Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biography: William Joseph Dunphy

Posted on November 28, 2019 by earltaylor

Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biography: William Joseph Dunphy

At the Dorchester Historical Society, we are in the process of a year-long project to commemorate the 100th anniversary of World War I. Using a collection of photographs we have of WWI Dorchester residents, we will be featuring servicemen in a number of short biographies throughout the year. At the culmination of the project, we hope to produce an online exhibit that highlights these men and their service to our country.

Our next biography features: William Joseph Dunphy.

William Joseph Dunphy was born March 28, 1895.  His father was John J. Dunphy and his mother was Anna Whalen Dunphy.  William’s mother passed away from tuberculosis when he was 10 years old.

Although William and his family are not well documented in traditional sources, he is one of the heroes of World War I and was honored as such with the dedication of a Hero Square in June, 1921, at the junction of Hamilton and Bowdoin Streets. He shares the honor of this square with another Dorchester hero named Albert Gilbert. “William J. Dunphy and Albert Gilbert were pals in civilian life. They enlisted together in the old 9th Infantry. and were both killed in France–Dunphy on May 31 and Gilbert July 12 [actually 23], in the Chateau Thierry fight.   They were both great athletes, and were the battery of the Holy Name team of St Peters.” (Boston Globe, January 13, 1921.)  Dunphy enlisted and reported for duty on May 26, 1917 in Co. F, 9th Inf. Mass. National Guard (Co. F, 101st Inf., 26th Div).  He transferred on August 21st to Co. K, 101st Inf. and went overseas on September 7, 1917. On May 31, 1918, German forces reached the Marne river and captured Dormans and Chateau-Thierry.  Allied forces retook Chateau-Thierry on July 21, 1918.

On June 25, 1918, the Boston Globe reported: Private William J. Dunphy of 56 Hamilton Street, Dorchester, one of the most popular young men of the Meeting House Hill section, is reported missing in action May 31, in France. A telegram to that effect was received by his mother this morning.  Dunphy who is 23 years old, is the son of Mr. and Mrs. John D. Dunphy.  He enlisted in May, 1917, in the old 9th Regiment, and went to France from Framingham.

The Gold Star Record states that Dunphy was in a raid on Richecourt, Toul, sector.  He was never seen again after entering the lines, and no account of him was ever received.

William applied for an insurance policy with the Massachusetts Catholic Order of Foresters on July 19, 1915.  At that time he was living at 203 Hamilton Street, and he listed his step-mother as his beneficiary.  His medical report states that he was 5 ft 8 inches tall and weighed 140 pounds.  He had a burn on his left arm incurred when he was 5 years old.  The certificate from the War Department included in the Forester records states he died May 31, 1918, and that he was living at 56 Hamilton Street.His father and step-mother died in the flu epidemic before the insurance policy was paid out, so the payment went to his sister Anna, who was then living on Mallet Street.

William J. Dunphy is listed on the Tablets of the Mission, St. Mihiel American Cemetery, Thiaucourt, France.

Sources:

For information about the dedication of the Hero Square, see Boston Globe June 2, 1921

For information about Dormans and Chateau-Thierry, see http://www.greatwar.co.uk/timeline/ww1-events-1918.htm

American Battle Monuments Commission https://abmc.gov/node/351749

Foresters Records. Healey Library, UMass Boston

The Gold Star Record of Massachusetts. Edited by Eben Putnam.  (Boston, 1929), 489.

New England Veterans in the Home Sector.” Boston Globe, January 13, 1921

“Private William J. Dunphy of Dorchester is Missing.” Boston Globe, June 24, 1918

 

 

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Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biography: Carl Henry Alsen

Posted on November 28, 2019 by earltaylor

Alsen Village

Alsen Village, named for Carl Henry Alsen

Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biography: Carl Henry Alsen

At the Dorchester Historical Society, we are in the process of a year-long project to commemorate the 100th anniversary of World War I. Using a collection of photographs we have of WWI Dorchester residents, we will be featuring servicemen in a number of short biographies throughout the year. At the culmination of the project, we hope to produce an online exhibit that highlights these men and their service to our country.

Our next biography features: Carl Henry Alsen.

Carl H. Alsen was born in August, 1899, the youngest of four children to parents who had immigrated from Sweden. The 1900 US Census listed them in Lynn, and the 1910 US Census listed them in Somerville, and sometime in the next few years, they moved to Dorchester. As early as 1916, the family was living at 11-15 Spaulding Street, Dorchester, while Carl was living at home. They were probably renting an apartment in the house.

Carl enlisted in the National Guard on April 3, 1917.  He may not have been truthful when reporting his age: his service record states he was 18  years and 9 months of age, but he was really 17 years and 8 months old.  He reported for Federal service on July 25th of that year and by September he was in the American Expeditionary Force.  He was killed in action on April 12, 1918.  His record includes the following: “Awarded French C de G with gilt star ‘During the course of the combats of April 12, 1918, he displayed coolness, courage and zeal.  He was a member of a Stokes mortar platoon which contributed greatly by its fire to break the assault of one of the attacking lines, responding promptly to the demand from the front for a barrage and continuing its fire under the most violent bombardment of more than ten minutes until a counter artillery barrage could be launched.”  The following is from Wikipedia: “On 10, 12 and 13 April 1918, the lines being held by the troops of the 104th Infantry Regiment, of the 52d Infantry Brigade, of the 26th “Yankee” Division, in Bois Brule, near Apremont in the Ardennes, were heavily bombarded and attacked by the Germans. At first the Germans secured a foothold in some advanced trenches which were not strongly held but, thereafter, sturdy counterattacks by the 104th Infantry—at the point of the bayonet and in hand-to-hand combat—succeeded in driving the enemy out with serious losses, entirely re-establishing the American line.”

Alsen was honored when a newly-created park was named for him;  the city of Boston created an 11-acre playground that stretched from Victory Road northward to Park Street, it comprised of the man-made land where the part of Tenean Creek north of Victory Road was filled in.  On Victory Road, the armory now stands on part of the former playground.  After the second World War, this area was filled with  former barracks that were moved here for 763 temporary housing units for veterans and became known as Alsen Village.  The Alsen-Mapes Industrial Park off of Park Street is the remainder of this playground. [The playground to the south of Victory Road is the Philip McMorrow Playground.  A Dorchester native and graduate of Boston Latin School, Philip McMorrow was elected to the legislature in 1936 and served there 10 years. At the time of his death in 1948 he was chief assessor of the city of Boston.]

In 2017, at the playground on Victory Road, a square was named for Alsen . The citation on the City of Boston Veterans Services website listing Hero Squares says: ” By direction of the President, under the provisions of the act of Congress approved July 9, 1918, Private Carl H. Alsen, United States Army, is cited by the Commanding General, American Expeditionary Forces, for gallantry in action and a silver star may be placed upon the ribbon of the Victory Medals awarded him. Private Alsen distinguished himself by gallantry in action while serving with Headquarters Company, 104th Infantry Regiment, American Expeditionary Forces, in action near Seicheprey, France, 12 April 1918, during an enemy attack.”  His service record card says that he was in the Apremont Sector.

He is buried in the St. Mihiel American Cemetery, Thiaucourt, France, Plot C, Row 12, Grave 2.

Sources:

1900 U.S. Census on FamilySearch.org

1910 US Census on Ancestry.com

American Battle Monuments Commission https://abmc.gov/node/321976

“American Soldiers Who Died in France” in  The Official U.S. Bulletin, Thursday, November 21, 1918 (Washington, 1918), 22.

Boston. Municipal Register for 1948. (Boston, 1948), 61.

Boston Directory for 1916. (Boston, 1916), 184.

