We’re Number One: Davenport Firsts

Posted on May 4, 2009 by SCblogger

We felt like bragging this week, so we’ve brought out a brief list of some of the statewide or national things that happened first in Davenport.

 In rough chronological order:

 The first locomotive in Iowa was delivered in Davenport on July 20, 1855. 

 The first Railroad bridge over the Mississippi River was finished in April of 1856.  On May 6, two weeks later, the Effie Afton became the first steamboat to collide with a Mississippi River railroad bridge.

 In 1858, Abraham S. Kissell was appointed Superintendent of the newly formed Davenport and Scott County schools system, becoming the first school superintendent in Iowa.

 Phebe W. Sudlow was possibly the first woman principal of a public school in the United States (promoted in 1859) and was definitely the first female superintendent of schools in Iowa—and perhaps also the United States (appointed in 1874).* 

 The First National Bank of Davenport was the first US Bank to open under the National Banking Act of 1863.  The bank secured the very first certificate issued by the United States under the new Act.

 The first recorded appendectomy in the United States was performed at Mercy Hospital in 1883.

 The Crescent Macaroni Company, built in 1894, was the first macaroni manufacturer in the United States.

 D.D. Palmer made the first chiropractic adjustment in Davenport on September 18, 1895, and later established Palmer College of Chiropractic, the first of its kind in the United States.

 Alexander F. Victor owned nearly 80 patents for his motion picture inventions.  Among these inventions were the first 16mm projectors and cameras, which his Davenport-based company, Victor Animatograph began manufacturing in 1923.  The Eastman Kodak Company produced the 16mm film to be used with the machines, a combination that eventually led to the standardization of equipment for non-professional photographers and producers of home movies.

The Centennial Bridge, the first four-lane highway to span the Mississippi River, opened on July 12, 1940, connecting Davenport to Rock Island, Illinois.

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* Miss Sudlow was also elected the first female president of the Iowa State Teachers Association (in 1876) and the first female professor at the University of Iowa (hired in 1878).  These aren’t exactly firsts for Davenport, per se, but she’s one of us, so we think they should count.

 

 

 

 

(Posted by Sarah)

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From the Archives: The Masquers

Posted on April 27, 2009 by SCblogger

A recent addition to our Archive & Manuscript collection has brought to the forefront visions of Davenport drama and theater clubs.

Davenport’s Friendly House was an early supporter of this creative outlet, first providing the venue for the “Friendly House Players” and later the “Masquers Dramatic Club”. The “Players” were active from 1916 until about 1930 and performed for ten years in Claus Groth Hall, the first building Friendly House owned, located at 1224-1228 West Third Street. A fire in 1925 destroyed that building and all was lost with the exception of one set of Shakespearean costumes which the “Players” painstakingly repaired. These costumes were used again years later in a production, receiving much publicity.

The Friendly House built another building at 303 Taylor and continued the community theater mission, providing an auditorium with seating for 700, a system of univents insuring good ventilation and accoustolith plaster walls. . Although the original “Players” group stopped performing, a new group of enthusiastic Thespians began classes at Friendly House in 1931 and by 1933 they had formed a club and were performing as “The Masquers”.  Trained and often directed by Louise Murphy, a former member of the “Players” herself, this group pleased audiences with productions for the next twenty-plus years. They were the only Davenport theater group to make it through the Depression era and the World War II years. In fact in the 40’s one of their male actors exited the stage at Intermission only to be met and escorted by an officer to play another role…in the U. S. Army!

masquers-2009-06

 

We are delighted to have received scrapbooks kept by Louise Murphy documenting the professional and candid moments of these talented “Masquers” from 1933-1944. Telegrams extending good wishes, tickets, programs, photographic images and many news clippings  provide a sense of the pride and professionalism these Davenporters felt for their craft.  This collection is open for research and provides a fabulous opportunity to explore the cultural and social side of Davenport.

 

 

(Submitted by Karen)

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We Salute Our Volunteers!

Posted on April 21, 2009 by SCblogger

volunteers

 

Yesterday, the Davenport Public Library gave a reception to thank library volunteers for all that they do.  Those volunteers who could attend included many of the wonderful people who help our Special Collections Center .

 

 

What do Special Collections volunteers do?   What don’t they do?

Some cover the desk, answer phones, assist patrons, and work on research requests, and generally keep things running smoothly for several hours a week so our staff can  to concentrate on behind-the-scenes projects.  Other volunteers concentrate on several of those projects with us, painstakingly going through each resource (that’s books, newspapers and microfilm) line by line,  indexing and then entering data.  And a few of them do it all!

So here’s to the wonderful people who spend their spare time helping us help you!  We couldn’t run the Center (or take the time to blog) without you!

 

volunteers1

Amy G. and the Special Collections volunteers who attended the reception.
This group represents about half of the total number of marvelous people who help in our department!

