Sentimental Sunday

 Lots of births in the family this week . . .

My great grandfather Walter Beriah Sylvester Millard Davis was born 12 Sep 1867.

Walter Davis
12 Sep 1867 - 31 Oct 1934

My grandaunt’s husband Clifton Holland was born 14 Sep 1897.

Mae Killeen and Clifton Holland, Helen Killeen 

My great-grandmother’s brother-in-law Decatur Breeden, husband of Victoria Jollett, was born 15 Sep 1877.

Decatur Breeden
15 Sep 1877 - 27 Sep 1952

Lucretia Jollett Shiflett, sister of my 2X great-grandfather James Franklin Jollett, was born 18 Sep 1838.

Wendy

© 2021, Wendy Mathias. All rights reserved.

52 Ancestors - WORKING: The Envelope System

Davis Store in the 1920s

The Davis Store in Shenandoah, Virginia, has been the subject of several blogs here on Jollett Etc. It was built by my great-grandfather Walter Davis sometime before 1920 at the corner of Sixth Street and Pennsylvania Avenue, probably about the same time that he built their Sears & Roebuck Craftsman house on Sixth Street.

Walter Davis 1933

Walter was a carpenter by trade, just like his father Mitchell Davis. Walter must have had an entrepreneurial spirit when he built the store and named it “W.B. Davis & Sons Groceries Etc.” How long son #1 Millard worked there is unknown, but my grandfather Orvin, son #2, was the owner and manager according to the 1930 census. Actually, my grandmother Lucille ran the store because my grandfather also owned a garage where he repaired cars. The garage was located on Pennsylvania Avenue just behind the store.

Among the boxes of STUFF retrieved from my grandparents’ attic after 70 years are several bundles of receipts from the store.

Envelopes containing receipts

My grandmother Lucille Davis behind the counter of the Davis Store

J.D. SNYDER

Most likely J.D. was John David Snyder. He grew up in Shenandoah, and like his father, he worked for the railroad in the 1920s and 30s. Shenandoah was a boom town even during the Depression because of the railroad. If someone in Shenandoah didn’t actually work FOR the railroad, they had a relative who did. In spite of having a steady job, Snyder always seemed to owe money at the Davis Store. The receipts are dated from October 1935 to July 1936. 

The last receipts of JD Snyder

The Snyder shopping list was modest, usually Wheaties, bread, lard, soap, beans, bologna, “weinies,” eggs, and bacon. Other practical items included notebook paper, envelopes, and a pencil. The most extravagant purchases were chewing gum, candy and cakes. Occasionally he bought cigarettes. If times were hard, he made an effort to be thrifty and conservative. Nevertheless, he ran up a bill over $60. According to the inflation calculator, that equates to the buying power of $1138.67 today. 

1936 was about the time Snyder moved his family to Baltimore, Maryland where he, a son and a daughter went to work at the steel mill. The last three receipts indicate he worked hard to pay off his debt. According to the last receipt, though, he still owed $35. That equates to about $665 today. No wonder my grandparents held onto the receipts. They must have hoped he would finish paying them back. 

E.D. ROTHGEB

Receipts showing
purchase of medicine

No doubt this was Emil Rothgeb who owned the house next door to Walter Davis on 6th Street. In 1930 Emil was earning a living as a house painter. Perhaps he painted some of the houses that Walter had built. However, in the 1940 census, Emil was working with the WPA and reported having worked only 40 weeks in 1939. 

His receipts are all dated from October-December 14, 1938. The timing of going to work for the WPA and the purchases on credit make sense. Times must have been hard. The last receipt shows he put down $2.00 in cash reducing his debt to $20.58. That equates to about $385 in buying power today. 

Like the Snyders, the Rothgebs did not seem to be extravagant in their shopping. Most of the receipts are for the typical necessities like bread, lard, meat. However, purchases of aspirin, cough drops, Bromo seltzer and “medicine” suggest someone must have been sick. The holidays meant Essie Rothgeb needed yeast, nutmeg, sugar, flour, and coconut. 