Hero Squares on City of Boston’s webpage for Veterans.

https://www.cityofboston.gov/veterans/herosquares/view.aspx?id=16

Sheehan, Daniel. “Dot playground to be re-named in memory of World War I hero.”  Dorchester Reporter. October 26, 2017 at https://www.dotnews.com/2017/dot-playground-be-re-named-memory-world-war-i-hero

Suffolk County Registry of Deeds, Book 4045, Page 219 July 24, 1917.

Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/104th_Infantry_Regiment_(United_States)

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Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biographies: Arthur and Earle Means

Posted on November 28, 2019 by earltaylor

Means, Arthur H

Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biographies: Arthur and Earle Means

At the Dorchester Historical Society, we are in the process of a year-long project to commemorate the 100 year anniversary of World War I. Using a collection of photographs we have of World War I Dorchester residents, we will be featuring soldiers in a number of short biographies throughout the year. At the culmination of the project, we hope to produce an online exhibit which highlights these men and their service to our country.

Our first biography features a pair of brothers: Arthur and Earle Means.

Written by Kayla Skillin.

Arthur and Earle Means were brothers who both served in the United States armed forces during World War I. Arthur was born in 1890 and 10 years older than Earle, who was born in 1900. They were raised in a large family in the Mattapan section of Boston on Sturbridge Street in Lower Mills. Like many other families in Lower Mills, their father, Fred, was a factory worker at the Walter Baker Chocolate Factory only a few blocks away. Fred was also a Civil War veteran and his sons, Earle and Arthur, would follow in his footsteps when the United States entered World War I in 1917. Arthur enlisted in the military and joined the U.S. Navy when he was 27 years old on April 17, 1917. We know Earle joined the military as well but not sure of the exact timeline. Not much is known about their time in the military but from various genealogical sources, we can see what their lives were like when they returned from war. In fact, after the war, it looks like Arthur and Earle went in separate directions; we find Arthur living in New York City and Earle staying close to his family in Boston.

Arthur was honorably discharged from military service on April 16, 1921. In the 1925 New York State Census, we find Arthur Means living in New York City with his wife Helen and working as an “organizer of automobiles.” In the 1930, according to the United States Census, he is still living in New York City but is now listed as an “automobile executive.” Finally, the 1940 census still has him living in New York, but now listed as a manager of a ship supply company. He died in 1947 and is buried in Arlington National Cemetery in Washington, D.C. His interment records record indicates he was a Chief Machinist Mate in the United States Navy Reserve Forces.

After returning from the war, it seems Earle was living at home in Lower Mills, working as a machinist. However, in the 1929 Boston Directory, Earle is listed as a physical instructor at 48 Boylston Street which, at the time, was the Boston Young Men’s Christian Union (BYMCU) and living in Norfolk Downs – more commonly known as Quincy – with his wife Catherine (Cook). Throughout the years, he is seen living in various towns on the South Shore of Massachusetts including Quincy, Weymouth, Randolph and eventually settling in Holbrook. All the records indicate he was some type of physical fitness instructor. Earle died, at the age of 42, in 1943; his death records list his occupation as “retired physical instructor, World War I.” He is buried at the Forest Hills Cemetery in the Jamaica Plain neighborhood of Boston.

 

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Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biographies: James L. Cronin, Edward J. Cronin and William Francis Cronin

Posted on November 28, 2019 by earltaylor

Cronin,James L.; Edward J. and William Francis

Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biographies: James L. Cronin, Edward J. Cronin and William Francis Cronin

At the Dorchester Historical Society, we are in the process of a year-long project to commemorate the 100th anniversary of World War I. Using a collection of photographs we have of WWI Dorchester residents, we will be featuring servicemen in a number of short biographies throughout the year. At the culmination of the project, we hope to produce an online exhibit that highlights these men and their service to our country.

Our next biography features: Cronin brothers.

Written by Camille Arbogast.

[Illustration shows James at the top, Edward in the middle and William at the bottom.]

James L. Cronin was born on January 22, 1889, at 16 Fulton Street (today Lawley Street) in the Neponset neighborhood of Dorchester. His young brothers Edward J. and William Francis were born on December 19, 1894, and September 23, 1896. Their parents, Patrick and Ellen T. (Sweeney) Cronin, were both Irish immigrants. Prior to her marriage, Ellen worked as a domestic in Newton; Patrick was a nail worker or nailer, perhaps at the Putnam Nail Company on Ericsson Street. They were married in West Newton by the Reverend D.H. Riley in November 1885. In addition to their three sons, they had four daughters: Mary, born in 1887, Annie born in 1890, Margaret in 1891, and Helen in 1893. They lost two children in young childhood, as well: son John Henry died of influenza at four months; daughter Bertha died at two years of pneumonia, a complication of the measles.

In 1894, the family lived on Tolman Street. By 1896, they were living around the corner on Eaton Street, and then, by 1900, moved a short distance to 53 Mears Street (Mears Street was taken to create Morrissey Boulevard). In 1900, Patrick was working for the City of Boston. Living with them was a boarder, Cornelias Kelly, an Irish immigrant who worked in the nail factory. The children attended the Minot School.

By 1910, the family lived at 118 Wrentham Street. Patrick was a city street cleaner. The older children were working by this time: Mary a saleslady in a dry goods store, Annie a telephone operator, Margaret a mail clerk, and Nellie a milliner. James was a plumber in 1910; later in the decade he was an electrician. Though they were still in school in 1910, Edward and William soon began working. In 1912, William was hired by the Boston School Buildings Department as a “boy;” he was later promoted to messenger, then blueprinter. Edward was a machinist.

In 1915, James was arrested as an accessory to a break-in at Elmer Sears’ grocery store at 17 Newhall Street, Neponset. By 1917, he had moved to Flushing, Long Island, where he worked as a painter. He was in Flushing when he registered for the draft in June 1917.

James was drafted and inducted into the National Army on December 9, 1917. The next day, he was assigned to the 2nd Company of the 152nd Depot Brigade and sent to Camp Upton in Yaphank, New York, on Long Island for training. On February 1, 1918, he was promoted to Private 1st Class. On March 18, he was assigned to B Company, 307th Infantry, 77th Division.

On April 6, at 2:30 a.m., the 307th Infantry marched to the railroad and began the first leg of their journey to France. The next day they sailed from Pier 59 in New York City on the troopship S.S. Justicia. After a stop in Halifax, during which they saw the devastation recently wrought by the explosion in the harbor of a ship full of military explosives, B Company headed out into the Atlantic, accompanied by a convoy to protect the ship from U-boat attacks. A history of B Company described their experience on board, “We were crowded … with sleeping hammocks slung over our mess tables. … We were compelled to wear during the day, and to sleep with during the night, ungainly life preservers.”

On April 19, 1918, they landed in Liverpool, then were ferried across the channel to Calais on the Queen of Belgium’s personal yacht, which she had donated for war service. On the crossing, they were escorted by “destroyers, planes, and dirigibles.” They were sent to Picardy for additional training for five weeks, then spent five weeks in Flanders with the Lancashire Fusiliers of the 125th British Brigade. In early June, they travelled to Loraine. On the night of June 20, they moved to the front lines between Ancerviller and Badonviller. A few days later, they experienced their first shell and gas attack, during which the company cook died from gas “inhaled while trying to prepare the company breakfast.”

James was among the patrol of fifty-two men from B Company who were sent on a daylight raid of German trenches on Sunday, July 21. According to the company history, at 2:30 in the afternoon, the patrol “advanced on the enemy lines in a single file … The intent was to surprise the enemy with a daylight raid and thereby obtain information thru capture and observations. But either thru knowledge or by chance, the Germans had prepared against this maneuver and the surprise was reversed. Waiting until our patrol was fairly within their lines, and then partially surrounding them, the enemy centered upon our men a deadly fire of rifles, machine guns, and grenade.” The fighting lasted an hour. James was among the seventeen dead. A religious service was held in Vacueville for the soldiers lost on the raid.

