Who Was That Again??

Wait, how were they related? Which generation are we talking about? Who was Frank? Where does Loretta fit in? Who was Grandma Brown? Is it Josie or is it Lucille? I don’t remember anything about Jenny! Or is it Jane? Now you’re talking about Eskil - never heard of him! Are you telling me there were two people named Florence? How is Fred related to Emma? I’M SO CONFUSED!!

The Larson family was large to start with and is getting larger as I tell the stories of the different people who descended from the original Swedish immigrants. I get confused from time to time also! The answers to the above and other questions are on my handy dandy family tree chart you can find here.

The Five Travelers in 1938

If you have read my previous articles about the Larson family members, then you already know several of the people who were on the California trip in 1938. In this article I set the stage for the California trip and provide some additional background on the five people who made the epic journey in 1938.

Frank Larson

Frank emigrated from Sweden in 1881, lived in Limestone, New York and was the patriarch of a large, sprawling family. He was also my great grandfather.

In 1938 Frank was 76, retired and still living in the family home where he and Emma had raised their children. Sadly, he was widowed by that point, having lost his dear Emma in a car accident less than a year before. The immensity of that loss was made more tragic because Frank was driving the car when it crashed and caused severe head trauma to Emma. According to the newspapers, Frank’s car left the road while he was driving and overturned in a ditch. Emma was rushed to the hospital in nearby Bradford, but was not able to recover from her head injury and died just a few days later on May 31, 1937. Frank’s daughter Bertie (profiled below) and her two young children were also in the car but the only person who received serious injury was Emma.

Frank and Emma had celebrated their golden wedding anniversary in grand style four years earlier in July 1933 with a big reception at the fancy Emery Hotel in Bradford, followed by another celebration later that day at their house. Their daughter Jane came from California to help celebrate. Florence came from Vermont. Bertie came from Washington, D.C. Helen and Jule came from Ohio. There was a big write-up in several papers and lots of photos were taken of the festivities that day. Little did they know that for some of the attendees this would be the last time they saw their mother.

For Frank, I believe the 1938 trip served as a pilgrimage to see his far flung children and other relatives. Having lost a spouse myself, I imagine that after losing Emma he was staring his own mortality in the face, and wanted to make the most of the time he had left (I admit I’m projecting my own personal experience here). For a family man like Frank, visiting children and grandchildren he had not seen in many years was likely an important bucket list item he no longer could afford to ignore or delay. At age 76 he knew that this would likely be his last opportunity to see them, and must have felt a sense of urgency. If not now, when?

Another crushing loss for Frank that occurred a few years before Emma’s death was the passing of his son Walter in Alabama. I will save that story for another article, but suffice it to say that, as with Emma’s death, Walter’s was unexpected and sudden, and could easily have stirred up a desire in Frank to see his children in California one more time before it was too late. The sudden loss of Emma pushed him into action.

I don’t know who had the idea first of driving to California, but I’m sure it originated with either Frank or his son Fred.

Fred and Lucille

Fred and Josie Lucille (she went by both names so you may see me using them interchangeably) were my grandparents. They got married in 1914 when Josie was 18 years old. She would have four pregnancies but only two would live to adulthood. Their first child, Fred Jr., died during the flu pandemic in 1920 when he was two years old, and their third child Robert’s birth was apparently a difficult one because he died in 1926 of a forceps head injury less than two months after coming into this world.

Fred was the “Son” in the Larson & Son Grocery in Limestone for many years. In 1927 Fred left the store and moved his family to Fredonia, New York, to go into partnership with a man named George Blood, who had a funeral business there. It isn’t clear why Fred chose that particular profession after the grocery store, but knowing what I know about him and his personality, I can see that it would have been a good fit. For starters, he was a very likeable, gregarious fellow. This is a valuable trait in networking and building any business that serves the general public. He was also very comfortable in a variety of social and business settings. My mother was proud of the fact that her parents counted as close friends both the high society crowd (tea parties and bridge clubs) as well as the working class crowd (fire hall dinners and pinochle clubs). In his obituary in 1947 the local newspaper described him as “deeply interested in civic affairs.” The paper went on to say that even though Fred had been a resident of Fredonia for less than twenty-five years, “his affable personality won for him a wide acquaintanceship. The acquaintances he made in a new environment swiftly deepened into deep and lasting friendships. He will be sorely missed in many circles.”

