The Four-Generation Picture that Didn't Happen, "Corrected"

When Alice Josephine Richardson Dakin was born, the four-generation photo of the Richardson family (above) was taken.  Look above at my header with baby Alice and her father, grandfather and great grandfather.   Nary a woman in the photo beyond the baby girl.  Might they have included their wives?

Could they have taken a 4 generation photo of Alice with her women ancestors?

I did make a blog post of my maternal line a couple of years ago for women's history month.

Let's take a closer look now.

Alice's mother Adelaide Copeland Harvey Richardson (1893-1971) was alive and well and even had a photo taken with her, possibly the same day as the 4 generation picture with the men above.

Alice Josephine Richardson with
her mother
Adelaide Copeland Harvey Richardson

Alice was named for her maternal grandparents: Alice Copeland Harvey (1860-1921) and Joseph Elliott Harvey (1853-1915).






Her grandfather had died, but her grandmother Alice Copeland Harvey was very much alive.  Alice's family was living with with her when Alice was born.

Alice with her maternal grandmother,
Alice Copeland Harvey

Alice's paternal grandparents lived a few blocks way in the same town when she was born.  Years later she would live next door to Martha Elnora (Nora) Worthington Richardson (1865-1939) and Harry Bogart Richardson (1863-1932).  She had fond memories of living next door to her Richardson grandparents.

Alice with her paternal grandmother
Martha Elnora (Nora) Worthington Richardson

So, yes for her mother and grandmothers who lived nearby, they could have been in the picture or taken one of their own.

What about her great grandmothers?

Baby Alice  had two maternal great grandmothers:
Mary Hubbard Nye (1812-1859) who had died decades before and Hannah Elizabeth Blodgett (1826-1919) who was still alive and well in Wisconsin.

Hannah Elizabeth Blodgett Copeland

In 1909, Hannah Elizabeth Blodgett traveled to Iowa for a visit and a four-generation photo after two of her grandchildren were born in 1907 and 1908 (John Harvey Rhodes and Katherine Ellen Rhodes).  Her daughter Alice Copeland Harvey came for a visit at the same time.
Now in 1917, she was getting more elderly, age 91, living with two other daughters and probably not up to the trip.  We'll give her a pass on getting there for a photo with baby Alice.

Four Generations:  Hannah Elizabeth Blodgett Copeland,  John Harvey Rhodes,
Katherine Mary Harvey Rhodes, Katherine Ellen Rhodes, Alice Copeland Harvey

Baby Alice had two paternal grandmothers:
Elnora Esther Cobb Worthington (1840 -1923) and Mary A C Bogart Richardson (1841-1910)

Elnora Esther Cobb Worthington lived next door to her daughter and son-in-law, Martha Elnora Worthington Richardson.  Her husband, Robert Searing Worthington (1830-1903) had died so Alice never knew this grandfather.  She did know Great grandmother Elnora Esther Cobb Worthington and lived nearby and visited until she was 6 years old.

Alice with her paternal grandmother
Elnora Esther Cobb Worthington

Mary A C Bogart Richardson, died 7 years before Alice was born.  Her husband was the great grandfather in the above photo.
I don't have many pictures to share, but here is one of her as a younger woman:

Mary A C Bogart Richardson

So, There could have been another photo taken that day with Alice, 3 and possibly 4 generations of women.  All of the families, except for great grandmother Hannah Elizabeth Blodgett Copeland in Wisconsin, the folks all lived in Oak Park, Illinois.

So can we remedy this situation after all theses years?  Here is a try.

As a young woman, Alice went to Medical school starting in 1938, this picture was taken about that time so she is in her early 20s.

Alice Josephine Richardson Dakin

In this collage below we have Alice in her 20s, her mother (age 21) and one grandmother (age 19) are brides.  Her great grandmother in front is 16 in the picture and I'm not sure how old her great grandmother is, many decades past her 20s.

(Left to right) Adelaide Copeland Harvey Richardson (mother),
Alice Copeland Harvey (maternal grandmother)
Martha Elnora (Nora) Worthington Richardson (paternal grandmother)
Alice Josephine Richardson Dakin ("baby")
Hannah Elizabeth Blodgett Copeland (maternal great grandmother)

Thanks to the magic of Janine Smith, our collage is now a portrait of Alice with her women ancestors who were alive when she was born.  Not the picture that could or would have been taken then, but now available for our enjoyment.

Left to Right: Alice Josephine Richardson Dakin ("baby")
Alice Copeland Harvey (grandmother)
Martha Elnora (Nora) Worthington Richardson (grandmother)
Adelaide Copeland Harvey Richardson (mother)
Hannah Elizabeth Blodgett Copeland (great grandmother)

One can only imagine their conversations, if this were possible.  "YOU are in medical school!  Tell me all about it!"

