52 Ancestors - CRIME AND PUNISHMENT: Scam!

Did Maidie Macella Vernon ever regret her decision to give up her teaching job in Virginia to move to Ohio?

Maidie was the oldest daughter of my 2X great-grandmother’s sister Victoria Shiflett Vernon. At 22, Maidie was still single and working as a teacher in Greene County, Virginia. By 1910, she was a crew manager of canvassers for a furniture company in Richland, Ohio. She had been married less than a year to Reinhold Merschel, a naturalized citizen who emigrated from Germany in 1892. He was the manager at a furniture factory.

Marriage Record
Reinhold Merschel and Maidie Vernon
26 May 1909

It seems that Reinhold had a little side job going. He and Ernest W. Toadvine went into business together, but it was NOT a legitimate business. It was a SCAM. They sent agents to call on women convincing them to sign contracts agreeing to pay 50 cents every week to enter a drawing. The prize was their choice of a piece of furniture out of the Union Furniture Company catalogue. 

A nice piece of furniture for 50 cents?? As they say, “If it sounds too good to be true, it probably isn’t.”

Obviously, there was never a drawing and no one won a piece of furniture. 

How long the money-making scheme went on is not clear, but eventually the two men were caught. Their story was covered in newspapers throughout the country.

 

Sandusky Star Journal
18 Feb 1916

Fort Wayne Sentinal
6 Oct 1916

In 1917, Reinhold Merschel and Ernest Toadvine were charged with mail fraud and sent to the US Federal Penitentiary in Atlanta, Georgia. Toadvine was released a year later in 1918, Merschel 2 years later in 1919. Evidently, he had a larger role in their business venture.

Interestingly enough, despite being incarcerated, Reinhold registered for the draft. His occupation? Prisoner. The flip side of his card indicated that the first joint of his right thumb was crippled.

After his release in 1919, Reinhold returned to Toledo, Ohio, but it seems Maidie did not welcome him with open arms. The 1920 census shows him as a roomer across town from Maidie and daughter Ottielie. The City Directory that same year lists Maidie as a widow of Reinhold. However, he was not dead. He was very much alive and working as a salesman.

They eventually patched things up, apparently, because the City Directories from at least 1923 on list the couple together. But things were about to change once again.

The 1930 census shows Maidie claimed she was divorced. The 1932 City Directory shows her as the widow of Reinhold Merschel. Whether he was really dead this time is not known.

Toledo, Ohio City Directory

I can’t help wondering how much Maidie knew about her husband’s business venture. On their marriage record, she claimed her occupation was “soliciter,” and then in the 1910 census she worked as the crew manager of canvassers. Whether she was a willing participant in the scheme or merely another victim, she was not punished in the legal system.

Amy Johnson Crow continues to challenge genealogy bloggers and non-bloggers alike to think about our ancestors and share a story or photo about them. The challenge is “52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks.” 

Wendy

© 2021, Wendy Mathias. All rights reserved.

Sepia Saturday: The Vernons

Sepia Saturday challenges bloggers to share family history through old photographs.

This week Sepia Saturday has reached the letter V, but I do not have a violin photo or story to share. Therefore, I vow not to vacillate over various options, instead to vindicate myself with this view of the life of Victoria Vernon, the veracity of which you should not doubt.

Victoria Vernon was born in 1854 to Burton Shiflett and Nancy Frazier in Greene County, Virginia. She was the ninth of ten children and the youngest sister of my 2X great-grandmother Lucy Ann Shiflett Jollett.

Morris Reunion probably 1927
Susan Clementine Shiflett Morris (sister to Victoria
and my 2X great-grandmother Lucy Ann)
Austin Morris (Clementine's husband), 
James Franklin Jollett, Ambrose Vernon
(NOTE: Lucy Ann and Victoria are not present;
Clementine died in 1928 - hence the estimated date)

Not far away Ambrose Vernon grew up in the home of Edmund Jones and his much younger common law wife Margaret Vernon. I chuckled at Ambrose’s death certificate which asks the name of the deceased’s father and mother. Ambrose’s daughter openly pronounced him “illegitimate.” Ambrose’s brothers and sisters, however, all claimed Jones as their father.

Ambrose and Victoria married 26 Dec 1875. They were a farming family in the Monroe district of Greene County, and together they had 5 children:

• Ira McClellan Vernon (1876-1953)
• Madie Macella Vernon Merschel (1878- ?)
• Charles Marcus Vernon (1880-1959)
• John Fleming Vernon (1881-1937)
• Lucy Ann Vernon Snow (1884-1972)

In 1926, Victoria Shiflett Vernon died from pneumonia, likely due to complications from an abdominal tumor. The details on the back of her death certificate suggest she must have suffered a great deal in those last days of her life. 

Back of Victoria Vernon's death certificate March 13, 1926

TRANSCRIPTION: … cause of death is given as “Bronchial pneumonia – abdominal tumor.” Please state the exact location of the tumor & whether cancerous or benign.

Do not know the nature of the tumor as the death certificate will show that I only saw the patient the day of her death so had no opportunity of finding out. Suppose it was benign. It was as large as an infants head filled the hypogastrium and umbilical region – was so tender & sore when I saw her that it was impossible to palpate it.

Given what I know of my mother’s death from ovarian cancer, I wonder if Victoria’s disease was this as well.

Why don’t you venture over to Sepia Saturday where the venerable vanguard of verisimilitude in the vernacular will offer a veritable vortex of veracious verbalization.

Wendy

© 2021, Wendy Mathias. All rights reserved.