The Susie Situation - Episode 5 - Stale Old Stories

You can watch this on YouTube (below). Copies of news articles are in the written version (below that.)

If you’re joining us for the first time, we are cousins investigating a 100 year old family mystery. We call it The Susie Situation. This is episode 5.

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The Susie Situation - Episode 4 - Sensational Testimony

If you're joining us for the first time, we're investigating a family mystery from 1912. It centers around a homestead fire in Nebraska. One word of caution, this week's content does include references to historical events that contain sensitive information, so discretion is recommended.

This can be watch as a video (below) or read as a blog post (below that). 

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The Susie Situation - Episode 2 - A Name on A Page

Last week we talked about Fires and Farts. This week? Seventh Grade and Scams. We're investigating a 100-year-old mystery that we're calling "The Susie Situation." This is episode 2.

This is available as a video (below) or in written format (below that.) At the very end are some news clippings and one transcribed news article.

Imagine 7th grade. I know, you don't want to. It's such an awkward year. You're 13, maybe 12. Your complexion is staging this full blown rebellion. The other kids are all edges and elbows.

But let's say you have a teacher with a flair for the creative. "Gather round, class! Your maternal grandmother, that's your mom's mom. Do you know her first name? I want you all to seat yourselves alphabetically by that. If it was Alice, you're in the front. If it was Zelda, you're in the back. Shuffle it up! Let's go!"

There's a buzz in the room. It's almost as exciting as Harry Potter's sorting hat. The kids begin to sort themselves into rows while they keep up a steady banter.

"My grandma's cookies are better than yours."

"So what?"

And as they jostle and joke, you burst into tears, because it feels like you're the only person in this classroom without living grandparents, and you realize that not only do you not know what kind of cookies your maternal grandmother used to make, you don't even know her name.

This is how my cousin Melody first became interested in family history, there in her seventh grade classroom, thinking about her grandmother and wondering where to sit. She had a million questions she wished she could ask this unknown lady with the unknown name. So Melody went home that day and just started asking her parents questions about their parents.

Melody's mother told her that her grandmother's name was Sina Belle Carver. Her mother remembered spending a lot of time playing outside as a child — running wild, as she called it. And she didn't recall any specific cookie memories, but she did remember that sometimes she would get in trouble, and then she would have to sit on the stairs — sort of an old fashioned time out — but then Sina would feel bad about it afterwards and give her ice cream.

Sina was my father's sister, and Dad said that she was named after his father's former girlfriend. Now, why did Grandma go for that? I mean, it's a pretty name, but his former girlfriend? Sina Belle's brothers used to kid her about her name.

"When Congress sends a bill to the president, what do they want him to do? Sign a bill! Ha ha ha!"

Future tellers of dad jokes, right there. But Dad claimed they were very loving about this, because you couldn't help but love sister Sina. She was little and sweet and gentle and kind.

Sina and her siblings were all born in Nebraska, where her ancestors moved in hopes of rich farmland and a fresh start. Back in 1877, her father's Carver family came from Wisconsin with a group of other settlers to form a small town called Mars. Her mother's Hubbard family came from Vermont to settle in a nearby village called Venus.

These towns are kind of hard to find now. If you pull up Google Maps, you can see Venus. It's part of Walnut Grove. And then, Mars Campground is a few miles southeast of that, and that's most of Mars, right there. Our shirttail relative, Dick Haskin, lives there, on the old Haskin Homestead. This is right near where the old Carver Homestead used to be. Dick hosts family reunions there, and many Carver and Hubbard family members have been back to visit.

 I haven't been to one of these reunions yet, because I'm just not a very good traveler, but the last few years I've gotten better at traveling. At the Mars campground, Dick gives tours, and I'm kind of excited about this, because there are these dugouts that my great uncle stayed in while they built the house for the family to live in, and it seems like everybody's seen these except me.

So, to speed things up, a few months ago, I sign up for this special airline credit card from Bank of America. It claims to get me extra airline points so I can fly places for free. The card comes in the mail. And then, two days later, I get a letter from Bank of America. It says, "We're shutting down your account due to suspicious activity", and I'm like, What?

The letter says I have 25 days to sort this out or else, poof! And I'm thinking, goodbye airline points, no free trips to Nebraska, no tours with Dick to see the dugouts, unless I make this call.

I call the number on the letter and get a recording that says, if you're over 50 press 1, if you're under 50 press 2. That seems really weird, but I press 1. A woman answers. She doesn't say anything about suspicious activity or credit cards. Instead, she tries to sell me a Medic Alert Bracelet.

