Stories From the Census ~ Bubbie Lena in 1950

I have not had any luck finding my late father-in-law, Harry Handler, in the 1950 census. It is believed that he had moved from his hometown of Akron, Ohio, to live in the Atlantic City, New Jersey, area where his oldest brother, Arthur had moved in the late 1930s. But I can't find Uncle Arthur and his family either.

In 1940, Harry was living with his parents and other siblings in Akron, and Arthur, his wife, and two daughters, were living in Ventnor, New Jersey.

I thought perhaps Harry had returned to Akron, and I easily found Harry's mother, known to my husband as Bubbie Lena, living, as expected, at 557 Rhodes Avenue, in Akron. Harry was not living with her.

1950 U.S. census, Summit County, Ohio, Akron, ED 89-141, sheet 8, line 3, household 76 (Lena Handler); U.S. National Archives, 1950 Census (https://1950census.archives.gov/search/).

Lena lived in apartment 2 in this building. She was a 59-year-old Hungarian-born widow and a naturalized citizen. The "H" in column 15, asking what she did in the past week, indicated that she was keeping house.

She was one of five on the page asked the supplemental questions, which in her case, provided some interesting information.

Genealogy Blog as ... Bait

We genealogy bloggers often talk about blogs being cousin bait, meaning that relatives (known and unknown) search their ancestors' names on the Internet and our blog posts appear in the search results. They connect with the blogger and family history information is excitedly shared.

Well, blogs can be "bait" for those who may not be relatives but may have something of interest to share with us.

Years ago, I blogged about my husband's great-uncle Sam Handler, who ran several businesses in Cleveland, Ohio, over the years. At Workday Wednesday ~ Sam Handler, I shared what I had found in census records and city directories: he had run two different beverage companies during his many years in Cleveland.

At A Second Cousin Contacted Me, I shared my excitement about having a second cousin of my husband find my blog post about his grandfather, Sam Handler.

Sam died in California after moving there with his daughter and son-in-law.

This week, I received a package (actually mailed to the business address of the local historical society where I volunteer) with a bottle in it.

The following photographs are courtesy of my husband (and his light box):

Stories From the Census ~ Hattie Handler

When the 1930 census became publicly available in 2002, one of the first families I searched for was that of my father-in-law, because I knew exactly where the Handlers were living: in Akron, Ohio.

I knew I had the right family on lines 29-36: head of household Joe, wife Lena, and children, son Arthur, age 20; daughter Margaret, age 16; daughter Bella, age 12, son Alfred, age 10, son Louis, age 8, and daughter Hattie, age 7.

1930 U.S. census, Summit County, Ohio, population schedule, Akron, enumeration district 77-44, sheet 14A, dwelling 23, family 28, record for Joe Handlar [sic]; image, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com : accessed 7 September 2009); citing NARA microfilm publication T626, roll 1875.

Daughter, Hattie? Actually that last name should be son, Harry, age 7, my father-in-law.

When I showed this to my father-in-law, he laughed, and imitated his mother's accent as she likely recited the names of her children for the census taker. She was from Hungary, and spoke Hungarian, also referred to as Magyar. With this accent, it is absolutely possible that "Harry" sounded like "Hattie" to a census taker not familiar with the family.

Although it is not known for certain who provided the information to the census taker in any U.S. census before 1940, based on Harry's memory and description of his mother's accent, it is very likely that Lena provided the Handler household's information to the census taker in 1930.

A Jitney Driver in Miami Between Censuses

Thank you to the cousin of my husband's who let me know (a couple of years ago) that he found Joseph Handler as a jitney driver in a Miami, Florida, City Directory in the 1920s, thus confirming the family story that my husband's grandfather moved his family to Florida to see if he could be more successful there than in Akron, Ohio.

A jitney is a small bus which got its name because jitney was a term for a nickel and that's what it cost to ride the early jitneys.

This image from the Library of Congress website is a photograph of a New York City jitney in about 1915 to 1920.

Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, [reproduction number, e.g., LC-B2-1234]

Census records show the following addresses and occupations for Joseph Handler:

Year	City	Address	Occupation
1910	Cleveland	2515 Woodland Avenue	None, Factory
1920	Akron	644 Bell Street	Laborer, Rubber Works
1930	Akron	553 Rhodes Avenue	Salesman, Junk
1940	Akron	553 Rhodes Avenue	Industrial Salvage, Own Truck

But what happened between the times that the U.S. federal census was taken? It turns out that a lot can happen in ten years.