In August 1918, James was reported missing in action; he was officially listed as killed in action in February 1919. He was buried in Romagne-sous-Montfaucon, France, in the Meuse-Argonne American Cemetery and Memorial, the largest American cemetery in Europe. In 1921, the Ashmont Playground was named the James L. Cronin playground in his honor. (In 2012, the playground was renamed Dr. Loesch Family Park.)

James’s brothers, Edward and William, also served during the First World War. On his notecard for Edward Cronin, Dr. Perkins noted that Edward enlisted and that he served in F Company, 60th Infantry, Army of Occupation. F Company sailed overseas on April 16, 1918, on the S.S. Canopic. Edward returned from France in July 1919 on the RMS Aquitania.

During the war, the Cronin family moved to 54 Burt Street, and they were living there in 1918 when William registered for the second draft, for men who had turned 21 since the prior registration in 1917. On August 28, 1918, William was drafted and inducted into the National Army. He was assigned to the 156th Depot Brigade for training. On September 3, 1918, he was assigned to the 1st Brigade Field Artillery Replacement Draft at Camp Jackson, South Carolina.

William was discharged at Camp Devens in Ayer, Massachusetts, on January 10, 1919. Later in 1919, he was reinstated as a blueprinter in the Boston School Building Department, where he worked for the rest of his life. In the late 1920s, he was promoted to Storekeeper and in 1930, to Chief Storekeeper. He was a member of the City of Boston Clerks Association.

William and Edward both returned to the family home at 54 Burt Street after the war and lived there until the household broke up in 1928. William and Edward then lived for a year at 28 Santuit Street, before moving in with their recently married sister Helen and her husband Henry G. Imbescheid. They lived at 9 Englewood Street, Cedar Grove (Englewood Street later became part of Richview Street), which Henry owned. By 1936, Helen and Henry had two daughters and they had all moved to 475 Ashmont Street. The next year, William moved out, relocating to 422 Columbia Road, where he lived for the remainder of his life.

Edward continued living with the Imbescheids. Directories in the 1920s and 1930s list him as a laborer and a painter. The 1930 the census reported he had no profession. He appears on the 1940 census working as a house painter. In 1942, on his World War II draft registration, he gave his profession as a Works Progress Administration painter, working at Police Headquarters on Berkeley Street. In the late 1940s, the directory lists him as a foreman. By 1951, Edward and the Imbescheids lived at 141 Minot Street, and he was working as a guard.

William died in Dorchester on September 12, 1953. A High Mass of Requiem was held for him at Saint Brendan’s Church in Dorchester Center. Edward died two years later, dying on September 22, 1955. He, too, was celebrated with a High Mass of Requiem at St. Brendan’s Church.

Sources

Birth and Death record, Massachusetts Vital Records, 1840–1911. New England Historic Genealogical Society, Boston, Massachusetts; Ancestry.com

Family Tree, Ancestry.com

1900, 1910, 1930, 1940 Federal Census; Ancestry.com

“Hurley Caught in Store,” Boston Globe, 12 July 1915: 14; Newspapers.com

United States, Selective Service System. World War I Selective Service System Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918. Washington, D.C.: National Archives and Records Administration; Ancestry.com

New York State Abstracts of World War I Military Service, 1917–1919. Adjutant General’s Office. New York State Archives, Albany, New York; Ancestry.com

Julius Klausner, Company B, 307 Infantry: Its History, Honor roll, Company Roster, Sept 1917-May 1919. New York: Burke-Kelly Post No. 172, American Legion, 1920; Archive.org

Lists of Outgoing & Incoming Passengers, 1917-1938. Records of the Office of the Quartermaster General, The National Archives at College Park, Maryland; Ancestry.com

Dorchester Soldier was Killed in Action, Boston Globe, 7 February 1919: 9; Newspapers.com

“Eastern Massachusetts Men in the Casualty List,” Boston Globe, 8 February 1919: 2; Newspapers.com

“Dorchester Illustration of the Day no. 1820 Loesch Family Park,” Dorchester Historical Society. July 6, 2012, <http://www.dorchesterhistoricalsocietyblog.org/blog/?p=1069>

Military, Compiled Service Records. World War I. Carded Records. Records of the Military Division of the Adjutant General’s Office, Massachusetts National Guard.

Boston Directories, various years; Ancestry.com

City Record: Official Chronical Boston Municipal Affairs, various years; Archive.org

United States, Selective Service Registration Cards, World War II: Fourth Registration. Records of the Selective Service System, National Archives and Records Administration; Ancestry.com

Deaths, Boston Globe, 13 September 1953: 63; Newspapers.com

Morning Death Notices, Boston Globe, 24 Sept 1955: 2; Newspapers.com

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Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biographies: Robert Joseph Blake and John Joseph Blake

Posted on November 28, 2019 by earltaylor

Blake Brothers, Robert Joseph Blake on the left and John Joseph Blake on the right

Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biographies: Robert Joseph Blake and John Joseph Blake

 At the Dorchester Historical Society, we are in the process of a year-long project to commemorate the 100th anniversary of World War I. Using a collection of photographs we have of WWI Dorchester residents, we will be featuring servicemen in a number of short biographies throughout the year. At the culmination of the project, we hope to produce an online exhibit that highlights these men and their service to our country.

Our next biography features: Blake brothers

Written by Julie Wolf.

[In the illustration Robert Joseph Blake is on the left and John Joseph Blake on the right]

The brothers Robert Joseph Blake and John Joseph Blake were born in Milton, Massachusetts, to Irish immigrants James Blake (no relation to the owners of Dorchester’s famed Blake House, the oldest house in Boston) and Elizabeth “Bessie” Coakley. Robert was born on May 26, 1891. John came three and a half years later, on November 21, 1894. Their sister, Elizabeth, was born in between, on July 25, 1893. In 1897, Bessie died of heart failure at age 30, leaving James a widower with three young children. The following year he remarried. He and his second wife, the Irish-born Mary Scanlan, would have no children of their own.

According to the 1900 census, the Blakes lived in a rented home on Randolph Avenue in Milton, shared with Mary’s brother David Scannell (one of many spelling variations of her family’s name), a gardener, and another lodger named Malachy Crowley, who worked as a road maker. Ten years later, the census showed them still living on Randolph Avenue, at 304—possibly the same home as before—minus the boarders. Robert, now 19, had taken work as a carpenter’s apprentice, while John, 15, and their sister were still in school. Like so many area residents, their father, James, worked as a mill hand at the Baker Chocolate Factory in Dorchester.

Both Robert and John served overseas during World War I. John was 23 years old when he enlisted on May 30, 1917, one week before the first registration for the draft began on June 5. It was then that 26-year-old Robert registered, still single and already working in the profession that he would have for most of his life: police officer in the town of Milton. By the time the brothers sailed for Europe, the family had moved from Randolph Avenue to 69 River Street in the Lower Mills neighborhood Dorchester. (This would be the only time in his life that Robert had an address in Dorchester.)

U.S. Army Transport records allow us to track Robert and John throughout their service. In July 1918, Robert, a corporal 1st class, shipped out to France with Company A of the First General Headquarters Battalion of the Military Police Corps. He returned from Brest a year later aboard the USS Manitou. John’s service abroad and his return to the United States predated his older brother’s. As a private, he disembarked from Hoboken, New Jersey, for France aboard the USS Pantones on September 2, 1917, serving with Company E, 101st Regiment, U.S. Infantry. He was promoted to corporal the following year, on November 3, 1918. He arrived home to Boston aboard the USS America on April 5, 1919, having seen action as part of the Defensive Sector in France in some of the war’s most storied battles: Champagne-Marne; Aisne-Marne; St. Mihiel; and the horrific Meuse-Argonne, which claimed the lives of 26,000 of the 1 million-plus American Expeditionary Forces soldiers who fought in the brutal offensive that ended the war. John escaped the war uninjured and with no disabilities. On their transport documents, Robert listed their mother, Mary, as his contact, while John listed their father, James, as his.