Fred served a number of years on the Fredonia school board and town council, rubbing shoulders with doctors, lawyers, judges and other prominent businessmen. As the coroner and ambulance service, he drove all over the county at all hours of the day and night to serve the needs of the community and its people.

Fred and Lucille were people who cared deeply about others and did not take their privilege and affluence for granted. My mother swore that her family was “not rich” but in reviewing the record, it’s clear to me that they definitely lived a comfortable life. The fact that they could afford a new car and an expensive trip to California in the middle of a world-wide economic depression is revealing. When the Depression hit, they remained relatively untouched on a personal level. But they knew not everyone was as fortunate as they were. When someone’s family member died and needed Fred’s services, he was always willing to negotiate the price and method of payment so that the loved one could be buried in a timely and dignified fashion. My mother said that while she was growing up the basement of the funeral home was full of furniture and other items from the days when people did not have the cash to pay and bartered for the services they needed.

Once the decision was made to go to California, Fred was the primary organizer. While Frank had made trips to California with Emma after he retired from the grocery, I have not found any evidence that Fred and Josie had ever gone out west. It appears that this trip was a very special one that would involve a lot of sightseeing and touring as well as seeing family. Fred made good use of all of his extraordinary organizational skills plus his meticulous attention to detail to plan every aspect of this trip.

As I am writing this in the midst of planning my own trip to follow in their footsteps it occurs to me that this apple has apparently not fallen too far from my grandfather’s tree…

For example:

Fred bought a new car for the occasion (I have a newish van). He recruited two of his sisters to come along (I’ll have my dog). He consulted a travel agent and paid for a detailed itinerary that mapped out every route through every state (I am using various apps to help me plan the route). He figured out how far they would need to drive everyday and where they would stay when they stopped (I’m doing the same). He chose the key sights that he and the others wanted to see on the way there and on the way back and this determined some of the detours they took along the way (I have built in some of my own touring priorities while I’m on their route). He figured out exactly how long they would have during each stop so that they could stay on schedule (I have reservations in place along the way that will keep me on track). They made strategic use of Western Union telegraph offices along the route to communicate back and forth with the folks back home and the folks they were hoping to visit (I have my cell phone, computer, and GPS communicator).

The detailed information provided by the Touraide booklet is pretty remarkable when you think about the fact that there was no modern superhighway system yet in place, and all the motor courts and auto camps (as they were called then) were individually owned and operated. I’m sure Fred paid a pretty penny for the professional effort required to put his itinerary together.

Fred also would have been in touch with the various people they intended to visit on the trip. There was Walter’s family in Mobile, Alabama, as well as some business there that needed tending. There was sister Jennie in Bakersfield, where they would be spending the bulk of their time. There was brother Alex in San Francisco. And there was an entire branch of Frank’s family living in Rockford, Illinois, where they planned to stop on the way back.

While Fred was planning the trip, my grandmother Josie was busily making arrangements for the kids and probably figuring out what to pack. With five adults traveling in one car there wouldn’t be much room for the clothing and personal belongings, and they would have to be prepared for all types of weather. My Uncle Bill (“Billy”) was 15 years old and my mother (“Joanie”) was almost 9. They were still in school in March 1938 and would not make the trip with their parents. Instead, they would stay back in the apartment over the funeral home and Josie’s mother Loretta (“Grandma Brown” to my mother) would care for them. The funeral business would be overseen by Fred’s partner George Blood (you have to admit that’s quite a name for a funeral director…).

All the pieces were now in place. So who were the other two people going on this month-long vacation?

Florence

I have mentioned Florence several times in other articles because she has been a primary source behind different parts of the story I have told thus far. She died in 1998 at the age of 106. Her daughter Rhea was like a sister to my mother so we knew that family pretty well when I was growing up. I got to meet Flo several times and even as a child I could appreciate her independent spirit, her no-nonsense approach to life, and the love she had for her family. She was mentally sharp as a tack right up to the end. Before she died she made arrangements to donate her brain to the National Parkinson Foundation and University of Miami Brain Endowment Bank in the hopes that her brain might be helpful to researchers focussed on finding the causes and treatments for diseases like Parkinson’s, schizophrenia and Alzheimer’s. She was the oldest living brain donor at the time, and the Foundation was able to interview her every year from age 100 to 106 so that they had a good baseline of data to work with once she passed. Way to go Flo!!