The following table shows where I have found Joseph Handler in city directories in the early 1920s.

City	Year	Name	Occupation	Address
Akron	1922	Joseph Handler [Lena]	jitney driver	h 406 Raasch ave
Akron	1924	Joseph Handler [Lena]	jitney driver	h 406 Raasch ave
Akron	1925	Joseph Handler [Lena]	[no occupation]	h 406 Raasch ave

Joseph Handler doesn't appear in Akron City directories before 1922, though he was living there by 1917 when his daughter Belle was born. (Prior to that, he was living in Cleveland.) His 1918 World War I Draft Card reports that he was living at 646 Bell Street and working as a bartender for his cousin, Herman. He lived in Akron until at least the fall of 1922, when youngest son, Harry, was born.

But in 1925, Jos Handler appeared as a jitney driver in Miami, Florida.

Obituary for Herman Handler

Herman Handler died on March 19, 1961, in Youngstown, Ohio. There was a brief obituary in the Akron Beacon Journal the following day, which wonderfully ties together much of what I've found about the family.

"Herman Handler," Akron Beacon Journal, 20 March 1961, p. 24, col. 1;
digital image, Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com : viewed 7 October 2018).

City Directories Tell a Story for Herman Handler

Herman Handler appeared in a few city directories after he immigrated to America. Although I don't find him every year, I find him in enough directories that I can see that he moved several times and worked at a variety of occupations to support his family.

These city directories tell a story of a man whose occupation was affected when Prohibition was enacted, but he continued to do what he could in order to make a living and support his family.

All of these city directories were found at Ancestry in their U.S. City Directories, 1822-1995 database.

Because I could find no Herman Handler in any other city directories in 1906-1908, I am only guessing that these two entries may be for Herman Handler:

City	Year	Name	Occupation	Address
Cleveland	1906	Herman Handler	porter	2554 (old 436) Woodland av
Cleveland	1907	Herman Handler	clk [clerk]	4735 Woodland av SE

Once he married Sarah in February 1909, when I see [Sarah] next to his name, I know I've got the right one:

City	Year	Name	Occupation	Address
Akron	1909	Herman Handler [Sarah]	Goodrich Co	897 S Main
Detroit	1910	Henry Handler	tailor	1031 14th av.

From the 1909 Akron, Ohio, City Directory.

He appeared to have moved to Detroit for a year or two, because that's where he was found in the 1910 census. This directory listed him as Henry Handler, tailor, living at 1031 14th Avenue, which was the same address as in the 1910 census. The occupation here was tailor; the occupation in the census was presser (a specific job in the tailoring industry).

From the 1910 Detroit, Michigan, City Directory.

Herman Handler Moved Between 1930 and 1940

Previous posts about Herman Handler:

Herman Handler ~ Naturalization Record
Herman Handler ~ Birth Record
Herman Handler ~ Passenger List
Herman Handler ~ Marriages and Divorces 
Herman Handler ~ Draft Card WWI 
Herman Handler ~ Census Records, 1910 and 1920

There were big changes in this family between 1930 and 1940 and the U.S. Census records reflect the changes, as well a few similarities, helping to confirm that I have the same family.

 ~~~~~~~~~~~

By 1930, Herman Handler's family had moved again, to 629 Minerva Place in Akron.

1930 U.S. census, Summit County, Ohio, population schedule, Akron, enumeration district (ED) 77-60, sheet 11B, dwelling 155, family 176, Herman Handler; image, Ancestry.com (https://www.ancestry.com : accessed 20 November 2018); citing NARA microfilm publication T626, roll 1876.

Herman Handler, age 48, rented this property for $40 a month. His wife, Sarah was 41 and they had been married about 20 years. The entries for place of birth for him and his parents had Croatia crossed off and Austria written in, though at that time the area he was from was in the country of Yugoslavia (see Mappy Monday ~ Where the Handlers Were From). Wife Sarah was from Galicia - Austria. His original language was German and hers Polish, but I wonder if their original language was perhaps Hebrew. Herman reported immigrating in 1904 and Sarah in 1906 and they were both naturalized citizens. He worked as the proprietor of a produce company.

The family also happened to have a radio in the house.

Children, Arthur, Irwin, Milton, and Shirley were born in the U.S.: Arthur in Michigan (in about 1909-1910) and the younger three in Ohio. The younger two were in school. Arthur worked as a Manager in a dry goods store and Irwin worked as a clerk in a restaurant.