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The Fire Fighting Advance that Wasn’t

Posted on April 20, 2009 by SCblogger

In 1899, Davenport was a growing city.  This concerned those responsible for public safety, not only because the city was growing out, but because it was growing up.  From a fire department’s point of view, higher buildings mean higher fires—and in the late 1800s, when firefighting technology was in its infancy, this was no minor problem.

Grain elevators, those looming giants stuffed with a ton or two of flammables, were a fireman’s nightmare.  If one of these monstrosities caught on fire, more often that not it was hopeless to try to contain the blaze.  Standard fire equipment simply didn’t have the reach.

But when the Davenport Elevator Company decided to build a grain elevator in the west end, Davenport Fire Chief Peter M. Gilloley had a cutting edge solution in mind:  sky-high, permanent water nozzles.

According to an article in the Davenport Weekly Leader*:

“Fire Chief P. M. Gilloley of the fire department of this city is deeply interested in a new nozzle which is being adopted by the fire departments of a number of the larger cities and which are permanently fixed in large elevators or other high structures of a like nature where it is hard for departments to combat the flames.  It is so constructed as to retab [sic] automatically sending a solid stream in all directions.”

The idea was that the nozzles would be anchored around the top of an elevator, or other tall structure, and hose or pipe would lead from there to the ground.  In the event of a blaze, the fire department would connect the end to a water source, and the nozzles would send water spraying

In the City Council Meeting held on December 20, 1899, Chief Gilloley presented a report from the Chicago Fire Marshall, stating that the nozzles had saved all but the roof of an elevator in Milwaukee.**  He urged that they be used on the new west end elevator.

The city council tabled the issue twice, and finally decided that it was a private company’s responsibility to install (and pay for) its own permanent fire-fighting equipment as per the legal advice at https://slffirm.com/the-camp-fire-paradise-butte-county-ca/. Although they had no objection to recommending the nozzles to the Davenport Elevator Company, or to others wanting to build large structures in Davenport.  However, if an excessively tall public building were to be constructed in the future, the council would keep the idea in mind.

We could find nothing more about Chief Gilloley’s dream in our resources, but we see no evidence that any sky-high nozzles were used in Davenport three tallest buildings.  Of course, these were all private structures, and the Black Hawk Hotel was built sixteen years later, more than enough time, even then, to render cutting edge obsolete.

 

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*November 21, 1899, p.6

*There was a third nozzle that could have prevented even that damage, but the fire was too intense near the base of its structure to connect it to the water source.  Still, the fire was stopped and the building was still viable.

(posted by Sarah)

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Mission Accomplished: Census Mortality Schedules

Posted on April 14, 2009 by SCblogger

A few weeks ago, we mentioned the addition of two new indexes to our collection of searchable databases.  One of these was the Mortality Schedules for Scott County, Iowa.

Mortality Schedules are the section of each Federal Census that provides information on those persons who died within the twelve months prior to the taking of that Census.  These Schedules provide a variety of information—age at death, cause of death—depending on the census year.

Our marvelous volunteers have been working diligently to index the 1850, 1860, 1870, and 1880 Mortality Schedules for our county, and then type, enter and upload each line. 

And with the addition of the 1054th entry, we are pleased to announce that this project is now complete. Come visit our website and check out the results of months and months (and months) of hard work—you might just find another leaf on the family tree!

Congratulations to all who worked to make this information available to everyone!

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Guilty Pleasures: Genealogy Blogs

Posted on April 13, 2009 by SCblogger

Blogging is huge right now, and genealogy blogs are booming. Although our little blog hasn’t made one of these lists yet, some very thought provoking ones have. So next time you have a few minutes, you may want to do some browsing. One of my favorites made both lists! I relish Footnotemaven’s Shades of the Departed.  It is my guilty pleasure as my personal obsession is old photographs.  Another spot on read is the Genealogy Tip of the Day by Michael John Neill, a Galesburg, IL resident. Follow the links below for two lists of current favorites. Perhaps you will find your own guilty pleasure!

25 Most Popular Genealogy Blogs

http://www.progenealogists.com/top25blogs2009.htm

10 Genealogy Blogs Worth Reading

http://www.blogs.com/topten/10-genealogy-blogs-worth-reading/index.html

 

(submitted by Karen)

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In Defense of Ordinary Ancestors

Posted on April 6, 2009 by SCblogger

“An Authority said not long ago that there are only 40 or 50 American families that are in any way entitled to the insignia of nobility, but you cannot get the average American who has made money to believe that.  He is sure that among his ancestors he shall find somewhere coronets and Norman blood, and when he hires a genealogist to study his lineage, woe be to the searcher if he does not discover at least a baronet or two.” Davenport Democrat, 3Dec1905, p.4

Times have changed.  In our experience, most genealogists are truth-seekers, rejoicing in the location and documentation of their Great Uncle Bill (who led a blameless life selling wool socks) and in finally being able to hang his ordinary ornament in place on the family tree.  No ancestor left behind is their motto.