After the war, the Blake brothers no longer lived together. The 1920 census found Robert living at 308 Randolph Avenue in Milton, a few doors down from the Blakes’ former family home, a boarder with the Scanlons—an aunt, uncle, and cousin from his mother Mary’s side. He had resumed work as a police officer with the Milton Police Department. John, employed as a fireman in the fire department shipyard, continued to live with his mother, now a widow, at 69 River Street in Dorchester, along with an Irish-born lodger named Patrick Rafferty, a chocolate factory employee. Their father, James Blake, appears to have died sometime during his sons’ military service or immediately thereafter.

Within two years, Robert and John would establish homes of their own, but going forward their professional lives would follow similar paths. On November 13, 1921, Robert, age 30, still with the Milton police, married a telephone operator from Quincy named Mary Trainor Sugrue. They made their first home at 11 Bunton Place in East Milton. Shortly afterward they moved to 66 Grafton Avenue, also in Milton, the home they owned for the rest of their lives and in which they brought up their four children, Mary, Robert, James, and Barbara. In 1922, 28-year-old John married Catherine Amelia Bertram, also of Quincy. For the first year of their marriage, they lived at 43 Avondale Place in Dorchester. During this year John adopted his brother’s vocation, becoming a Boston police officer at Quincy Hall Market. Over the next four decades, John and Catherine lived in a number of locations (likely all rented) around Dorchester: 1258 Morton Street, 110 Fuller Street, 32 Percival Street, and finally 83 Dakota Street. They would have three children: Elizabeth; John F., a decorated World War II veteran; and Daniel.

During Robert’s 36-year tenure with the Milton Police, he played an active role in many professional organizations, including the Milton Police Social Club, of which he was president; the Massachusetts Police Relief Association; and the Massachusetts Retired Police and Firefighters Association. He was also a member of the American Legion Milton Post 114 and St. Agatha’s Holy Name Society. On the force, he seemed to take particular interest in tending to the morale of his fellow officers, and in 1929 he was instrumental in establishing the Policeman’s Memorial Sunday.

As a patrolman for Station 1 of the Boston Police Department at the tail end of Prohibition, John’s work took on a grittier feel than Robert’s.  In January 1933, John was among one of the special officers directing a raid at 5 Langdon Place, “believed by Federal agents to have been the center of the North End’s wholesale wine supply.” The Boston Globe described the “seizure [as] one of the largest in the North End recently,” with “the cellar piled high with barrels” and hundreds of quarts of wine valued at more than $2,000 confiscated. Later that year, he was also involved in breaking up an illegal “numbers,” or lottery, game on Portland Street, a case in which the perpetrator admitted his wrongdoing but requested leniency from the judge on the basis of “[providing] an outlet during these depressing times for a lot of people who had hopes that a two or three cent ‘play’ would bring in some money.” John was a member of the Boston Police Post No. 1018 VFW and the Boston Police Relief Association. He stayed on the force through at least 1946.

Both brothers spent their retirement working as messengers. Following his separation from the force in 1952, Robert became a messenger with the Boston law firm of Bingham, Dana and Gould, a position he would hold for twelve years. John was employed by the Estabrook Company from at least 1956 through 1964, the year his wife died.

Robert Joseph Blake died on February 4, 1965, age 73, at Massachusetts General Hospital. He was survived by his wife, still of 66 Grafton Road; their four children; and his brother. John Joseph Blake died six years later, either in Canton or Norwood, on March 28, 1971, age 76, predeceased by his wife and son John and survived by his other son and daughter. Both brothers were buried in Milton Cemetery, which has been used as a burying ground since its founding in 1672, shortly after the town’s incorporation, and has been listed on the National Register of Historic Places since 2004.

SOURCES:

Ancestry.com. 1900 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2004.

Ancestry.com. 1910 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2006.

Ancestry.com. 1920 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.

Ancestry.com. 1930 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2002.

Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012.

Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Birth Records, 1840-1915 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2013.

Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, City Directories [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2005.

Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Death Index, 1970-2003 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2005.

Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Death Records, 1841-1915 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2013.

Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Marriage Index, 1901-1955 and 1966-1970 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2013.

Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Marriage Records, 1840-1915 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2013.

Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.

Ancestry.com. U.S., Army Transport Service, Passenger Lists, 1910-1939 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2016.

Ancestry.com. U.S., City Directories, 1822-1995 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.

Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc., 2015.

Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Death Index, 1935-2014 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014.

Ancestry.com. U.S., World War I Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc., 2005.

Ancestry.com. U.S., World War II Draft Registration Cards, 1942 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.

“Annual Memorial Service by Policemen of Milton.” Boston Globe, June 7, 1937: 7.

“Blake (John J.).” Boston Globe, March 30, 1971: 30.

“Blake (Mary A.).” Boston Globe, December 3, 1935 : 26.

“Blake (Robert J.).” Boston Globe, February 6, 1965 : 2.

FamilySearch.org. Massachusetts Births, 1841-1915, database with images.

FamilySearch.org. Massachusetts Deaths, 1841-1915, database with images.

FamilySearch.org. Massachusetts Marriages, 1841-1915, database with images.

FamilySearch.org. Massachusetts, Town Clerk, Vital and Town Records, 1626-2001, database with images.

FamilySearch.org. United States Census, 1920, database with images.

FamilySearch.org. United States, Veterans Administration Master Index, 1917-1940, database.

FamilySearch.org. United States World War I Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918, database with images.

FamilySearch.org. United States World War II Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918, database with images.

“Federal Dry Agents Stop North End’s Wine Supply by Making Seizure Valued at $2235.” Boston Globe, January 31, 1933: 15.

Military, Compiled Service Records. World War I. Carded Records. Records of the Military Division of the Adjutant General’s Office, Massachusetts National Guard.

“Milton.” Boston Globe, February 21, 1918: 5.

“Milton Police Memorial to Be Unveiled Tomorrow: Son and Daughter of Patrolmen to Assist…” Boston Globe. June 6, 1931: 16.

National Archives, Military Records, World War I Draft Registration Cards.

“‘Number’ Writers Given Heavy Fines: Three Appeal—Two Others Face Same Charge.” Boston Globe, October 14, 1933: 2.

“Quincy Telephone Girl Weds Milton Ex-Soldier.” Boston Globe. November 15, 1921: 4.

“Registrar Wars on ‘Mr. Fixits’: Officers Elected.” Boston Globe. October 21, 1929: 4.

“Robert J. Blake: Policeman, 36 Years; 73.” Boston Globe. February 5, 1965: 14.

“With the Colors.” Boston Globe, May 31, 1944: 14; June 9, 1945: 5.

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Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biography: Ralph Cunningham Barnstead

Posted on November 28, 2019 by earltaylor

Barnstead, Ralph Cunningham

Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biography: Ralph Cunningham Barnstead

At the Dorchester Historical Society, we are in the process of a year-long project to commemorate the 100th anniversary of World War I. Using a collection of photographs we have of WWI Dorchester residents, we will be featuring servicemen in a number of short biographies throughout the year. At the culmination of the project, we hope to produce an online exhibit that highlights these men and their service to our country.

Our next biography features: Ralph Cunningham Barnstead.

Written by Julie Wolfe.

Ralph Cunningham Barnstead was born at 21 Berkeley Place in Boston on September 7, 1879, the fifth of nine children of Robert P. Barnstead and Ellen “Nellie” Cunningham. Robert was born in Nova Scotia, and Nellie came from Ireland; both emigrated to America around 1865. When Ralph was born, Robert was a plumber; at the turn of the century, he held multiple patents on water-distilling and -sterilizing equipment used in hospitals and laboratories and was the president of the Barnstead Pure Water Still Company (later the Barnstead Still & Sterilizer Company), ultimately located at 2 Lanesville Terrace in Jamaica Plain.