~~~~~~~~~

At first, I had trouble finding the family in 1940, but remembering that Sarah divorced Herman in 1931, I determined that yes, Herman Handler living at 3326 East Street in Hallidays Cove, West Virginia, was the same man who was in Akron, Ohio, in 1930.

Herman Handler - Census Records, 1910 and 1920

Previous posts about Herman Handler:

Herman Handler ~ Naturalization Record
Herman Handler ~ Birth Record
Herman Handler ~ Passenger List
Herman Handler ~ Marriages and Divorces 
Herman Handler ~ Draft Card WWI

 ~~~~~~~~~~~

At first I couldn't find Herman Handler in the 1910 U.S. Census. He was easy to find in the 1920 census with wife and children, so I did some creative searching in 1910 and found his young family in Detroit, Michigan. It's no wonder I couldn't find Herman Handler; for some unknown reason, he was enumerated as Wilbur Handler.

1910 U.S. census, Wayne County, Michigan, population schedule, Detroit Ward 10, enumeration district (ED) 155, sheet 12B, dwelling 253, family 279, Wilbur [sic] Handler; image, Ancestry.com (https://www.ancestry.com: accessed 30 August 2018); citing NARA microfilm publication T624, roll 684.

Although the head of this household was "Wilbur," everything else matches the expected information for Herman Handler. He was 27 years old (implying a birth year of about 1882-1883) and born in "Hun. Magyar" (Magyar is another term for ethnic Hungarian), as were both his parents. He immigrated in 1903, had his papers (the first step to becoming naturalized), and was able to speak English. He worked as a Presser in the clothing industry, working for himself. He had not been out of work for the entire previous year. He could read and write and he rented his home at 1031 Fourteenth Avenue, which appears to have eight apartments in it, based on what is seen on the full census page.

Wife, Sarah, was 20 years old (implying a birth year of about 1889-1890) and born in "Aust. German" as were both her parents. "Aust" would refer to the Austrian-Hungarian Empire which, before World War I, covered a large area of Europe. Sarah and Wilbur / Herman were in their first marriage (M1) and she had one child who was living. She immigrated in 1905 and spoke English. Note that as a woman, she didn't have any notation by her name for citizenship because her citizenship status derived from her husband's status.

They had one child, a "daughter" named Arthur. Note that all subsequent records reported Arthur as a male so this one instance where he is listed as a daughter is an anomaly. Arthur was listed with an age of 4/12, which suggests a birth date in December 1909. The birthplace was Michigan, implying that soon after Herman and Sarah married in Akron in February 1909, they moved to Michigan.

This is not the Arthur (born January 1910) who was the oldest son of Joseph and Lena Handler of Akron, nor was he Arthur (born January 1912), son of Sam and Sadie Handler of Cleveland.

Herman Handler ~ Draft Card WWI

The World War I Draft Card for Herman Handler confirms some information that I have previously found for him and adds to that information.

"World War I Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918," digital image, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com : accessed 12 November 2018), Herman Handler, serial no. 3604, order no. A7187, Draft Board 5, Summit County, Ohio;
citing World War I Selective Service System Draft Registration Cards, 1917-1918, NARA microfilm publication M1509; Family History Library Roll No. 1819623.

Herman Handler lived at 107 S. Portage Path, Akron, Ohio. He was 36 years old, born 10 February 1882 and is a naturalized citizen. His occupation is Saloon Business and he lists "none" for employer's name, suggesting he was the owner of a saloon, which was located at 1223 Sweitzer Ave., Akron. Herman's nearest relative was Sarah Handler at 107 S. Portage Path, Akron. The description of Herman notes that he was tall, with blue eyes and dark hair.

Herman's draft registration was part of the third registration, in September 1918, just a couple of months before the war ended.

Out of curiosity, I looked back at Joe Handler's World War I Draft Card. (He also lived in Akron at this time.)

Herman Handler - Marriages and Divorces

This is a continuation of posts about an immigrant Handler relative and I will ultimately provide analysis of the evidence to show how he is related to my husband's family.

Herman Handler married twice in America and his marriage records provide additional information about who he was.

