Mix Children in the 1940 Census

My grandmother Ann (Mix) Domelle was one of 10 children born in the Finger Lakes region of New York between the years 1905 and 1927.

Now that we have the 1940 census available, I went and looked up each of the Mix children to see where they were living at the time of the census.

1. Floyd Mix, the eldest, was living on Shaffer Road in Newfield, Tompkins County, NY.  In his household was his wife Rena, their 4 children Betty, Beverly, Floyd Jr and Jean.  Floyd's dad, William Mix, was also living with them.  Floyd was 34 and working as a farm laborer.  His dad was also working, listed as a laborer.

2. Spencer Mix, the 2nd eldest, was missing (as usual).  Spencer left the area in 1933 and no one in the family heard from him again.  I was unable to locate him in the 1940 census so he either avoided it or gave another name.  He would have been married to a woman named Helen Smith with one child.  I was unable to locate them as well.  I do have Spencer's death certificate, but for now, his whereabouts in 1940 are still a mystery, as apparently, he wanted them to be!  :-)

3. Laurance Mix, the 3rd child (and yes, that's how his name is spelled) was living on Niagara Falls Blvd, up in Wheatfield, Niagara County, NY.  In his household was his wife Hazel and their 2 children Laurance Jr and Jessie.  Laurance was 29 and working as a millwright.

4. Mazie Mix and her twin Daisy Mix were the 4th and 5th children and the 1st girls in the family.  I'll focus on Mazie here for the moment.  She was living in a rural area of Seneca, Ontario County, NY.  She was married to John Patrick and they lived with their son John.  Mazie was 27 and had no occupation listed so of course she was taking care of the house.

5. Daisy Mix was living at home with her mom Cornelia (Akins) Mix Simpson and her step-Dad Leon Simpson and 4 of her younger siblings.  Their home was at 402 Center St, Ithaca, Tompkins County, NY.  Daisy was 27 and working at housework in private homes. 

6. William Mix, the 6th child and 4th boy, was living in Chatham, Tioga County, PA.  In his household was his wife Mary and a hired hand named Leonard Coazer.  William was 26 and working as a farmer.

7. Leslie Mix, the 7th child and 5th boy, was living at home with his mom Cornelia (Akins) Mix Simpson and his step-Dad Leon Simpson, his older sister Daisy and 3 of his younger siblings.  Their home was at 402 Center St, Ithaca, Tompkins County, NY.  Leslie was 21 and working at farm work.

8. Ann Mix (my grandmother), the 8th child and 3rd girl, was living at home with her mom Cornelia (Akins) Mix Simpson and her step-Dad Leon Simpson, her older sister Daisy, older brother Leslie, and 2 of her younger siblings.  Their home was at 402 Center St, Ithaca, Tompkins County, NY.  Ann was 20 and working at housework in private homes.

9. John Mix, the 9th child and 6th boy, was living at home with his mom Cornelia (Akins) Mix Simpson and his step-Dad Leon Simpson, his older sisters Daisy and Ann, and 1 younger sibling.  Their home was at 402 Center St, Ithaca, Tompkins County, NY.  John was 14 and attending school.

And last, but certainly not least!

10. Donald Mix, the 10th child and 7th boy, was living at home with his mom Cornelia (Akins) Mix Simpson and his step-Dad Leon Simpson, his older sisters Daisy and Ann, and his older brother John.  Their home was at 402 Center St, Ithaca, Tompkins County, NY.  John was 13 and attending school.

Finally, below I marked on a map the locations of the children of William Homer Mix and Cornelia Elizabeth (Akins) Mix Simpson as based on the 1940 Federal census.  Other than Spencer, the Mix kids tended mainly to stay around the New York and very northern PA area, which I greatly appreciate as I do my research.  :-)

Wordy Wednesday - 12 December 2012

This is my Uncle Steve.  The story behind this slightly crooked photo is that it was taken by my mom, his younger sister, who was due to have a baby soon - the first of the 3 siblings to have a child.