In his school years, Ralph distinguished himself in athletics, but was not the only Barnstead to do so. His younger brother Frederick, a star pitcher, would play semi-professional ball across North America and was, according to his 1956 obituary, among “the last living members of the famed semi-pro baseball club, the Dorchester Lower Mills” of the World War I era.

In 1900, Ralph resided with his parents and five of his siblings at 49 Burt Street in Dorchester, which the family owned since the late 1890s. His elder brother Charles and sister Ida were both married and living elsewhere by this time, and one of his younger brothers, Herbert, Frederick’s twin, had died in 1888 of “blood poison” at age 4. (Another younger brother, Walter, would die in 1904 at age 16.) For several years, Ralph worked as a clerk, first at 29 Bedford Street and later at 62 Sudbury Street; the industry is uncertain.

In 1907, Ralph ran for city council as a Democrat in Ward 24, but wasn’t elected. The following year, on August 12, 1908, he married Margaret J. Bennett, the daughter of Canadian émigrés. Their first home was at 86 Tuttle Street, in Dorchester’s Savin Hill section. By 1910, Ralph had settled into his lifelong occupation, as a plater, initially in the jewelry industry. He and Margaret later rented a home at 89 Auckland Street, still in Savin Hill, where three of Margaret’s relatives boarded with them. In 1912, when a broken sewer made area living conditions hazardous and intolerable, Ralph was one of two neighborhood men to petition the mayor to approve the sewer’s immediate repair. Margaret also participated in the campaign. The following year, the couple moved near Ralph’s parents, to 45 Burt Street, where they would remain until 1927.

A member of All Saints’ Episcopal Church in Dorchester’s Ashmont neighborhood, Ralph was elected a delegate to Boston’s archdeaconry two years running. In 1916, he garnered several mentions in the Boston Globe for his performances as an interlocutor (master of ceremonies) in church “minstrel shows.” These shows were a staple of civic and fraternal organizations at the time, and although they were considered comic, the performances’ racially charged elements would be deemed distasteful today.

It seems Ralph put his penchant for performing to use during World War I. He was close to 40 years old when he registered for the draft, a foreman specializing in nickel plating at his father’s business, Barnstead Still & Steel. His service card—a punch card—is unlike any we’ve encountered during this project. It comes not from military archives but from the YMCA Archives. After enlisting in the YMCA’s motor service as an “auto driver,” Ralph applied for a passport on October 14, 1918, and set sail for Europe the following day with a “party of American YMCA secretaries.” In addition to facilitating the YMCA’s wartime entertainment and R&R programs, the 82d Division, to which Ralph belonged, also assisted the Red Cross in base and field hospitals. On June 28, 1919, he was one of 12 YMCA volunteers from New England rewarded for “their good work” with an invitation to accompany their units home. He arrived on July 5, 1919, sailing from Brest, France, to Hoboken, NJ, aboard the SS Leviathan.

Ralph and Margaret resumed life on Burt Street; he remained a plater and continued performing. While Ralph had been overseas, on April 1, 1919, his mother, Nellie, died; her funeral wasn’t held until November of that year. Her death appears to have been overwhelming for his father. On October 11, 1921, five months after selling their “large frame house” at 49 Burt Street, Robert reportedly “threw himself in front of an inbound train in the Ashmont station and was instantly killed.” Ralph and his brother Bob rejected the Globe’s speculation that their father had died by suicide, asserting that he “had been subject to fainting spells” and had “had an attack when the train approached.”

Until 1927, Ralph worked at Erikson Electric at 6 Portland Street. In 1928 he and Margaret moved to 4 Stockton Street. Ralph had switched employers, working at Boston Edison at 6 Power House, South Boston, until at least 1936. When the 1940 census was taken, the couple had moved again, this time to 170 Ashmont Street. Ralph was a foreman plater in light fixtures; the city directory shows that he had returned to Erikson Electric as of 1939.

On April 26, 1942, Ralph, age 62, now unemployed, registered for the World War II “Old Man’s Draft.” Standing 5’7” and weighing only 100 pounds, he may have been sick, although this isn’t indicated on his card. Ralph died at home less than a month later, on May 18. His longtime church, All Saints’ at Peabody Square, held his funeral. For the next several years, Margaret appeared in Boston city directories, a widow working as a bookkeeper, her job before marriage. In a strange coincidence, Margaret apparently died on May 18, 1951, exactly nine years to the day after her husband.

SOURCES:

Ancestry.com. 1900 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2004.

Ancestry.com. 1910 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2006.

Ancestry.com. 1920 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.

Ancestry.com. 1930 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2002.

Ancestry.com. 1940 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012.

Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Death Records, 1841-1915 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2013.

Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Town and Vital Records, 1620-1988 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.

Ancestry.com. New York, Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.

Ancestry.com. U.S., Army Transport Service, Passenger Lists, 1910-1939 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2016.

Ancestry.com. U.S., City Directories, 1822-1995 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.

Ancestry.com. U.S., Passport Applications, 1795-1925 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2007.

Ancestry.com. U.S., Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc., 2015.

Ancestry.com. U.S., World War I Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations Inc., 2005.

Ancestry.com. U.S., World War II Draft Registration Cards, 1942 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.

Ancestry.com and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. 1880 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.

“Barnstead (Herbert J.).” Boston Globe, March 21, 1888: 6.

“Barnstead (Ralph).” Boston Globe. May 19, 1942: 28.

“Broken Sewer Causes Protest: Residents of Savin Hill Start Action Against Intolerable Conditions in the Neighborhood.” Boston Globe, September 30, 1912: 14.

“Busy Inventors Receive Patents.” Boston Post. November 5, 1916: 11.

“Change in One Service Hour at All Saints in Ashmont.” Boston Globe, January 24, 1918: 5.

Documents of the School Committee of the City of Boston. (Boston: School Committee, 1898), 247.

“Dorchester District.” Boston Globe, October 22, 1918: 5.

———. Boston Globe, April 30, 1920: 8.

———. Boston Globe, April 22, 1921: 9.

FamilySearch. Massachusetts Births and Christenings, 1639-1915, database.

FamilySearch. Massachusetts Marriages, 1695-1910, database.

FamilySearch. Massachusetts Marriages, 1841-1915, database with images.

FamilySearch. United States, YMCA World War I Service Cards, 1917-1919, database with images.

“Fred J. Barnstead, Oldtime Pitcher, Dies.” Boston Globe, April 2, 1956: 13.

“In and About Greater Boston: Dorchester District.” Boston Globe, April 27, 1918: 3.

“In sad and loving memory….” Boston Post, April 2, 1920: 30.

“Leaps on Track to Death under Train: Robert P. Barnstead, 75, of Dorchester, Suicide.” Boston Globe, October 12, 1921: 5.

“List of Patents.” Boston Globe, July 29, 1891: 5.

“New Englanders Honored by Wild-Cat Division.” Boston Globe, June 28, 1919: 2.

“Real Estate Transactions: Dorchester Dwellings.” Boston Globe, May 16, 1921: 11.

“Results of City Primary.” Boston Globe, November 15, 1907: 7.

“Sibley Gives List of Bay State Workers for YMCA in France: They Won Golden Opinions in Service for Soliders.” Boston Globe, April 1, 1919: 18.

“Son Says Dorchester Man’s Death Accidental.” Boston Globe, October 12, 1921: 4.

“To Give ‘Somewhere on the Border’ in the Form of a Minstrel Show.” Boston Globe, November 14, 1916: 16.

WorldWarI.com. The History of the YMCA in World War I.

