatorium or doing some kind of volunteer work with their church (the Sanatoria of Holland were broken up by religion, so you went to the Sanatorium that your religion sponsored). Hilje was almost a two hour drive from home, but Lunteren is only a 30 minute drive away from the Sanatorium so that would make the most sense, I think. The letter didn’t go into detail about how they met, unfortunately, even if it was a really lovely letter from one friend to another, sent to the USA after Hilje had left the Netherlands.

As for the other girl in my photo above, we have no idea on that either, probably a friend of Gesina’s as she had no siblings. It means Gesina was the last of her line, and as fate would have it that’s one of the things I actually enjoy giving a voice to – the end-of-the-line people who otherwise might not be noticed just because they didn’t carry on the biological line. So, there we have it, a photo of Gesina Zomer and her friend with their dogs for this Sepia Saturday!

Sepia Saturday

Sepia Saturday 328

By Sheetar 30 April 2016 29 April 2016

The prompt image for this week’s Sepia Saturday was a little difficult for me – I really have nothing quite like it, so I’m reducing it to the super basic idea of two women in a photograph. Well, I have lots of those! This photo has a label on the back and identifies someone I haven’t been able to sort out yet. The back has a date, August 5, 1936, and then underneath in the shaky handwriting indicative of my great grandma’s older years, it says, “Mother & Aunt Poll Creber from Canada.” Mother would be Jessie (Battin) Powis, but I’m not sure about Poll Creber! I know Jessie’s sister, Mary Jane Battin, married John Samuel Creber in England and then went to Canada, but none of her kids are named Poll or Polly, and none of John’s siblings are named Poll or Polly or married a woman by that name. There’s another photo of the same two people in a larger group apparently taken at the same time, and if I were a betting woman, I say that the “Poll” here is probably Mary Jane and Olga, as an older woman, couldn’t quite remember the details. I checked the border crossing database on ancestry.com and didn’t see the family there. If they visited and arrived by car, they wouldn’t have been recorded at the border crossing in the 1930s unfortunately – it was just arrivals by sea or train. But, based on the other photo, I think I can be pretty sure this is Mary Jane, and perhaps she went by the nickname Poll or Polly, but I hadn’t seen reference to that nickname until now. So, I think I might have sorted out this little mystery today!

Sepia Saturday

Sepia Saturday 327

By Sheetar 23 April 2016 22 April 2016

This week’s Sepia Saturday featured a prompt image of a young Queen Elizabeth II and her sister. I didn’t quite have anything like it, but I do have a photo of a pair of sisters! This is another photo from the great Red Velvet Victorian Photo Album I’ve posted about before. I’m pretty sure the two girls are Kathleen Mary Rowe and Olga Maria Rowe. It’s actually kind of funny – I had run a bunch of photos through Picasa in an attempt to do some facial recognition and see what turned up. This one matched to Kate Battin, but it was much too young of a photo to be her. Kate married a man named George Thomas Rowe and had two daughters, so I figured this must be them! The photo does match up with photos of the girls when they were older too. Also, Kate was the only sister who stayed in England, so all of those circumstances combine to make me pretty sure these are my girls!

The photo itself is pretty neat from the maroon colored board the photo is mounted on to the gold lettering naming the studio, H. Hayman & Son of Launceston. The girls’ mother grew up in Lawhitton which is pretty close. As far as a date goes, Kathleen was born in 1905 and Olga in 1903, so if they’re about 10 years old, the photo was probably taken in 1915 give or take a year or two. The girls are wearing identical dresses and even have similar short haircuts, something I find a little odd for 1915. Still, it’s a great photo of the two of them, and one I’m glad my great great grandmother, Jessie (Battin) Powis saved!

Sepia Saturday

Sepia Saturday 326

By Sheetar 16 April 2016 12 April 2016

A pretty easy prompt photo for this week’s Sepia Saturday! The prompt photo featured a series of portraits of a baby, and boy do I have baby photos since my great-great grandmother, Jessie Battin, was apparently obsessed with baby photos! There are a few that are identified, but many appear to be of friends – some may be family, but they’re unlabelled and baby photos can be so hard to match up to adult photos. In the above set are two labelled photos. On the left is Earl William Powis, born 15 October 1896 in Pennsylvania. On the right is Olga Mary Louise Powis, born 27 August 1900 in Pennsylvania. Even though they’re only 4 years apart, the photos were taken by different photographers and even used different gowns! The face on poor Earl just gets me though – what a grumpy little face he has on.

While I have lots of these old baby photos, I thought I’d finish off the post with these two. On the left is Harry Oscar Frederick “Fritz” Powis, born 1 May 1903 in Pennsylvania. On the right is an unidentified photo of two babies who I assume would be twins! It was probbaly taken around the same time as the others (late 1890-1910 or so) and was done at a studio in Pittsburgh, “J. H. Truxell.” All the photos here are from different photographers around central Pennsylvania – three from Coalport and one from Pittsburgh. So, to wrap it up, just a few old (over 100 years old!) baby photos to fit with the theme this week.