Help! I've fallen for a scam, and I just need to hang up. But I guess I shouldn't be surprised because my family's been falling for scams since at least 1877, when those Carver great grandparents migrated to Mars.

Here's an article from the Neligh Independent from January, 1878. (See below.) The editor recounts a trip to the area to visit a homestead. He says the grass rivals Kentucky bluegrass, perfect for fattening cattle, splendid groves of trees, fine meadowlands, four tons of hay per acre, "many others to be had in this immediate neighborhood."

I wonder what kind of commission this guy got for each homestead that was settled. I showed this to Dick Haskin. He laughed and said, "This soil is sand, gravel, and volcanic ash. Nothing grows well here. Nothing."

So, back in Wisconsin, some excitable farmer reads a glowing article like this, and then he goes around to his relatives and neighbors and gets them all worked up about Nebraska. Free land. Tons of hay per acre. Fat cattle. And they all get scammed into moving to Mars.

The article goes on to mention several homesteaders, including Wallace Haskin and Mr. Carver. The Mr. Carver in this article was Sina's grandpa. That's Melody's two times great grandpa. And despite the bad soil, he did figure out how to scrape a living out of his homestead. But, it appears that it was a constant scrape.

We know a few things about Cyrus Carver and his wife Mary from old newspapers. We know that in Mars they were called Grandma and Grandpa Carver, that sometimes they were called out in the middle of the night to help care for the sick, and that he donated part of his land to be the first cemetery.

These old newspapers weren't available for Melody to search back in 7th grade. They've been scanned in recent years and put online, some of them just in the last couple of years. And when Melody was in seventh grade, we also didn't know each other. I was aware of her mom, but really only as a name on a piece of paper.

And sometimes with family history, that's really all you have to start out with, a name on a page. And for some people, it seems like that's the whole goal, a collection of as many connected names as possible, going back as far as possible, and maybe highlighting as many connections to famous people as possible.

But we're still trying to understand just a few people a couple of generations back. And honestly, we want to know a lot more than just a name on a page.

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In Flew Enza

Excerpt from journal of Orland William Carver Jr. Portland, Oregon, 1976.

Two doctors consult on the porch of a small wood frame house in the Smelter Hill district of Joplin, Missouri. Inside, four young people lie on pallets on the floor of the main room. A fifth child watches from the doorway of a back room. He is thin and pale and doesn't look particularly well himself.

The little house is usually cold, having no insulation to speak of, but the children's mother has tacked blankets over the windows and added extra wood to the fireplace. As a result, the main room is absolutely sweltering. Even so, some of the children shiver on their pallets.

It is 10:30 on Wednesday morning, November 27, 1918. Tomorrow is Thanksgiving day. The Joplin Herald calls for increasing cloudiness today, with a chance of rain tomorrow.

During the last few days these doctors have tried every remedy they can think of, from a special white powder to a contraption called a pulmotor, a portable ventilator housed in a large wooden suitcase. It looks like the grandfather of a modern day sleep apnea machine.

None of their remedies have helped, and now they've escaped to the porch for some fresh air while they discuss what to do next. "Let's try the white powder," murmurs the older doctor. The powder is in his doctor's bag. He plans to mix it with water. The younger doctor will use an eye dropper to dribble this mixture into Susie's mouth.

Susie is not really a child anymore. She is 20, but in Annie's mind, Susie is still her baby girl. Annie hovers, waiting to bring whatever the doctors need. As the doctors shake their heads and talk quietly out on the porch, she begins to pace and wring her hands, silent tears running down her face.

The powder doesn't help. At 11 Susie takes her last breath. Six hours later Clarence dies as well. A neighbor lady comes over to try to comfort the children's mother while they wait for Susie and Clarence to be taken to the morgue, but at this particular point in time, Annie Carver is inconsolable.

Annie's husband Orland is unreliable at best, so the family has become accustomed to sporadic stretches of hunger and homelessness, but the last few months have been rough, even for them. In July they packed up the wagon, hitched up the mules, and started the 220 mile journey from Enid, Oklahoma to Joplin, Missouri.

On the way young Ashton came down with typhoid fever. They were only 20 miles away from Joplin, but Ashton was too sick to travel, and the family was almost out of food. They stopped and asked for help. Kind local residents put them up in an empty house and called a doctor. They stayed for at least two weeks while Ashton recuperated.