We do admit that some still long for roots of gold.  And there’s nothing wrong in wanting to join the Daughters of the American Revolution, or finding the truth about grandma’s stories about her grandmother, the full-blooded daughter of a Cherokee chieftain, or whether that family crest you want to hang in the living room is the real deal or something your grandfather bought from a travelling insignia salesman who happened to have your surname in stock. 

The problems come when a searcher intent on fame-by-inheritance ignores documented evidence, or lack of any, in the hopes that grafting an apple branch onto an orange tree will somehow make the oranges taste better.  It’s as if they believe that without a king or war hero (or, these days, an infamous black sheep) in their ancestry, they are somehow diminished, the ordinary descendant of (yawn) ordinary people.

They forget, or never considered, how interesting an ‘ordinary’ person can be. 

Take Great Uncle Bill for instance, that ho hum seller of itchy foot coverings who isn’t even in the direct line:  He was the first member of the family to be born in America, not two months after his parents came here from Germany.1   He wasn’t quite old enough to fight in World War I, instead staying home to endure the suspicions faced by anyone who spoke or understood German.2    Great Uncle Bill owned and operated his own sock shop-throughout the Depression, no less—employing his family (his sister, Great Grandma Erma, helped knit the merchandise—she taught her daughters the patterns, and they taught theirs) until they got back on their feet. 3   His wife, Laura, died in childbirth and he never remarried, though photos show a handsome, dapper fellow with the family nose and eyebrows.4   He raised his surviving son, Thomas,  by himself, but lost him in World War II; he sponsored the Memorial Day parade for years afterward.5   Great Uncle Bill sold the shop when he turned sixty; the store is now a Batteries Plus.6   He died at the age of seventy-four and was buried next to Laura; his estate went to his nieces and nephews, two of whom are named after him.7    His knock-knock jokes are legendary , especially the risqué ones, and are repeated at every single family reunion.8

An ordinary life, full of ordinary difficulties, trials, triumphs.  All families, for the most part, are a long series of lives like these, people who loved and lived and didn’t need family crests or tiaras to be worth remembering.  In the end, at our end, it doesn’t matter whether our ancestors were rich, poor, beggars, thieves, doctors, lawyers, or descendants of royalty.

It only matters that they are ours.

___

Similar information on your own Great Uncle Bill might be found in:

1 birth records and immigration papers or census information

2 Newspapers and local histories

3 City Directories, census information, and family stories and documents

4 Death records, family photos

5 Obituaries, newspaper accounts

6 City Directories

7 Death records, cemetery records, probate records

8 Family stories

 (Posted by Sarah)

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Probate Records: Exempt from Execution

Posted on March 30, 2009 by SCblogger

Probate records are very popular with genealogists, and no wonder.  Probates basically tell the story of who got what and what it was, which is always interesting, and to this end, it includes an heir list and an inventory of the deceased’s property, often down to the contents of the house.  A probate file can even outline the family’s spending habits through the bills submitted to the estate.

The forms themselves are an interesting record of the time period in which they were used.  On the back of the inventory form for a 1868 Scott County probate file, for example, are instructions on the specific property that is ‘exempt from execution,’ if the deceased left a living spouse.  In, other words, this is a list of the type and amount of possessions that the executor of an estate had to set aside for the widow, safe from the claims of creditors or other heirs.

Here is a breakdown of this list:

  • Wearing apparel, trunks or other receptacles to contain same;
  • The proper tools, instruments, or books of any farmer, lawyer, &c;
  • Horse, or team, not more than two horses or mules, or two yoke of cattle, and wagon, or other vehicle with harness;
  • All private libraries, family bibles, portraits, pictures and paintings not kept for sale;
  • A pew;
  • An interest in burying ground, not exceeding one acre;
  • One cow and calf;
  • Fifty sheep and wool therefrom;
  • Five hogs, and all pigs under six months;
  • The necessary food for animals exempt for sixty days;
  • All flax raised, and manufactures therefrom;
  • One bedstead and bedding for every two in the family;
  • All cloth manufactured by the deceased, not exceeding one hundred yards;
  • Household and kitchen furniture, not exceeding one hundred dollars in value;
  • Spinning wheels and looms, and other instruments of domestic labor kept for actual use;
  • The necessary provisions and fuel for the use of the family for six months.