Young Men’s Christian Associations. National War Work Council. Summary of World War Work of the American Y.M.C.A.: With the Soldiers and Sailors of America at Home, on the Sea,

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Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biography: Joseph Ballard

Posted on November 27, 2019 by earltaylor

Ballard, Joseph

Dorchester Illustration World War One Service Member biography: Joseph Ballard

 

At the Dorchester Historical Society, we are in the process of a year-long project to commemorate the 100th anniversary of World War I. Using a collection of photographs we have of WWI Dorchester residents, we will be featuring servicemen in a number of short biographies throughout the year. At the culmination of the project, we hope to produce an online exhibit that highlights these men and their service to our country.

 

Our next biography features: Joseph Ballard.

Written by Donna Albino.

 

Joseph Ballard was born on September 18, 1894, in Roxbury, Massachusetts, to John Ballard and Delia (Curley) Ballard. Joseph was their fourth son. John Ballard was working as a brass moulder (making molds for casting brass) at the time of his son’s birth.

In 1900, the Ballard family was living in a rented house in Hyde Park, and at that time  the family had grown to four sons and two daughters. Joseph’s father, John, was working as a carpenter.  By 1910, the family owned their home at 4 Middleton Street in Dorchester and John was then working as an inspector for the railroad. Joseph’s three older brothers were all working adults, but they were still living with their parents. John, age 20,  was working as a printer for a newspaper; Thomas, age 18,  was a shipper of plumbers’ supplies; and William, age 17 was  a salesman of wholesale wool.

 

Joseph registered for the draft in 1917, when he was 22 years old. At the time, he was working as an attendant at North Grafton State Hospital, a psychiatric hospital in Grafton, Massachusetts, about 45 miles away from his parents’ home, where he was still living. His WWI draft card describes him as medium height and build, with light hair and blue eyes. He was inducted into service in the Army on September 6, 1918.

 

James was assigned to the Supply Company Ordnance Training Corps. The Ordnance Corps is the branch of the US Army that deals with the supply and storage of weapons, ammunition, and related equipment. By the end of the war, almost 8,000 plants were working on Ordnance contracts for the war effort. To train new Ordnance soldiers, the Ordnance Department established schools at a wide array of locations, including universities, civilian factories, armories, arsenals, and field depots. Eventually, much of the training was consolidated at the Ordnance Training Camp at Camp Hancock, Georgia, where James was stationed until his discharge on February 14, 1919.

 

James returned to his parents’ home after the war, and a few months later, his mother passed away in June, 1919. The 1920 census shows Joseph living at 4 Middleton Street in Dorchester with his widowed father and some of his siblings. His father  was then  working as a gas fitter for the railroad; his brother John  was still a printer for a newspaper; his brother Thomas  was an elevator constructor; his brother William  was a checker for an army base; his sister Hazel was  a housekeeper; and his younger brother Walter  was a clerk in a shoe store.

 

By 1930, Joseph’s sister Hazel had married an accountant named Lester Menkes. Lester and Hazel  were living at 262 Codman Street (present day Gallivan Boulevard) in Dorchester, and Joseph and his sister, Florence (Ballard) Dowling, were living as lodgers in their home; Joseph was working as a clerk for the US government. In the 1940 census, the four were still living together at the same address in Dorchester; Joseph was working as an office clerk for the Federal Bureau of Veterans.

 

In 1942, Joseph registered for the WWII draft. He was living in Newton Centre, Massachusetts with his sister Hazel, and working at the Veterans Administration Post Office Building in Boston.

 

Joseph Ballard died on April 30, 1964 at the age of 69. His obituary mentioned he had been the supervisor of the records and mail section of the Veterans Affairs in Boston. He is buried at Newton Cemetery in Newton Centre, Massachusetts with his sisters Hazel and Florence in a family plot.

 

 

Sources:

 

Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Birth Records, 1840-1915 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2013.

 

Year: 1900; Census Place: Hyde Park, Norfolk, Massachusetts; Page: 21; Enumeration District: 1042; FHL microfilm: 1240670

 

Year: 1910; Census Place: Boston Ward 24, Suffolk, Massachusetts; Roll: T624_625; Page: 29A; Enumeration District: 1638; FHL microfilm: 1374638

 

Year: 1920; Census Place: Boston Ward 21, Suffolk, Massachusetts; Roll: T625_739; Page: 4A; Enumeration District: 510

 

Year: 1930; Census Place: Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts; Page: 23A; Enumeration District: 0463; FHL microfilm: 2340689

 

Year: 1940; Census Place: Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts; Roll: m-t0627-01676; Page: 11A; Enumeration District: 15-600

 

Ancestry.com. U.S., Find A Grave Index, 1600s-Current [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2012.

 

Registration State: Massachusetts; Registration County: Suffolk; Roll: 1685013; Draft Board: 21

 

The National Archives at St. Louis; St. Louis, Missouri; World War II Draft Cards (Fourth Registration) for the State of Massachusetts; Record Group Title: Records of the Selective Service System, 1926-1975; Record Group Number: 147; Series Number: M2090

 

United States Army Ordnance Corps: The History of Ordnance in America by Karl Rubis, Ordnance Branch Historian

 

The Boston Globe (Boston, Massachusetts) 24 Jun 1919, Tue page 17

 

The Boston Globe (Boston, Massachusetts) 01 May 1964, Fri page 32

 

The Boston Globe (Boston, Massachusetts) 03 May 1964, Sun page 69

 

Ancestry.com, Eileen O’Donnell Family Tree

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Dorchester Illustration 2432 Boston from Mount Bowdoin

Posted on November 24, 2019 by earltaylor

2432 Boston from Mount Bowdoin

Dorchester Illustration no. 2432      Boston from Mount Bowdoin

Scan of wood engraving Boston, From Mount Bowdoin published in Picturesque America by William Cullen Bryant. New York: D. Appleton & Co., 1872-74. Hand-colored.

The view is probably from the land owned by Nathaniel Phillips, shown in green in the detail from the 1874 Hopkins atlas.  The highest points of land on the hill are along Bowdoin Avenue.

Mount Bowdoin is one of the hills of Dorchester.  It was named for Governor James Bowdoin who once owned much of the hill. The Boston Landmarks Commission’s area form dated 1995 for Mount Bowdoin says:  “Mount Bowdoin was named for James Bowdoin, the Revolutionary War patriot and governor of Massachusetts during the late 1780’s. As early as the mid 18th century. Governor Bowdoin summered on Dorchester’s Mt Bowdoin or Bowdoin Hill as it was originally known. He was undoubtedly attracted to the panoramic views of the harbor and Blue Hills visible from atop the hill that would be named in his honor. The Bowdoin House was located at the crest of a secondary hill projecting from the lower southern slopes of Mt. Bowdoin. In fact, Bowdoin Avenue started out as a two-pronged driveway leading up the hill from Four Corners (Bowdoin, Washington, Harvard Streets intersection) to the Bowdoin house. The western “arm” of this driveway continued northward past Bowdoin’s residence and over the Mount’s upland pasture. This road represents present day Bowdoin Avenue. The eastern “arm” of Bowdoin Avenue ran directly past the governor’s house and was renamed Rosseter Street during the late 19th century.”

Other hills are: Ashmont Hill, Codman Hill, Jones Hill, Meetinghouse Hill, Mount Ida, Popes Hill, Savin Hill. Other lower hills are mentioned at https://www.bostonbasinhills.org/pages/boston-dorchester-hills.html

The view shows Boston in the distance with the Massachusetts State House just left of center.  The body of water in the center of the illustration is the former South Bay, at that time a body of water that rose and fell with the tides as the sea water flowed through what is now the Fort Point Channel.  There is railroad trestle crossing the South Bay, and that line of tracks was the early version of the Fairmount line.  At the far right, First Church stands on Meetinghouse Hill.

 

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Dorchester Illustration 2431 Everett Frank Merrill

Posted on November 17, 2019 by earltaylor

2431 Everett Frank Merrill

Dorchester Illustration no. 2431      Everett Frank Merrill

At the Dorchester Historical Society, we are in the process of a year-long project to commemorate the 100th anniversary of World War I. Using a collection of photographs we have of WWI Dorchester residents, we will be featuring servicemen in a number of short biographies throughout the year. At the culmination of the project, we hope to produce an online exhibit that highlights these men and their service to our country.