ERNEST COMER

Paper-clipped together is the thinnest collection of receipts from Ernest Comer, a farmer by trade. They are dated from July 1937 to October 1938. However, a death record indicates he died in 1936. I know I have the right Ernest Comer because a couple of the receipts are written to his wife Lottie. Aside from the date confusion, what makes this group of receipts interesting is that part of the family debt was paid in goods, specifically meat in November 1937 and potatoes in June 1938.

MRS. MOORE

When I first opened the envelope, I thought Mrs. Moore was a customer at my grandfather’s garage. All the receipts are from his car repair shop. Only one receipt shows work done on her car. 

2 tubes and a condenser
only 75 cents for labor!

The rest of the transactions, however, show she was a customer at the grocery store. I wonder if this was about the time that my grandfather took over at the store. Maybe he had not had new receipts printed yet.

Because there were a number of families named Moore living in Shenandoah, Virginia in the 1930s, I did not think I could identify the woman who ran up a debt at the Davis Store in 1933. Robert and Charlotte Moore lived on Seventh Street, just a block behind the store which certainly would have made shopping there convenient. By 1940, the couple was divorced. That made me rethink all the accounts at the Davis Store. Since men were the bread-winner in most households, the accounts were likely in their name even if the wife did the shopping. As a divorced woman, Mrs. Moore had her own account. Unfortunately, the envelope holding her receipts was marked “Judgment.” I think that indicates my grandparents must have sued for payment.

REFLECTIONS

If my grandparents kept a ledger or other bookkeeping system, it did not survive. Only these envelopes of detailed receipts attest to who shopped at the Davis store, what they purchased, what they still owed. With no Excel spreadsheet and no calculator, my grandparents carefully carried the balance forward on each carbon-backed receipt and calculated debits and credits. It was a simple system.

One story I always heard was that customers who could not pay their bill often left diamond rings as collateral. I wonder if these receipts are for the very customers who owned those diamond rings and never came back for them.

Ring my mother had made from the diamonds
left at the Davis Store

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.

52 Ancestors - SCHOOL: Education in the One-Room School

I come from a long line of dedicated teachers. It is therefore no surprise that some dusty old textbooks have been saved and passed from one generation to the next along with pieces of china, crystal, and silver. These books belonged to my grandfather, his father, and his uncle.

My grandfather's textbooks

Looking closely at these very old books (over 130 years old) makes me rethink the one-room country schoolhouse. I always assumed those poor kids probably got a second-rate education because the school couldn’t afford to do any better. However, I see now that Rockingham County and Page County picked the best textbooks to be had in their day. 

WALTER’S ARITHMETIC BOOK

Walter's arithmetic book

My great-grandfather proudly wrote his name on several pages of his arithmetic book. “Walter B. S. M. Davis.” 

Inside cover of Walter's arithmetic book
(Did he really need 3 middle names?)

But he was not the first to use it. The inscription “A. N. Davis” suggests at least one older brother of the 15 Davis children used the book too:  Amaziah Nathaniel.

Amaziah Nathaniel's initials

The book was “Ray’s Practical Arithmetic, Part Third.” The Ray’s series was one of the most respected textbooks of its day because it emphasized “real life” math that students could apply to practical pursuits of running a farm, a business, a household, even a grocery store. Early on, the series was praised for beginning with the basics using concrete items like blocks and marbles in order to prepare students to be able to visualize the abstract later on. Ray’s almost exclusive use of word problems is credited with improving students’ reading comprehension. 

This textbook is very unappealing by today's standards.
No colorful charts.  Very little "white space."

 

Ray believed teaching could help students develop high moral character. To that end, he structured his math problems to show honest men and women hard at work plowing fields, planting and harvesting crops, building, buying and selling, being generous and sharing their goods. Look at some typical problems:

• If 16 men build 18 rods of fence in 12 days, at the same rate, how many men can build 72 rods in 8 days?
• When cloth costs $4.37 ½ per yard, at what price per yard must it be sold to gain 33 1/3 percent?
• What is the value of 1 pound 3 pennyweights of gold ore at 3 cents a grain?