Sepia Saturday

Sepia Saturday 325

By Sheetar 9 April 2016 9 April 2016

Another theme for Sepia Saturday that feels like it was made for me! While my boats carry the flag of Holland and aren’t being rowed under a bridge, this was just TOO good of an opportunity to pass up. In the photo above, we see an “aakschip” or quite literally, a “barge boat” in a canal in Holland, with the photo likely taken in the mid 1930s. Hilje Dijkema, my husband’s grandmother, is the person in the checkered print dress on the left, the person at center is likely her sister Ellechien and the man in the dark clothes to the right is probably Hendrik. The barge’s name is the “Vertrouwen” or “Trust” and was built in 1926 for Hendrik Dijkema, my husband’s great-grandfather. Hendrik is one in a long line of “turfschippers” or “peat boatman” but the translation doesn’t accurately explain what that is – the Dutch is just SO much more efficient here! Basically, Hendrik ran boats up and down the canal that carried peat logs used for heating fuel. The boat was primarily based out of Uithuizen, but likely went all over Groningen on deliveries. The family was based out of Uithuizen and I know from paper records that they had various homes there over time. Before the Vertrouwen, Hendrik had another ship, the tjalkschip Ebenhaezer. There is a short series of photos taken around the same time, so I’m going to go ahead and post them all!

Likely taken on the same day as the photo at top, here we can see the barge’s name, “Vertrouwen,” painted on the back. On the boat we have, left to right, Hendrik Dijkema, Elizabeth van Eerden, Hilje Dijkema, and Ellechien Dijkema. Again, probably about mid 1930, maybe a little before 1935 – Hilje was born in 1914, so if I guess she’s in her late teens, it puts the window between 1931-1934 if we guess she’s between 17 and 20. They’re all standing or sitting on the area of the boat that would’ve been the living quarters. Further to the left of the photo is the cargo area where the peat logs would’ve been stored with covers to keep them out of the elements. Based on the leaves on the trees, this looks like it was probably taken in the summer.

One last one! again, same time period, and from left to right we have Hendrik Dijkema, Elizabeth van Eerden, Jantje Oosting, and Hilje Dijkema. Jantje Oosting married Hilje’s brother Albert Dijkema in 1934, which further helps solidify the timeline. Together, the three photos give us a little glimpse into their life aboard these barges. During the winter, the canals mostly close down due to ice, so while they spent their winters in Uithuizen, the rest of the time was spent on these barges going all over the northeast of Holland. They’re really precious photos and I’m so glad they survived and are here to tell their story.

Sepia Saturday

Sepia Saturday 324

By Sheetar 2 April 2016 13 April 2016

This was just too good of a match to pass up for Sepia Saturday! The prompt image is from the Cornish Fishing Village of Clovelly, and I’ve long assumed that my image above is from a town in Cornwall as well though I don’t know the exact town. My great-great-grandmother, Jessie Battin, brought this over from England and put it in a big red velvet photo album along with other treasured cabinet card photos. The photos in the album range from the 1880s to 1910 or thereabouts, and only a few are labelled on the back. This photo, unfortunately, falls in the unlabeled set, but it’s a favorite of mine. I’d probably put the date right around 1900 based on the women’s dresses. Jessie left England around 1890, so this may have been taken after she left and sent to her in the USA to remind her of home. Unfortunately, there aren’t enough identifying landmarks to tell exactly where it was taken though and that may remain a mystery forever since I’m sure the landscape has changed quite a bit in the last 100 years. There isn’t even a photographer’s mark on the back – it’s just a photo mounted to an unremarkable plain piece of cardboard. If I were a betting woman, I’d wager this was sent from her hometown of Lawhitton, but it could be from any one of her friends or family that lived elsewhere.

There’s a lot to love about the photo – the dog sitting near the doorway on the left. The two girls standing just about in the center of the photo. The horse-drawn cart going down the street. The curious bystanders peering around each other to watch the photographer. The disembodied hand sticking out of the doorway on the left. The mystery of this photo may never be solved, but that doesn’t stop me from enjoying this photo without knowing all the details!

Sepia Saturday

Sepia Saturday 323

By Sheetar 26 March 2016 23 March 2016

For this week’s Sepia Saturday, our prompt image features a group of boys playing marbles. Well, no photos of marble playing in my collection, but I do have this really interesting photograph from my husband’s family. The back is a photo postcard back, and someone pencilled in, “D Jaarsma Tech High School,” in pen later on. That “D Jaarsma” would be my husband’s grandfather, Doede “Douglas” Jaarsma who apparently went to a technical high school as a kid. Best we can guess is that he’s the boy in the back row on the right side with a hammer slung over his shoulder.

It doesn’t quite look like a high school by our standards – the boys seem to range from maybe age 8 to 12 or so. Doede was born in 1911, so the photo date is probably about 1920 if we guess he’s just about 10, and the location is likely in Friesland, Netherlands. So, what school is this? I can’t say exactly, but we do have a report book from about 8 years later that indicates he attended a technical school (Vakteekenschool) in St. Nicolaasga. It’s possible this is his first year at that school which is why the photo was saved. I’ve put in scans of the report card below, and even found the school listed numerous times in the Delpher Newspaper Archive (link) advertising for teachers. There are a few other documents to support his work history that he brought with him from the Netherlands to the USA including certification of apprenticeship, a letter from a metalworkers’ union, and a trade certificate. I know that in later life, he shoed horses and did blacksmith type work in northern New Jersey, USA, so this all fits together very neatly with who he was after he came to the USA. It’s so great to have all these pieces of the puzzle to make a bigger picture of his employment and work history really come to life. The boys in my photo may not be playing with marbles, but they were learning skills and a trade.