Our next biography features: Everett Frank Merrill.

Written by Camille Arbogast.

Everett Frank Merrill was born October 15, 1898, in Campton, New Hampshire. His mother, Gertrude (Little) was a teacher and his father Frank E. was a farmer; they married in December 1897. Everett was the oldest of nine siblings.

While he was in high school, Everett worked as a bellhop at the Plymouth Inn, in Plymouth, New Hampshire. He attended three years of high school, according to the 1940 census. Around 1915, he moved to Boston. He initially worked for a shoe manufacturer, before working as an office boy at the Arthur C. Harvey Company, a steel wholesale warehouse on Everett Street in Allston. At this time, Everett lived at 804 Washington Street in Dorchester. During World War I, Everett enlisted in the Navy. On his notecard for Everett F. Merrill, Dr. Perkins noted that Everett was an Assistant Inspector of hull material in the United States Naval Reserve Force.

On November 22, 1919, Everett married Dorothy Ruth Frizell at her home, 2 Butler Street in Dorchester. Her father, Frederick A. Frizell, was a professional photographer with a studio in Pierce Square in Lower Mills. Ruth was a graduate of Simmons College. They were married by Reverend A.A. Rideout, who performed a double-ring ceremony. Everett gave Ruth a diamond bar pin as a wedding gift. For their honeymoon, they took a trip to New York and Washington.

In 1920, Everett was living in Buffalo, while Ruth remained in Dorchester at her parents’ home. During this period, Everett “shoveled coal” at the Lackawanna Steel Company, according to his obituary; on the 1920 census his occupation was reported as inspector at a steel company. Later that year, Everett was “laid off along with 15,000 others.” He moved back to Boston, going to work as a salesman at a Boston-area steel business he had worked for previously, possibly the Arthur C. Harvey Company.

In 1922, at age 23, he started his own sheet metal business in Worcester: Everett F. Merrill, Inc. The initial incorporators were Everett, Dorothy, and Dorothy’s mother, Amelia. Eventually, the company became the Merrill & Usher Company of 5-7 Arctic Street, Worcester, a large steel warehouse serving all New England. Active in his field, Everett also published articles like “How to Melt the Iron Curtain,” and “Toughest Sales I Remember.”

In 1925, Everett and Dorothy had a daughter, Eleanor Louise. By 1930, they owned 18 Dorothy Avenue in Worcester, valued at $4,500. That year, Everett’s brother Leslie, a salesman, was living with them. Everett and his family were still living at 18 Dorothy Avenue in 1940, though Leslie was no longer in the household. Everett, the president of his own company, earned $5,000 a year.

In 1948, Everett was elected president of the Worcester Chamber of Commerce, where he helped to develop the “Worcester Industrial Plan,” a strategy for handling the city’s job shortage after World War II. As he described it, “We decided it was up to the Chamber of Commerce to make available to the small industries of the community the management brains they could not afford [sic] to hire. We hired four management engineers, an expert in production, sales, foreign trade and transportation, and put their services at the disposal of the community. … Small businesses, with one or two men running them, have learned production systems and plant organization and grown to plants with 50 workers.” That year, Everett also testified before the Senate regarding a recent Supreme Court Case, The Federal Trade Commission vs. Cement Institute, et al, that impacted industrial transportation costs.

In the late 1940s, Worcester voted to adopt city-manager based government. The “politically divided City Council” unanimously selected Everett to be the first city manager in January 1950, on an acting basis, a position he held for over a year. In January 1953, he was appointed special consultant on economic issues to the newly elected Governor Christian A. Herter. When a tornado hit Worcester county that June, Everett headed the official “disaster appraisal committee.” The tornado, which touched down over a 25-mile area, killed at least 82 people and injured up to 700. Many were left homeless.

At the end of 1953, it was reported that Everett sought medical care at Memorial Hospital on 68th Street in New York City. When Everett died on April 26, 1955, he was also at Memorial Hospital. After his death, his wife, daughter, and son-in-law ran the Everett F. Merrill Foundation, which distributed grants to local educational, community, religious, and health organizations.

Sources

“New Hampshire, Birth Records, through 1900.” New England Historical Genealogical Society, Citing New Hampshire Bureau of Vital Records, Concord, New Hampshire; Ancestry.com

US Federal Census, 1900, 1910, 1920, 1920, 1940; Ancestry.com

The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1962; Books.Google.com

“Dorchester District,” Boston Globe, 24 November 1919; 6; Newspapers.com

Frizell Family: “Dorchester Illustration #2292 Mattapan Bridge,” Dorchester Historical Society. 19 March 2017; <http://www.dorchesterhistoricalsocietyblog.org/blog/?p=2920>

Iron Trade Review, February 23, 1922; Cleveland: Penton Publishing Co, 561; Books.Google.com

“New Simmons Official,” Boston Globe, 17 April 1949; 33; Newspapers.com

“Merrill Elected Head of Worcester Chamber,” Boston Globe, 16 Jan 1948; 2; Newspapers.com

“Where There’s a Will-: Worcester, Mass. Chamber Head Tells Camden Unit How to Boost Sales,” Courier-Post (Camden, NJ), 8 May 1948; 11; Newspapers.com

Hearings, United States Congress, Senate, Committee on Commerce 1948; Books.Google.com

“Sees Task in Cutting 50 City Agencies,” Boston Globe, 3 Jan 1950; 26; Newspapers.com

“City Manager of Worcester to Speak Here,” The Berkshire County Eagle (Pittsfield, MA) 5 April 1950; 7; Newspapers.com

“Worcester’s First City Manager to Advise Herter,” Boston Globe, 2 Jan 1953; 15; Newspapers.com

Masterson, Bert (UP), “New England Counts 82 Dead, Thousands Hurt in Tornado,” Evening Republican (Columbus Indiana) 10 June 1953; 1; Newspapers.com

Owens, C.R. “Politics and Politicians: Pay Gripes Rumble Among State’s 32,000 Employees,” Boston Globe; 4 Oct 1953; 46; Newspapers.com

“Everett Merrill Dies; Steel Head, Herter Adviser,” Boston Globe, 27 April 1955; 43; Newspapers.com

Roche, John J. Directory of Foundations in Massachusetts. Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Department of the Attorney General, 1965; Archive.org

 

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Dorchester Illustration 2430 Louis Ferdinand Korb

Posted on November 10, 2019 by earltaylor

2430 Loius Korb

Dorchester Illustration no. 2430      Louis Ferdinand Korb

At the Dorchester Historical Society, we are in the process of a year-long project to commemorate the 100th anniversary of World War I. Using a collection of photographs we have of WWI Dorchester residents, we will be featuring servicemen in a number of short biographies throughout the year. At the culmination of the project, we hope to produce an online exhibit that highlights these men and their service to our country.

Our next biography features: Louis Ferdinand Korb.

Written by Julie Wolf.

Louis Ferdinand Korb was born at 118 Longwood Avenue in Boston on May 17, 1887, the sixth child of Joseph Korb, a hairdresser from Bavaria, Germany, and Alice Towle of Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, the daughter of Irish émigrés. Louis had one brother and nine sisters, the eldest of whom, Ellen, succumbed to diphtheria at age 2 in 1881. In the 1900 census, the Korbs’ Dorchester household at 1 Baker’s Court contained 14 members: Louis and his siblings, their parents, their mother’s sister, and two male boarders. Sisters Alice and Frances and their aunt were laborers at the Baker Chocolate Factory, as were many neighbors. The two boarders and Louis’s brother, William, were hairdressers like Louis’s father.