Although Dr. Joseph Ray died in 1855, his arithmetic books are still in use today, especially among homeschoolers. However, I’m not sure how the homeschoolers feel about the explanation of pints, barrels, and hogsheads required in beer measurements. But I must admit, the explanation of apothecary measurements could be helpful to today’s drug dealers who might need to know how to answer this one:

• What will 1 pound 1 dram 1 ounce of opium cost at 4 cents a scruple?

(Who knew drug dealers had scruples?)

ORVIN’S HISTORY BOOK

History of Virginia - New Edition

I don’t remember how much American history was included in my high school history textbooks, but only once did we make it to World War II. How far did the teachers of my grandfather Orvin Davis get exposing him to American history? 

His book is about the size of a 5”x7” photograph and just about ¾” thick. The last chapter is entitled  “The Reconstruction Period 1865-1890.” I guess there’s something to be said for being born early. 

 

ORVIN’S LITERATURE BOOK

Stepping Stones to Literature: A Reader for Fifth Grades is one ambitious collection of works by such people as Nathaniel Hawthorne, William Cowper, Sir Walter Scott, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and John Ruskin. JOHN RUSKIN!!! Has anyone read Ruskin? I have. Hopefully my grandfather at age 10 was exposed to some lighter weight Ruskin than I got in graduate school. Good grief.

 

The introduction to the book says it all:  “…its authors aimed to include nothing but good literature …. The tendency of the day is to scrappy reading. It is fostered by newspapers, periodicals, and compendia of literature; and it is hoped that these Readers will help to combat this unfortunate tendency, and lead to the reading of good books.”

As textbooks always do, this one gives teaching suggestions, especially on ways to improve oral reading. The authors are not shy about saying Americans have poor speech habits and “disagreeable voices.” They deem it a “national defect.” They even recommend calisthenics to improve students’ carriage, breathing through the nostrils, drilling for proper enunciation, using a dictionary to assure proper pronunciation, and learning to incorporate the right inflections to express the feeling of the written word. 

So noble. But these are fifth graders. 

Here is what fifth graders did to their books even in 1910:

The message has been erased for the most part, but it says, "Look on page [?] and you will see my sweethearts name."

 

Flipping pages, I found this on page 25:

 

On page 300, there's this message saying "She ran away from me and nobody knows where she is."

So who was she, for crying out loud?? DARN! I thought books held the key to all knowledge.  What a let-down.

 

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.

52 Ancestors - HANDED DOWN: Two Bibles

From the time I became interested in my mother’s family history, I heard there was a family Bible SOMEWHERE. No one seemed to know who had it. Maybe it was written in German. If so, then that would be from my 3X great-grandfather Fielding Jollett and his wife Mary Ann Armentrout. She was among the first generation born in the Shenandoah Valley to German immigrants. I began to imagine all the questions that could be answered if only I could find that Bible. However, none of the Jollett descendants seemed to know anything about it. I began to think maybe a Jollett Bible just did not exist. 

Many years later, my cousin Glenn passed away. As his widow Fran went through some of his things, she decided to return family memorabilia. Glenn had been in possession of 2 old Bibles. Fran sent them to my aunt. When I asked to borrow them, she said I could just have them. Woohoo!

Davis Bibles
Mitchell Davis's Bible on the left
Walter Davis's Bible on the right

It turns out they are not written in German at all. And they are not from the Jollett side of the family. They are Davis Bibles.

MITCHELL DAVIS BIBLE

Mitchell and Martha Davis's Bible

 This is clearly the older of the two Bibles. The publication information on a torn page indicates the Bible was printed in 1846. Perhaps the Bible was a wedding gift for my 2X great-grandparents Mitchell Davis and Martha Ann Willson who settled in Beldor, Rockingham County, Virginia following their marriage in 1846.

