Military Monday ~ Short Snorter

Another reason to have a blog: yesterday, I received an email from a history buff letting me know that he had a "short snorter" with my father's signature on it.

My first question was: What is a short snorter? From the Short Snorter Project website:

"A short snorter is a banknote which was signed by various persons traveling together or meeting up at different events and records who was met. The tradition was started by bush pilots in Alaska in the 1920's and subsequently spread through the growth of military and commercial aviation. If you signed a short snorter and that person could not produce it upon request, they owed you a dollar or a drink (a “short snort,” aviation and alcohol do not mix!)."

He included a photo.

Marguerite Hunter: A Registered Voter in 1912 (in California)

As I shared at Early 20th Century Hunter Sister Update, I found my great-grandparents, Percy and Marguerite Hunter, in a list of registered voters at an ancestry.com database: California, Voter Registrations, 1900-1968. In 1912, Marguerite and Percy were registered Republican voters, living at 2510 Buena Vista. See the bottom two lines in the image below:

Ancestry.com; California Voter Registrations, 1900-1968; Original data: State of California, United States.
Great Register of Voters. Sacramento, California: California State Library. Year: 1912; Roll: 7; Berkeley Precinct 35.

I just read a post at the Searching for Stories blog where I learned that California women had only just gained the right to vote in a 1911 referendum. It's very likely that my great-grandmother Marguerite voted in the 1912 presidential election! (See 1912 California presidential election results at Wikipedia.)

Page 5 headline from GenealogyBank.com: San Francisco Chronicle, November 6, 1912

The family returned to Pittsburgh by the time of the printing of the 1913 Pittsburgh City Directory, and Marguerite lost the right to vote until the 19th Amendment passed in 1920.

Exercise your right to vote - 100 years ago in Pennsylvania, my great-grandmother, Marguerite Hunter, could not, after having been eligible to vote four years earlier in California.

Sunday's Obituary ~ James J. H. Brown, d. 1912

To follow up on my post from earlier this week about using newspapers to confirm my 4th great-grandfather's death date and burial location, here is an obituary that provides a great deal of information.

"Capt. Brown's Death Hard Blow." The Buffalo Courier, 12 June 1912, online archives
(http://fultonhistory.com/Fulton.html): accessed 6 November 2016, page 6, columns 2-3.

Tuesday's Tip ~ Using Newspapers in Ohio and New York

I have been researching the descendants of my 4th great-grandfather, David Freeland, because I wanted to confirm that the burial record I found for David Freeland in Buffalo, New York, in February 1862, was that of my 4th great-grandfather. I am using the strategy of researching descendants not in my ancestral line to see if any more information can be found out about the common ancestor.

One daughter, Barbara Freeland, married a man with the last name of Brown and had one son, James. Several years after he died, she married Christopher Goulder. She had three sons with him and many grandchildren.

To research the family, who lived in Cleveland, Ohio, I used census records, online vital records (Births, Marriages, Deaths), FindAGrave.com, and newspapers.

The Goulder descendants have been relatively easy to research since Goulder is not a common surname.

James Brown, however, is another story. There are many James Browns out there... and I didn't know if he had stayed in Cleveland or returned to Buffalo, New York, or gone elsewhere. I also didn't have the name of his wife (or wives?) and if he had any children. Could he have died young?

The first clue to narrow down this first cousin 4x removed arrived as I was researching his half-siblings. GenealogyBank.com has digital images of the Cleveland Plain Dealer, which is very useful if you have Cleveland, Ohio, ancestors, and in it I found the 1928 obituary for one of his half brothers, Harvey D. Goulder, who died without children. I also found the following notice:

"Goulder Will Filed." Cleveland Plain Dealer, 23 June 1928, online archives
(http://genealogybank.com/), page 17, column 5.

GOULDER WILL FILED
Admiralty Lawyer Leaves $580,000 in Bonds and Real Estate.
  An estate of $500,000 worth of stocks and bonds and $80,000 worth of real estate was left by Harvey D. Goulder, nationally known admiralty law expert, who died last week, it was learned yesterday when his will was filed by probate.
  Heirs named in an affidavit filed with the will were two brothers, Charles Goulder, 81, of 1261 Parkwod [sic] Drive N. E., and Robert Goulder, 76, of 2826 Coleridge Road, Cleveland Heights, and the four children of a half brother, James J. H. Brown. [emphasis mine.]
  Terms of the will cannot be made public until it has been probated by Probate Judge George S. Addams. The executor is the Central National Bank. Goulder died June 14 at his home 2806 Coleridge Road, after a twelve-day illness.