In June 1902, Louis graduated from the Gilbert Stuart School in Dorchester Lower Mills. Earlier that month, the Boston Globe had described a civic affair in Milton with “350 in attendance” at which Louis provided music. Snippets mentioning Louis’s presence as a pianist and song conductor at similar events were published throughout the decade. Later in life, through the 1920s and 1930s, such performances, particularly at events hosted by the Knights of Columbus (he was a member of Milton’s Bishop Chevrus Council), continued to garner press.

The century’s first decade brought terrible suffering to the Korbs. In January 1903, Louis and his sisters were “nearly asphyxiated” by a gas leak in their Baker’s Court home. Their father managed to rescue them, despite being nearly overcome himself. But there would be no stopping the calamities of 1908. In February, Louis’s sister Frances, 25, died “of accidental multiple first- and second-degree burns” sustained when an oil lamp in the family home at 1066 Washington Street exploded in her face. Six months later, in August, sister Mary, 23 (one of the Korbs’ two adopted daughters), was killed in a freak accident “when a driverless car ran amuck” in Franklin. Their mother, Alice, was also badly injured. The Korbs seemed to enjoy a degree of local standing, and interest in the story was high, the Globe running updates on Alice’s condition for some two weeks after the accident. In newspaper write-ups, Frances was described as “a belle of the Dorchester Lower Mills district”; Mary as “very popular among the [district’s] young set”; and their father as “one of [Dorchester’s] best known barbers.”

Louis remained in the family home through both of his parents’ deaths, his father’s in 1911 and his mother’s in 1915. (His sister Florence, 26, died two weeks after their mother, of lobar pneumonia.) 1066 Washington Street may or may not have been his address when he registered for the draft in 1917, his World War I registration card listing 2145 Dorchester Avenue, but his service card showing 1066. Thirty years old when drafted, described as single and afflicted with “heart trouble,” Louis worked as an organist at St. Mary’s Church in Quincy. Little is known about his service other than that he was a sergeant detective, general staff, in the Army’s relatively new Military Intelligence Division. He enlisted on August 29, 1918, and was discharged on April 24, 1919.

Following the war, in 1920, Louis moved to 48 Sanford Street in Lower Mills, the home of his sister Pauline and her husband, Watson Kilcup, a chocolate factory employee. Next door was their sister Alice and her husband, Louis Grefield, one of the barbers who had lodged in the Korbs’ childhood home. At this time, Louis resumed his long career as a piano teacher at 1177 Washington Street in Dorchester (possibly a music school) and became a piano salesman at Hallet & Davis at 179 Tremont Street in Boston, a job he held through at least 1937.

Louis’s stay with his sister was short-lived, and in 1921 he moved into 2195 Dorchester Avenue, the rented home of sisters Henrietta and Mary Erhard. This would be Louis’s home for two decades.

By the time Louis registered for World War II’s “Old Man’s Draft” in 1942, he was again living with Pauline and Watson, now at 28 Sanford Street. Still a salesman and teacher, he had a new employer: M. Steinert & Sons, Boston’s preeminent piano showroom at 162 Boylston Street. The store is still there today.

Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, Louis’s address fluctuated in records between 28 Sanford Street and 18A River Street a few blocks away. Whichever was correct, both were his sister’s. Following the war’s end, Louis, still employed, cruised extensively to Latin America: to Colombia aboard the SS Santa Paula in 1947; to Havana and Guatemala aboard the SS Talamanca in 1950; and possibly to Cuba (again), aboard the SS Veragua, in 1951. In 1955, he sailed to Europe aboard the RMS Queen Elizabeth and returned three weeks later, flying from Rome to Boston via Trans World Airlines.

In 1957, Louis ventured closer to home: to Manhattan. It was there he died on August 31, 1957—”suddenly,” according to his obituary. He was 70 years old. Following a Solemn High Mass at St. Gregory’s Church in Dorchester, he was buried at Roslindale’s Mount Cavalry Cemetery, as his parents and three sisters had been decades before him.

SOURCES:

-Ancestry.com. 1900, 1910, 1920, 1930 and 1940 United States Federal Census [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2004.

-Ancestry.com. Massachusetts City Directories [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2005.

-Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Death Records, 1841-1915 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2013.

-Ancestry.com. Massachusetts, Passenger and Crew Lists, 1820-1963 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2006.

-Ancestry.com. New York, New York, Death Index, 1949-1965 [database on-line]. Lehi, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2017.

-Ancestry.com. New York, Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.

-Ancestry.com. U.S. City Directories, 1822-1995 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010.

-Ancestry.com. U.S., Departing Passenger and Crew Lists, 1914-1966 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2016.

– “By Prof James Mahoney, Lecture to Be Given Sunday at Catholic Literary Union, Charlestown.” Boston Globe, February 21, 1913: 13.

– “Cardinal Dedicates West Quincy Church: Thousands Present at Impressive Ceremony in the Beautiful New Edifice of St Mary’s Parish, Built Entirely of Native Granite,” Boston Globe, October 1, 1917: 9.

-“Dorchester District.” Boston Globe. June 6, 1902: 5.

-“Dorchester Lower Mills Council, K. of C. Elects.” Boston Globe, September 15, 1927: 11.

-“Dorchester Lower Mills K. of C. at Communion.” Boston Globe, May 9, 1927: 8.

-“Driverless Auto at Pythian Camp: One Woman Killed and Five Persons Injured at Franklin Field.” New Castle (Pennsylvania) Herald, August 5, 1908: 10.

-“Eight Lives in Jeopardy: Nearly Asphyxiated by Gas in Dorchester: Korb Family Saved by the Father’s Awakening,” Boston Globe, January 26, 1903: 1.

-“Explodes in Girl’s Face.” Boston Globe, February 3, 1908: 7.

-FamilySearch.org. Massachusetts Births and Christenings, 1639-1915, database, 14 June 2016.

-FamilySearch.org. Massachusetts Deaths, 1841-1915, database with images.

-FamilySearch.org. Massachusetts, Town Clerk, Vital and Town Records, 1626-2001, database with images.

-FamilySearch.org. United States, Veterans Administration Master Index, 1917-1940, database, 5 December 2018.

-FamilySearch.org. United States World War I Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918, database with images.

-FamilySearch.org. United States World War II Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918, database with images.

-FindaGrave.com. Louis Ferdinand Korb.

-Finnegan, John Patrick, and Romana Danysh. Army Lineage Series: Military Intelligence (Washington, D.C.: Center of Military History, United States Army, 1998), 21-39.

-“Gilbert Stuart School: Members of Graduating Class at Dorchester Lower Mills Present Bust of Longfellow.” Boston Globe, June 26, 1902: 3.

-“Girl Killed by Explosion of Oil Lamp: Pretty Frances Korb Dies at City Hospital in Terrible Agony; Father Was Also Burned.” Salina (Kansas) Evening Journal, February 15, 1908: 8.

-“The Globe Latest: Highland District.” Boston Globe, January 8, 1907: 2.

-“Greater Boston News Briefs and Personal Paragraphs: Dorchester District.” Boston Globe, November 20, 1933: 8.

– “Korb.” Boston Globe, September 3, 1957: 46.

-“Lower Mills Ass’n to Have Banquet.” Boston Globe, October 18, 1930: 18.

-“Miss M. Korb’s Mother Worse: Name on City Hospital Dangerous List: Daughter’s Death in Auto Mishap Unknown to Her.” Boston Globe, August 7, 1908: 3.

  1. Steinert & Sons: Our History.

-Public Documents of Massachusetts: Being the Annual Reports of Various Public Officers and Institutions for the Year 1903,” Published by the Secretary of the Commonwealth, vol. XI (Boston: Wright & Potter Printing Co. State Printers, 1904), 98–99.

-“Was Engaged to be Married: Mary Korb Victim of Runaway Auto. Her Sister Frances Also Met Death by Violence,” Boston Globe, August 5, 1908: 1.

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