FamilySearch has wonderful records for Ohio. The Ohio, County Marriages, 1789-2013 collection includes records from the early 20th century, four marriage records on a page:

     Cuyahoga County Marriage records 1908-1909 vol. 72, p. 35, application number 61140, record for Herman Handler and Sarah Dick, 24 February 1909; digital image, “Ohio, County Marriages, 1789-2013,” FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 25 September 2018).

A closeup of the record for Herman Handler and wife Sarah Dick reports that the license was issued on 20 February 1909 and that they were married on the 24th.

Herman Handler, age 27, residing in Detroit, Michigan, married 19-year-old Sarah Dick of Cleveland. He worked as a Presser and she as a Dressmaker, both in the clothing manufacturing industry. Sarah Dick was the one who applied for the license and she appeared to know the name of Herman's father: Philip Handler, but not his mother's name.

A little more than twenty years later, they divorced. A notice of the divorce was found in the Akron Beacon Journal, a newspaper found on Newspapers.com.

Herman Handler - Passenger List

Herman Handler's Naturalization Papers reported that he arrived in New York on the Vatterland. Ancestry happens to have images of some of the early 20th century passenger ships.

Image of S.S. Vaderland, Passenger Ships and Images, Ancestry (www.ancestry.com : viewed 30 August 2018);
Original data: Various maritime reference sources.

What can a passenger list tell you? Quite a bit. Herman managed to travel to Antwerp, Belgium, to depart on December 28, 1903, and he arrived in New York City on January 8, 1904, just as his naturalization papers reported.

Herman Handler is on line 19 of the following passenger manifest.

New York, Passenger and Crew Lists (including Castle Garden and Ellis Island), 1820-1957 (Provo, UT, USA, Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2010), Ancestry.com, Year: 1904; Arrival: New York, New York; Microfilm Serial: T715, 1897-1957; Microfilm Roll: Roll 0425; Line: 19; Page Number: 52. Record for Hermann Håndler.

Herman Handler - Is He Related? [Naturalization Record]

Last week, I shared an updated version of Surname Saturday for the Handler ancestral line.

In addition to the three siblings in my husband's grandfather's generation, Joseph, Sam, and Regina, there were additional Handler relatives who immigrated to America and I'm slowly working on connecting them to my husband's family.

Many years ago, I found records for Herman Handler, who was born in Erdevik, Hungary, according to his naturalization record. How is he related to my husband? I will share documents over several blog posts which will ultimately show his relationship to my husband's father's family.

Herman Handler petition for naturalization (1912), naturalization file no. 284, U.S. District Court, Summit County, Ohio; digital image, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org/search/collection/1987615 : viewed 30 August 2018).

Tombstone Tuesday ~ Sally Handler (d. 1932)

Here lies

Our dear (or beloved) mother

Chaya Sarah daughter of Mr. Tzvi

Died 25 Tishrei 5693

Mother

Sally Handler

Died Oct. 25, 1932

Age 78 Yrs.

I got help with the Hebrew translation by the Steve Morse Deciphering Hebrew Tombstone Dates in One Step and JewishGen's Reading Hebrew Tombstones, as well as confirmation via the Tracing the Tribe Facebook Group.

This is my husband's great-grandmother, buried in Lansing Cemetery, Cleveland, Ohio. I wrote about finding this at Great-Grandmother Sarah or Sally Handler.

Sally's youngest grandson was my father-in-law, who died this past March and whose gravestone will be unveiled this coming weekend. He was named after Sally's father.

Many thanks to FindAGrave volunteer PatMaruna for fulfilling my longtime photo request for Sally Handler's memorial.

Surname Saturday ~ Hollander of Hungary

I am using the Surname Saturday prompt to review the ancestral lines for my husband's family.

As far as I know, the only Hollander who came to America was my husband's paternal grandmother, Lena, after she married her husband, Joseph Handler.

Thanks to the Family History Library, which has been microfilming (and now digitizing) records from around the world, I have been able to trace Bubbie Lena's ancestors for several generations through the vital records found on FHL microfilms. Hungary records before 1895 are still only on microfilm.