The condition is best described as POOR. Pages are crumpled and stained with mildew. 

But here is a sweet find: a dried flower. 

Dried flower in the Davis Bible
Was it a wedding keepsake?

I wonder if it could be a flower Martha carried or wore in what appears to be a wedding portrait (IF indeed this is Mitchell and Martha – identities are not confirmed).

Is this Mitchell and Martha?

Family Bibles are usually good sources for women seeking to join a lineage society like Daughters of the American Revolution because they confirm family relationships and dates. This Bible did not have the “built-in” pages to record births, marriages, and deaths, so someone sewed loose-leaf paper into the binding.

 

Old threads and loose leaf paper

The important dates all relate to Mitchell and Martha’s children, their births, their marriages, and their deaths. When I saw the page listing the deaths of members of the Davis family, I thought, “YES – my ticket to DAR” because there they were: 2 entries for Leonard Davis, who were Mitchell’s father and grandfather. Surely this would help prove my lineage to Revolutionary War soldier Leonard Davis of Albemarle County. Or so I thought.

 

Deaths in the Mitchell Davis Bible
include Leonard Sr and Jr,
Leonard Jr's wife Frances,
Mitchell and Martha

Unfortunately, the Davis Bible did not secure my membership. The DAR genealogist pointed out that even though the pages are old and the handwriting looks of the time, there is nothing to say that one Leonard was Mitchell’s father, or that one Leonard was father of the other Leonard. I would have to find something else to connect the genealogical dots.

Still I find this Bible fascinating. Written on the inside covers are notes one does not typically associate with a Bible. There are no references to favorite books, chapters, verses. Instead there are mathematical calculations and lists. Mitchell was a carpenter by trade. Was he estimating the costs of a building project, creating a bill perhaps? Did he have no scrap paper?

Chimney, Floors, Roof, Doors, Windows,
Mantle, Stairway

Math calculation:
26 times 2 is 52
52 divided by 3 is 17 1/3

WALTER DAVIS BIBLE

Walter Davis Bible
printed before 1890

This Bible displays features of a high-quality publication. The cover is ornate tooled leather. A colorful map and gallery of illustrations of Biblical stories are printed on slick paper. The all-important fill-in-the-blank family records are included. There is even a page for family members to sign their names to the Temperance Pledge. (What does it say that no one signed?)

 

Otherwise the condition is equally poor, and the back cover is missing.

I know this Bible belonged to my great-grandparents Walter Davis and Mary Frances Jollett because the dates begin with them. Their children are included. 

Mary Frances also added pertinent dates about her parents, one grandfather, brothers and sisters, all neatly penned on loose leaf paper stapled onto the Temperance Pledge.

Mary Frances included her parents' dates of birth
and death; her grandfather's date of death,
dates of death for her father and siblings

Scraps of paper found in the Bible

The Walter Davis Bible, like that of his parents, includes some odd bits of ephemera: slice of cardboard with the name and address of one of Walter’s sisters, a scrap of paper containing incomplete addresses and phone numbers with mathematical calculations on the back. It appears someone was figuring out how old someone was at death – I recognize the dates. There is a transcription of births and deaths of the Davis children; apparently someone wanted a copy but failed to take it with them. Loose-leaf papers were inserted with “new information” as someone married or died.

While the Bibles do not answer all my questions, it is gratifying to be able to insert an exact date of birth or death in place of a broad estimate of “before 1830,” “circa 1800,” “after 1880,” and so on and so on. What I appreciate most about this Bible is that this is where Mary Frances saved the newspaper clippings of her sister’s obituaries.

Collection of obituaries

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

© 2020, Wendy Mathias. All rights reserved.

52 Ancestors - SERVICE: Davis Radios and Service

This week’s prompt makes me think how often we say “Thank you for your service” to men and women in the armed services. Now in that greeting we are including health-care workers, postal carriers, grocery store employees, garbage collectors, and many others who risk their own health keeping us safe during the current Coronavirus pandemic.