 

Some of the above were obviously chosen for the sake of survival, economic stability, or personal sentiment.  But a few might seem slightly obscure–the pew, for example, might seem odd, unless you know that in some churches, parishioners could buy (or ‘sponsor’) a pew, which meant that they and their family had the privilege of sitting in it and perhaps installing a plaque on the aisle side stating that this was the case.  The allowed bedstead and bedding for every two in the family might also seem a little awkward to the modern mind as well, depending on the numbers and demographics of the household, but in a time when there might be little indoor heat or floor space, two to a bed was quite generous.*

So if you’d like to find how who really inherited your ancestor’s estate, the extent of that estate, and perhaps other information beyond date of death and place of burial, why not try probate records?  And if your ancestors lived–and died–in Scott County, why not try our collection?

 

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*In fact, compared to some of the Scott County divorce settlements recorded in our early documents, the terms of this list are positively luxurious.  It is perhaps a credit to the honesty and integrity of early Scott County citizens that more marriages didn’t end in mysterious death, rather than divorce.

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Not Exactly Neighborly: The City Hospital Fire of 1860

Posted on March 24, 2009 by SCblogger

Every city experiences growing pains along the way, and Davenport, Iowa is no different. As population and businesses grew during the nineteenth century the city began to adapt. Davenport’s city council realized early on that two medical facilities to treat different medical needs were required as the town expanded: a hospital and a pest house.

It was not unusual during the nineteenth and even early twentieth, century for hospitals to only treat patients suffering from non-communicable diseases: broken bones, diarrhea, rheumatism and the like.

The pest house, or pestilence house, was built for those with contagious diseases such as cholera, smallpox or measles. Frequently found on hospital properties or near a cemetery, these buildings were not built for long standing use, but to get through epidemics. In Davenport, pest houses seem to have had shorter existences than usual.

City council research indicates that a city hospital was available in Davenport by the early 1850s. City council minutes of June 6, 1855 reference the matter of fencing in the city hospital grounds. It looks as though these were rented properties and buildings until 1858 when the city built and opened a City Hospital on Locust Street, north of downtown.

If you ever wondered how many people took advantage of hospitals in the mid-nineteenth century the answer seems to be not many, at least not in Davenport. With barely a handful of patients per month and the cost of running the building nearly $1,000 for the same time period, the city council made the decision to close and sell the hospital in 1859. By 1860, the building was still for sale and contained only a caretaker to watch over the structure and grounds.

Finding patients seems to be only one problem. Neighbors were not likely to appreciate living near a hospital or pest house. Fear of disease must have been overwhelming at a time when no control was possible over sick individuals coming into the area and when many diseases had no known cure.

It appears that by March 1860 that one or more individuals felt compelled to act as talk began to grow of using the pest house again in Davenport. On March 15, 1860 an empty building described as “the old City Hospital” was burnt down by supposed arson on West Second Street near the City Cemetery.* On March 17th another structure in the same area was also destroyed by fire that was also determined to be arson. This empty house sat one mile from City Cemetery near the river. The rumor was the house was to be sold to the city for the new pest house after the first site burnt down. The Davenport Daily Gazette even wrote that several fire companies started out to the second fire, but turned around and went home when they realized which building was aflame.**

Then, on the evening of March 20, 1860 fire struck the closed City Hospital on Locust Street. Arson was the verdict. The Davenport Daily Gazette reported that the city had recently discussed turning the building into the new pest house. The paper also mentioned the two previous fires that had occurred only days before in buildings used, or rumored about to be used, as the pest house. The Daily Democrat briefly reported in its May 22, 1860 edition on the fire, but without mention of arson. They did note that the city alderman had insured the building for $1,000 on that very afternoon. The paper jokingly said while they knew the city needed money; they doubted the alderman had burned it down!

We have not been able to uncover reports of any individuals arrested for the various fires. Could the last fire have been an insurance fire as the Daily Democrat insinuated tongue-in-cheek? Or should we look back to May 25, 1857 when the Davenport Daily Gazette reported that an arson fire destroyed a building on the corner of Warren and Seventh Streets. That building had just been rented to the City for use as a hospital.

Currently, we will have to put this story down to another local History Mystery. We will keep our eyes open for more evidence that may present itself. We hope you do too!

(Posted by Amy D.)

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*Davenport Daily Gazette, March 17, 1860. Page 1.

** Davenport Daily Gazette, March 20, 1860. Page 1.

 

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Now Available: Two New Online Indexes

Posted on March 23, 2009 by SCblogger

We are pround to announce that our searchable Local Index Databases  have increased by two!

The anticipated index for the  Civil War Enlistment Papers is now up and running.  As you may recall, these papers are for the men who volunteered for the Union Army in Iowa after June of 1862.  We are regularaly adding more soldiers to this database, so please check frequently! 

Also, we have added the Mortality Schedules for the 1850, 1860, 1870, and 1880 Federal Census.  These schedules list the people who died in the twelve months prior to each census being taken in June.  Depending on the year, these schedules provide a variety of information, including the cause of death.   This index is also being updated on a weekly basis.

So please take the time to explore our Local Index Databases this spring—and watch your family tree flower!

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