Shopping Saturday ~ Buy a radio at Levitt's

Levitt's Electric Service, Woodbine, New Jersey

One of my favorite photographs from my husband's family collection is of Levitt's Electric Service storefront. Unfortunately, the quality is not so great. This is a scan of a photograph of a photograph. The writing at the bottom notes that the man at the left is Artis Baker; the man standing near the door is Eddie Levitt, and the man at the right is Morton Levitt. I'm guessing this is from the early 1930's.

Morton (b. 1904) and Edward (b. 1908) Levitt were the youngest two sons of Max and Golda (Segal) Levitt (my husband's great grandparents).

Military Monday ~ WWII brothers die in action

World War II was a defining period in U.S. (and World) History. As a mother of boys, I can't imagine being a mother and sending three sons to fight!

Joseph and Lena Handler had six children, four boys and two girls. I am able to track the family from their immigration, to Joseph's naturalization in 1919, through the 1920 U.S. Federal Census to the 1930 U.S. Federal Census, in Akron, Summit County, Ohio. The three youngest sons enlisted in the U.S. Army and saw action in WWII.

Two of them did not return home.

Getting Ready for the 1940 Census

Because there won't initially be an every-name index to find ancestors in the 1940 U.S. Census when it is released in April 2012, it helps to know the Enumeration District (E.D.) of the ancestor I'm looking for. There are a couple of ways to find the 1940 Enumeration Districts of the ancestors I hope to find once the 1940 Census is released in April 2012. Thank you to Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings for his July 18 post about the availability of 1940 Census Enumeration District Maps at NARA's website. Another option is to go to Steve Morse's 1940 Census Quiz which I believe I first read about in Dick Eastman's newsletter in late June.

In 1940, my husband's father, Joseph Handler, and his family were living at either 553 or 557 Rhodes Avenue in Akron, Ohio. (553 was the address in the 1930 U.S. Census, and 557 was the address I found on Joseph Handler's 1947 death certificate.) To find the E.D., I started at the 1940 Census Quiz looking for what Enumeration District this neighborhood was in. I found this E.D. by using the One-Step Large City E.D. Finder Tool. Entering "Ohio", the city of "Akron", and the street names "Rhodes Av" and cross street "Bishop" (I got a little help from Google Maps to find the cross street), up popped the Enumeration District of 89-70. I can click on "View" under the microfilm number T1224 to see a verbal description of the E.D. where I see that this neighborhood is in Ward 3, Tract F8, Block 15.

I then went to the Archival Research Catalog of the National Archives and entered as search terms: "1940 census maps Akron Ohio". The result with the digital icon at the left brings up maps in thumbnail view. There are only eight maps for Akron, and they do not appear to include the entire city. As I looked through each of these images, I looked for Tract F8, but couldn't find it. (Image 4 has F1, F2, F4, F5, and F6.) When I searched for the county of Summit, Ohio, I did find a county map, and Akron, in general, is in the center of it.

Close-up of 1940 Enumeration District map for Summit County, Ohio

I have marked where I guess that Tract F8 is with a little help from Google Maps. I hope that ARC will update these maps and provide more-detailed maps of the southern half of Akron.