Florence was good with numbers and her father Frank taught her how to keep the books in the grocery store. This skill served her well and she was always able to find work, even during the difficult years of the Great Depression. She worked for a few years in the 1920’s as a secretary or bookkeeper for several different state-run institutions in western New York.

A small digression (because I can’t help myself…)

During the late 19th and through much of the 20th centuries large institutions (also known as asylums) were commonplace around the country, and there were quite a few in New York state. They housed thousands upon thousands of pensioners, persons deemed mentally ill or unfit, orphans, and the old and poor with nowhere else to go. These institutions also included training schools for “wayward boys" and schools for assimilating Native American children into the dominant culture (there has been much written recently about what went on at many of these Indian schools). This reform movement was borne out of mostly benevolent (but also highly racist and classist) aspirations to help the vulnerable and prevent the destitution and extreme poverty experienced by so many in those days. The reality was very different, however, and many people suffered at the hands of the people running the institutions. One of the most notorious (and I mean that in the most negative possible way) Indian schools in the country was the Thomas Indian School in Western New York. Originally named the Thomas Asylum for Orphan and Destitute Indian Children, this institution began operating in the mid-1800’s with a goal of saving Native American children from the poverty experienced by their parents living on the reservations. They tried to do this by taking the children away from the reservations and raising them at the school, acculturating and assimilating them into the dominant White population and European-based culture. The unambiguous intention around this cultural indoctrination was to strip all Native American identity from the children who attended the school. The school was still going strong when Florence worked there for a few years in the 1920’s.

My discovery that Florence found steady work in several of these asylums that have such horrific histories (and many experts think the Thomas School was one of the worst of its kind) blows my mind. I try to imagine what it must have been like to work in those asylums during Flo’s young adult years. Although she was not one of the caregivers who would have been assigned to the care of patients (or inmates, as they were often called), could she really have been blind to what went on there? I can’t imagine it, but we have no real way of knowing what she thought about what she surely saw and heard going on around her. She told my mother that she “loved” working at the Thomas School for the few years she was there and I’m guessing that’s probably because she enjoyed the people she worked with and felt she was making a valuable contribution to a societal good. I’m sure she was a product of her time and wanted to believe the best about the places that hired her.

Florence and Daniel lived in Bennington for almost nine years. According to local papers Florence was active in the VFW Auxiliary and was a talented bridge player, winning prizes for her high scores (seems kind of quaint that such things were routinely reported in local papers). When she wasn’t playing cards Florence was supporting the family through her office job at the Bennington Wax Paper company. She must have made quite an impression there because the office staff threw her a festive going-away party in 1937 just before she moved back to Limestone. Rhea, who was 13 when they moved from Bennington back to Limestone, also received a goodbye party from her teachers and school friends.

By 1937 Flo’s marriage had fallen completely apart. As a musician Daniel no doubt had difficulty finding steady work during those Depression years, and when Flo’s mother died she apparently decided that was a good time to return to Limestone. Unlike several of her sisters who were never single for very long and went through two and sometimes three husbands, Florence made her way in the world as a single, self-sufficient working mother and would never marry again. And unlike her sisters who gave up careers to tend the home and family, Flo lived and worked independently her entire life. She remained very close to her father Frank and when she moved to Florida after the 1938 California trip, she left Rhea behind to stay with Frank and finish school in Limestone. This gave her a chance to settle and find work before Rhea joined her.

While Flo and Frank were gone to California, Rhea stayed in Fredonia with her cousins Billy and Joanie (my mother) and transferred to school there while the travellers were on the road.

Florence had been in California a couple of times, once in 1912 when Frank sent her out to care for Jennie when she was sick and again in 1922 when she visited just before she began working for the Thomas School. I’m sure she was eager to see her sister again and didn’t hesitate to join the group of travelers. This would be a very different trip for her, full of sightseeing and fun with some of her favorite people.

Bertie

Bertie was the youngest of the clan of eleven children in Frank and Emma’s household. The oldest child, Jennie, was 20 years old when Bertie was born in 1904. While Bertie was still a baby Jennie would marry and move out of the house. Fred was 17 years older than Bertie, and Florence was 11 years older. She was truly the “babe” of the family, and that’s what they called her throughout her childhood.

When Bertie was six years old Frank took her on one of his trips to visit Sweden. There is no evidence that Frank took any of his other children on one of his Swedish trips (much to Flo’s annoyance as reported to my mother), which suggests that she held a special place in Frank’s heart as the youngest of his large brood.