Hungary Civil Registration, 1895-1980 is available online at FamilySearch.org, though for Tolna District, the records are not yet indexed; you have to browse through them (which is kind of like scrolling through microfilm).

When I searched the microfilm in late 2011 and early 2012, the earliest Hollander I could find was Samuel Hollander, whose name is mentioned in the marriage record and death record for his son Leopold.

Generation 2: Leopold Hollander was born in the 1830s in Bezdán, Bacs-Bodrog, Hungary, according to his marriage record. He married Babette Kohn on June 9, 1862, in Bonyhád, Tolna, Hungary.

The following part of his son's 1886 marriage record has the groom's name on the left: Samu (Samuel) Hollander with his occupation: Pipafaragó (pipe carver) and his birth place: Bonyhád. The next column lists the groom's parents' names: Lipod [Leopold] Hollander with his occupation, also Pipafaragó, and Betti Kohn, and their residence: Bonyhád.

Detail from 1886 marriage record of Samu[el] Hollander and Anna Honnenvald

Leopold's death record lists his occupation as házaló (peddler).

Birth records for Bonyhád, Tolna, Hungary, provide me with the names of the children of Leopold and Babette, born between 1863 and 1883: Samuel, Rosalie, Herman, Hanni, Moritz, Abram, and Ignatz. Another son, Adolf, has Leopold and Babette listed on his marriage record.

I previously shared the death record for Leopold Hollander, who died on February 8, 1907, in Bonyhád of végelgyengülés (old age).

Surname Saturday ~ Handler of Yugoslavia and Ohio

Surname Saturday is a daily blogging prompt from GeneaBloggers, the genealogy community’s resource for blogging. I have decided to use this prompt to review the ancestral lines for my husband's family.

The earliest Handler whose name I know are brothers Aaron Handler and Tzvi Hersh (or Harry) Handler. After Aaron's first wife died (they had four children together), he married the daughter of his brother, whose name I believe is Rozalia (She also went by Rosie, Szali, and Sally - see Different Names-Same Person.) According to U.S. records that I have found, they lived in or near Ilok, in a part of eastern Europe that is currently in Croatia, but has previously been considered part of Hungary and Yugoslavia. It is believed that Aaron was a large landowning farmer.

Here is a website (Macrohistory: Worldhistory) with a changing map of Europe from WWI to 2000. I have taken screen shots and done my best to show where Ilok is situated: at the point of the arrow in each map.

1914: Ilok was in Hungary

1919-1938: Ilok was in Yugoslavia

1956: Ilok was still in Yugoslavia

2000: Ilok is now in Croatia.

Handler Family ~ Another Generation Back

I recently shared my "aha" moment about my father-in-law's Hebrew name being Tzvi Hersch (צבי הרש) which often becomes Harry in America.

My father-in-law's paternal grandmother was Sally Handler. (Also known as Roza, Rozalia, and Szali, as I shared at Different Names-Same Person.) I shared some information about her at Mystery Monday - Finding a Jewish Great-Grandmother, where I noted that JewishGen's Online Burial Registry (JOWBR) has an entry for Sally Handler:

She is Chaya Sara bat [daughter of] Zvi.

In Great-Grandmother Handler Married Twice, I shared a 1911 marriage record for Rosalie Hendler [sic] and Samuel Goodman where her parents are listed as Harry Hendler [sic] and Anna Stern.

I therefore theorize that this Handler line is:

Harry Handler = Anna Stern

|

Sally Handler

|

Josef Handler

|

Harry Handler

|

My husband

And the awkward thing about this line is that Sally Handler married her father's brother, Aaron Handler who was about 20 years her senior and a widower with children.

More information on Bubbie Lena Handler

At about 44 minutes into the "Mishpacha Tape Helen and Esther" at YouTube, these cousins of my father-in-law tell the story about their Uncle Joe Handler and his wife Lena (Hollander) Handler (my father-in-law's parents). The statements from the cousins are in italics below, and my comments follow.

Joe was four years older than his brother Sam. That's relatively accurate. I show Joe's birth date as 24 August 1884, and Sam's birth date as 27 December 1887, based on their draft cards, naturalization records, and in Joe's case, his marriage record from Hungary.

Arthur and Lena

Cousin and Athlete Art Handler

More from "The Mishpacha Tape Helen and Esther 1988," which can be found on YouTube.

Esther and Helen

At about 38 minutes into this video, Helen talks about Art Handler, son of Sam Handler and Sadie (Herskovitz) Handler. This Art Handler is a first cousin to my father-in-law, as well as first cousin to Helen and Esther.