Only two women in this group lived to see Alice at this age.  Her mother lived to see Alice graduate from Knox College and to go to medical school.  Her grandmother  Martha Elnora (Nora) Worthington Richardson died the next year. She must have been so proud of her granddaughter, not only graduating from college but one of three women students in Northwestern University Medical School, class of 1942.  Nora was self educated, she graduated from high school, spent many years reading and learning and often gave engaging talks to local groups.  During the Depression she was hired as part of the team researching and writing the “Historical Survey of Oak Park Illinois” by the W.P.A. published in 1937(Work Projects Administration) a few years before Alice started medical school.  To have a granddaughter to to college and then medical school, must have been a great joy to the conclusion of her life.

I'm working on researching my family history.  The most recent book was on my great grandmothers and included Martha Elnora Worthington Richardson and Alice Copeland Harvey.  To read a summary, check out this blog post.  The year before, my book was on my grandmother's generation and included Adelaide Copeland Harvey Richardson, check out this post for more about her.  This year's book is on my great great grandmothers and will include Hannah Elizabeth Blodgett Copeland along with each of all of my great great grandmothers.

If you have a group of people you would like to put into a photo like mine, contact Janine Smith at Portrait DNA From Many to One.  Janine can sure work magic with restoring old pictures (such as Mary A C Bogart above) and creating new family portraits.  Her artistry made this blog post possible. Thank you Janine.

The link to this post is https://genea-adventures.blogspot.com/2019/05/the-four-generation-picture-that-didnt.html
©Erica Dakin Voolich, 2019

A Scrapbook with a Surprise, and a Question

A few years before my mother died, she took me upstairs to a chest where she had a couple quilts and some scrapbooks.  Two of the scrapbooks belonged to Robert Searing Worthington.  Mother said the other scrapbook belonged to Robert's daughter, Martha Elnora Worthington Richardson.  I suspect that this scrapbook belonged to Robert's wife, Mattie's mother, Elnora Esther (Ella) Cobb Worthington (1839 - 1923).

The scrapbook is full of illustrations that were originally published in the woman's magazine, Demorest's Monthly Magazine dating from 1876 to 1882.  Since Martha was born in 1865, I suspect her mother, Ella, kept the scrapbook because Mattie would have been age 11 when she was first saving pictures from a woman's magazine that included articles, prints, and paper dress patterns.  It turns out that the Demorests developed a business selling dress patterns, magazines and sewing machines among other things.

A few illustrations were in color.

There was a big surprise about this scrapbook that I accidentally discovered as I looked through the various pictures.  One picture became unglued over time.  I discovered this was not a regular blank book meant to be a scrapbook.  Instead of blank pages with pictures glued onto each one, this is what I saw:

The Congressional Record?!  YES, THE Congressional Record for the House.  I'm not sure which year, but this unglued page is December 14, the year would be on the top of the right hand page and all of those pages are securely glued down.  The year was probably in the about 1874 or 1875 since the pictures which have dates start in 1876 and the footnote on this page refers back to something in 1873.

For the curious about the business of the day in Washington then here is more of this page:

I got to wondering why the cover (above) didn't identify the book as the Congressional Record?  Was that flower strategically placed on the cover?  I looked at the binding more carefully and realized that the three lighter colored stripes of tan were actually tape, probably strategically located over the book title!

The book weighs 7 3/4 pounds.  The pages are quite thick.  Looking carefully at the book I and realized how she had constructed this.




For each page used front and back with pictures glued on, there were a bunch of pages equal in thickness cut out.  Then a page of tissue was glued in, using one of the cut out pages to glue to, before another page of pictures.

The page on the right has the print from the magazine, there is a page of issue paper inserted.  If you look closely towards the bottom of the page on the left,  you can see the stumps of the cut out pages.

So now my question:  Why would Ella Cobb Worthington own a copy of the Congressional Record?

In 1876, Ella and Robert Worthington were living in Chicago, and according to the Lakeside annual directory for the City of Chicago, he was a cashier.  Before the Chicago Fire, Robert worked for Gibson, Chase & Company (in freight forwarding).  After the fire, Gibson, Chase goes out of existence and Robert goes to work for J.N. & S.E. Hurlbut, commission merchants.  At some point, Robert goes to work for the Chicago Board of Trade Real Estate Committee, as the Secretary and is involved with the building of the new board of trade building which opened in 1885.  About 1877, they move to "the country," Oak Park.  Robert's scrapbook was full of articles from the newspaper that he found interesting, anything on Thackery & Dickens and obituaries of friends and family.

None of this points in my mind to a family who would have bought a copy of the Congressional Record -- not exactly a casual reading book at 2 1/2 inches thick (and now 7 3/4 pounds).

Do my readers have any idea?  Please post if you do!

The link to this post is http://genea-adventures.blogspot.com/2013/03/a-scrapbook-with-surprise-and-question.html
©2013 Erica Dakin Voolich