Baxter Springs News (Baxter Springs, Kansas) · 30 Aug 1918, Fri · Page 2

Baxter Springs News (Baxter Springs, Kansas) 06 Sep 1918

Baxter Springs News (Baxter Springs, Kansas) - 13 Sep 1918

In mid-September they finally made it to Joplin, rented this house, and got settled. Susie got a position as a telephone operator. Clarence and Orland found work as well. But then, Orland announced that he was leaving. “Mother, children, the government has called me to work in the shipyards in Virginia, to help with the war effort.”

The family was shocked but not totally surprised. Orland had a habit of leaving like this, for days or weeks at a time. None of the kids knew where he went or what he did while he was gone, but they assumed he was working elsewhere or looking for work.

Somewhere during all of this hubbub, daughter Sina Belle complained of illness and took to her bed. A visiting nurse examined her and said that she had tuberculosis. The nurse helped Annie make arrangements to send Sina to the nearby Jasper County Tuberculosis hospital in Webb City.

On November 11 news spread quickly that the war was over. An armistice had been signed with Germany. The older kids stayed out late celebrating. Annie thought this was appropriate under the circumstances. Nearly everybody was out celebrating.

A few days later Susie came home with a cough, Clarence woke up with a fever, and Robby and Willie complained of headaches. They all had the Spanish flu, that super-sized worldwide pandemic that killed so many people in 1918.

During the weeks before they got sick, Annie spent countless hours helping sick neighbors. Now the neighbors helped her, bringing soup on Thanksgiving day and watching after the younger kids while she went alone to the burial.

For those of you who are counting, that's six kids having three scary diseases all within the span of about 90 days. In later years, Annie was to wonder if the kids caught the flu on Armistice day, out in the cold with all the other flu-ridden celebrants. It's hard to know. At the rate this strain was spreading, they could have caught it anywhere.

When my father (Willie) wrote this story down, he called it “The Valley of the Shadow”. He remembered things an 8-year-old would remember. Instead of influenza, the school kids called it “hen flew endways”. They also had a little jump rope chant: “I had a little bird, its name was Enza. I opened the window, and in flew Enza.”

Articles on the subject say that the Spanish flu of 1918 was unique, in that it was particularly hard on the young and the strong. In this case, it took the family's only sources of income. Fortunately Annie was able to find work to tide the family over until Orland returned.

Susan Viola Carver and Clarence Dean Carver are both buried in Fairview cemetery, presumably in pauper's graves.

Aunt Susie, Uncle Clarence, rest in peace.

Joplin News Herald 28 Nov 1918 Page 1

Joplin Globe 28 Nov 1918 Page 4

Notes: 
1) Despite the information in these articles and on their death certificates, Susie and Clarence would have been 20 and 18, respectively. 

2) I found a newspaper article dated Nov 2, 1918, that says both Orland and Clarence were called to Hopewell, Virginia to the munitions plant there. However, Clarence must not have gone.

Joplin News Herald 2 Nov 1918 Page 5

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Sina Belle (Carver) Carey Death Certificate 1951.08.12 Norfolk Nebraska

Description:
Sina Belle (Carver) Carey Death Certificate
Note: Year of birth should be 1908

Source:
Nebraska Vital Records

Transcription:

Place of Death	County: Madison C-600  City or Town: Norfolk
Length of stay in this place	21 years
Hospital or Institution	Rest Home, 201 No 12th
Usual Residence	State: Neb   County: Madison   Town: Norfolk
Name of Deceased	Sina B, Carey
Date of Death	8/12/51
Sex / Race / Marital	Female / White  Married
Date of Birth	2-24-1808
Age	43
Usual Occupation	Housewife
Birthplace	Cerdigree NEB
Citizen of What Country	USA
Father’s Name	Orland Carver
Maiden Name of Mother	Annie Hubbard
Name of Husband	Clarence Carey
Informant’s Name	William Carver, Lincoln, Neb.
Filed	6/1/1921 Norfolk, Nebr, Talich/Registrar
Date of Death	5-22-1921
I hereby certify that	I attended deceased from May 17 through May 22, 1921 Last saw her alive on May 21, 1921 Death occurred at 6 am
Disease or Condition directly leading to death	Carcinoma of Breast with Lung metastases
Interval between onset and death	June 1950
Major findings of operation	Too late for operation. Laboratory findings carcinoma.
I hereby certify that I attended deceased	From July 19, 1950 to 8-11-1951
That I last saw deceased alive	8-10-1951 at 6:25 am
Signed	EJ Verges MD   Norfolk, Neb 8-12-1951
Burial / Location	8-14-51 / Prospect Hill, Norfolk Neb

Image:

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