In the video, Helen states that "Art aspired to be a basketball player and was very, very good. He played...semi-professionally...and they wanted to send him to school on a scholarship and he would have gotten a scholarship to college for basketball...but Aunt Sadie and Uncle Sam didn't want him to do that. For some reason or other he let them talk him out of that...They didn't want him to do basketball...They wanted him to take over Uncle Sam's business."

I have another Handler cousin who found my blog a couple of years ago and after my last post mentioning this video, he sent me an email noting that there are quite a few details that are not correct (which I already knew). Specifically, he provided clarification on the above story about Art Handler, who was his Uncle Art:

The story about Art Handler is not accurate. He was a baseball player and was a bat boy for the Cleveland Indians. When Sam and Sadie found out, they stopped him. That is the semi-professional playing they talk about, (The Arthur that is Sam and Sadie Handler’s son) while he was still in high school. The story I heard, is that after school, they locked him in the basement so he wouldn’t go to that job. And, he could not get any scholarship because he disappeared from that world. When I later asked Art about that, he didn’t want to talk about it. In any case, he never got to play professionally, which he wanted to do. He was a good athlete and he played pick-up basketball (that is why they thought he was involved with basketball). He played on a senior team until he was an old man and couldn’t play anymore. He ended up doing what he did at the pop factory, delivering to grocery stores - but when the pop factory closed, he got a job delivering potato chips and related snacks and did that for his career. [Thank you to Alan Simon for this story.]

Connecting with a Handler Cousin ~ Blog as Cousin Bait

Thanksgiving is a wonderful time to discuss family and think about those family who are no longer with us. When I opened my email the day after Thanksgiving this year, I found an email from a second cousin of my husband's who did just that. Gary has been making video recordings of family members for almost 30 years, knowing that they would be interesting to family members. He wrote: "I figured that either someday I would have the time to start exploring our history based on these histories or perhaps my kids or grandkids would." After watching one of his older videos (which my husband and I have now watched - it's a treasure), he thought he would search on the Internet for some of the information mentioned by his aunts in the video.

Well, up comes my blog with a good bit of family information about Handler ancestors and relatives in Ohio. He and I started an email conversation and this past weekend, enjoyed a Google chat with our respective spouses.

Sisters Esther and Helen

Well, the treasure can be found at YouTube in a two and a half hour video called: "Mishpacha Tape Helen and Esther 1988." Gary's aunt Helen and aunt Esther are first cousins of my father-in-law; their brother, Gary's dad, Morton, died at age 44 in 1972. All these cousins were born in Ohio to Regina (Handler) and Jake Solomon.

Just mentioning these aunts to my mother-in-law reminded her that my father-in-law introduced Morton (who lived in Cleveland) to Gary's mother (who lived in Akron, in an apartment in the Handler home). Gary's mother is still living and was visiting for Thanksgiving. She was thrilled that we connected online!

Some of the information about the family that Helen and Esther talk about in this video is new to me (including several photographs shared near the end); some information reinforces what I already knew; and some is in error. For example, they say that their cousin Margaret Handler was born in Hungary, as well as her older brother Arthur. However, passenger lists show otherwise.

I will share some new findings about the Handlers that I found in this video in future blog posts. I thank Gary for taking this video almost 27 years ago and sharing it at YouTube. I especially thank him for contacting me and look forward to seeing photographs that I haven't seen before!

Wordless Wednesday ~ Two Dear Mothers

My husband's grandmothers:

And the back is labeled:

At left is Rose (Levitt) Goldstein (1902-1995) and at right is Lena (Hollander) Handler (1891-1983). The photo was taken on Rhodes Avenue in Akron, Ohio, in June 1952, a few months after Rose's daughter married Lena's youngest son.