Stuff from the attic

Before the “stay home” order, I was contacted by the current owner of my grandparents’ house after she discovered several boxes of my family’s STUFF hidden away in the attic. I was glad to retrieve it even though none of it is especially valuable except to a family historian.

Three pieces of paper held together with a rusted paper clip outline my maternal grandfather’s work career. I can think of only one logical explanation for why Orvin Davis made a list of places he worked and when. The family moved from Shenandoah to Portsmouth around 1940, so it is a reasonable assumption that he was preparing an application to the Norfolk Naval Shipyard.

The smallest piece of paper is the least complete. The numbers at the bottom of the page might be a reminder to check his employment for the years 1914-1917 and 1918.

1 Natl Heat & Power 14 mo Left 11-39

2 Owner – garage 1922 to 1938

3 Gibson Motor Co 2 yrs Left 1922

4 U.S. Post Office 1 yr Left 1920

5 Combs Motor Co 1 yr Left 1919

14-17

18

This next page fills in some gaps and includes more exact dates.

May 15, 1940

Oct 1938 to Oct 1939 Nat Heat & Power

Massanutten Co Inc 11-39 to present time

National Heat & Power Co Oct 38 to Nov 39

Own Garage & Machine Shop 1923-1938  - lathe

Gibson Motors 1920-1922 Machine Shop

U.S. Post Office 1919 Auto rep Feb to Dec

Combs Motor Co 1918 Auto rep Apr to Feb 1919

Mich State Auto School 1917 Oct to April 1918

Shendo Planing Mills 1914-1917

Jan 1918 – Oct 1938 Town of Shenandoah

The large paper is the one I noticed because of the letterhead.

 (See what I did – SERVICE). The papers all confirm one thing I knew about my grandfather: that he owned his own auto repair shop for a time.

6-1914 to 11-1917 Carpenter Shenandoah Planing Mill

11-1917 to 5-1918 Mechanical School Detroit Mich

5-1918 to 1-1922 Auto repair Shenandoah Va for self

1-1922 to 3-1937 radio and electrical contracting for self

3-1937 to 3-1938 Electrician J.D. Cash Shenandoah, Va

3-1938 – 10-1938 [Ditto] Virginia Skyline Corp

10-1938 – 12-1938 out of employment

12-1938 to 11-39 present time Electrician National Heat & Power Co Shenandoah Va

11-39 to 7-1-40 July 1, 1940 to present time Massanutten Co Inc

WHAT I LEARNED

Just about everything was NEW information to me.

• That he worked for his father at Shenandoah Planing Mills from 1914-1917. He was a teenager of 15 when he started there. I knew my great-grandfather was a carpenter who built many homes in Shenandoah, and I was aware of a building that he worked out of. However, I never knew it was a separate business with a NAME.
• That he attended the Michigan State Auto School. The school did an awful lot of advertising.

  

  Part of ad for Michigan State Auto School
  appeared in Popular Mechanics
  from Google Books

• That he worked for the post office. It appears he might have been performing auto repair for the post office, not delivering mail.
• That he worked for two motor companies – Combs Motor from 1918-1919 and Gibson Motor from 1920-1922. That seems to be about the time he went into business for himself.
• That he worked as an electrician for various companies: for Virginia Skyline Corporation, National Heat & Power Company, and Massanutten Power Corporation.

WHAT SURPRISED ME

While I knew the Davis Store was never my grandfather’s main interest, I was still surprised that it was not in his list in any form. His father Walter Davis was the builder and owner. Over the years the store receipts bore various names: W. B. Davis, W. B. Davis & Sons, W. B. Davis & Son. After Walter died in 1934, my grandmother continued to work there. According to the 1940 Federal census, Granddaddy was manager and owner of the Davis Store.

Ironically, in the 1940 census, Granddaddy also claimed to have been out of work during 1939 and received no income. Methinks Granddaddy contradicted himself.

 

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

© 2020, Wendy Mathias. All rights reserved.