Also at Cornell she met Ralph Tweedale (who went by “Tweed”). Tweed was to become a well-respected patent attorney and a bit of a Shakespeare scholar in retirement, but in those early days at Cornell he was apparently quite the rogue. He liked cars and in 1927, just as he was getting ready to start his senior year at Cornell he got himself arrested for car theft. The Ithaca Journal reported the incident thusly:

A man who described himself as R.C. Champlin, of 717 Washington Street…called the detectives and wanted to know whether they could tell him the name of the owner of a Ford car. Detective Donahue stalled him off for awhile, but the man hung up the receiver.

Detective Sergeant John I. Crawford, quick to take in the situation, said that there was no such a number on Washington Street. Then the sleuths began to smell a rat. All was not well, they averred.

Another telephone call came in from the same man. He indicated that he had valuable information relative to the car as he had once done work on it and had never received pay. At this juncture the detectives set to work.

While they were investigating, another call was received a half hour later from a third station. It was learned that the man had been talking from pay stations…Tweedale, singled out as the man from a description given at one of the places from which he telephoned, was picked up by Detective Donahue…and taken to headquarters for questioning. He declared that he was a student at Cornell University.

Tweed spent the night in jail, and when the dust finally settled, the police determined that Tweed was indeed a student at Cornell and that he had stolen several other vehicles, selling a couple of them to unsuspecting students at Cornell. Tweed told the detectives that he owned a Ford roadster that he claimed to have purchased, but then admitted to purchasing a set of plates in Washington, D.C. for a fictitious car, which he then used on the stolen cars. Once caught, he came clean, admitted to a total of four thefts and indicated his intent to plead guilty and make restitution. His mischievous but somewhat benevolent spirit is exemplified in this account of one of his thefts:

He said that he drove one of the cars back to Buffalo, learned the name of the owner and took the car within two blocks of the owner’s home. He said that he went to the home of the owner… and gave a note to a young woman, explaining where the car could be found.

As I was doing my research on Bertie I found these tales of Tweed highly amusing. Was Bertie attracted to his “bad boy” image? Was she the girl who bought one of the cars he stole? Apparently after they married and moved to Washington, D.C. (where he would earn his law degree at George Washington University), he drove a taxicab to earn money. One evening while driving the cab he somehow drove into a woman and her adult son, knocking them down. Fortunately, no one was badly injured. In today’s world I’m not sure Tweed would have gotten off so easy after committing grand theft auto, a serious felony. He could easily have gone to prison and all his career aspirations would have gone up in smoke. His parents were contacted when all this happened and I’m sure there was heavy negotiating between the police department, the prosecutor’s office, the university and the family. He was allowed to return to school and from then on stayed on a straight and narrow path.

After receiving his law degree and working in D.C. for a couple years, Tweed moved with Bertie to Waterbury, Connecticut where he worked as an engineer and inventor for the Waterbury Tool Company and was awarded several patents. Bertie was quite a social butterfly in Waterbury as an active member and officer of the Waterbury Women’s Club, which hosted numerous social events, bridge parties and fundraisers. She also made use of her sewing and design skills volunteering as a costumer and seamstress for numerous local theatrical productions. In 1937 the couple would move to Southfield, Michigan, but Bertie still had close ties in Waterbury in 1938 when she was considering the California trip.

Bertie didn’t decide to go on the trip until Friday, February 25, 1938, just days before they were to leave. She was living in Michigan and sent a telegram to Fred in Fredonia that day that said “Ok I will go with you.” She then informed the group that she was heading to Waterbury, Connecticut for the weekend, but would arrive at the airport in Cleveland Monday night. That would have been Monday, February 28, just in the nick of time to join the group before they departed first thing in the morning on Tuesday, March 1. She barely made it, however, and had to send another telegram letting the group know that she would be flying in at 1:21 a.m. Tuesday morning and would need someone to meet her. Apparently someone did, and Bertie was ready to roll with the rest of the gang when they posed for their picture the morning they left.

Next Steps

The stage is now set for the launch of this long-awaited, meticulously planned trip. Next time you hear from me I’ll be on the road and so will the Larson gang!

Sources

Some of the information in this article came from the following sources:

• Larson, Zeb. (2018). America's Long-Suffering Mental Health System. Ohio State University. https://origins.osu.edu/article/americas-long-suffering-mental-health-system?language_content_entity=en

• Burich, Keith R. (2016). The Thomas Indian School and the “irredeemable” children of New York. Syracuse University Press.