He had been away and while he was gone, my mom had me (unexpectedly - a few weeks early) and no one told him.  When he got home, he went to visit with his sister, she was in her bedroom supposedly resting.  On his way to the bedside, he walked past the bassinet and this is the look on his face when he realized there was a baby in it!  That baby was me, and my mom managed to snap this wonderful picture from the bed.

Surprises like that aren't easy to pull off any more - we're so intimately connected with everyone.  It's a lovely picture that I'm so grateful to have!

A Visit to Indiana

Last week I took a trip to Indiana to visit with my 97-year-old Great Uncle Pete.  My parents and my aunt took the trip with me as well, we drove out, visited, and drove back!  We rented a minivan so everyone could have a roomy trip and now I'm thinking I need a new car because I don't have cell phone chargers and USB ports hiding out everywhere in my car!  We're all so spoiled!

Anyway, we took the trip specifically to visit with my Great Uncle Pete Domelle.  He is the last of the Domelle siblings, Tony, Mary and Bill (my grandfather) have all passed away.

It was just lovely visiting with him and with his daughter, my 1st cousin once removed, Mary.  Mary and her husband Larry welcomed us and let me rummage through all kinds of photographs.  :-)

Here is a photo of Mary and her 1st cousins, my Mom and aunt.

Uncle Pete regaled us with many stories during our visits with him!  The last time we were out in Indiana was over 9 years ago. 

It was strange - Uncle Pete doesn't really look like my grandfather, but the way he used his hands - the gestures he made, as well as the cadence of his speech - when it came to that they were nearly twins!!  It made we wonder - did they learn their gestures from being around their father?  Uncle Pete would still toss out a German word or two - growing up, their parents were immigrants and spoke German.  My grandfather says he remembers his dad reading German language newspapers from Chicago (they lived in the northwest corner of Indiana).

I'm so glad we were able to make this trip.  It was a long car drive but so worth it to visit with everyone!!!!

My First Enumerator!

Imagine my delight as I'm transcribing data from the 1940 census and I see that the enumerator is one of my Domelle relatives!

She's not technically a blood relative, she's Mae BINGHAM DOMELE, the wife of my 2nd cousin twice removed, Tony DOMELE, son of John DOMELE.  This line uses only one "L" in spelling of the name.

Seems she is the enumerator for Lake Township, Newton County, Indiana.  Yay for Mae!

At the time she did this, she was 35 years old, with a 12 year old and 15 year old at home.

Wordful Wednesday - I am the Keeper of Things

This is a photograph of a corner of my living room.  As some of you know, my grandfather recently passed away.  His birthday is in a couple of weeks - he would have been 94!!  He lived a long and full life and I miss him, and my grandmother (who passed away nearly 2 years ago) every day.

Now that they are both gone, the family did what families need to do, and we went through their belongings making sure that important items and furniture went to those in the family who wanted or needed items.  We then had an estate sale for the rest of the things.  It wasn't easy, seeing my grandparents belongings carried away out the front and back doors of the house. 

What made that a trifle bit easier to bear was the knowledge that some of those items went to people who needed them so badly - one person was gathering items for her neighbor, whose house had just burned down.  Another was a young couple that had just moved to the area and had no furniture at all.  Another was a petite elderly lady, who was so grateful for the chair to put in the bathtub because her husband needed help bathing.

And now after that, I have my pile of boxes and items.  As the family genealogist and historian, I was the default whenever a pile of papers was found.  They always save it for Leah and I am so happy for that!  (You don't know how easy it is for my Mom to throw things out.  She would probably have tossed me and my sister long ago except that we're hard to catch!!  Well, ok, maybe she have just tossed me, I was the really annoying teenager and probably deserved to be out on the curb - my sister was the smart one!)

It's hard though, looking at this corner.  I dutifully brought everything home and packed it neatly in boxes and stowed it away here in this corner where I don't see it every day.  When we are gone, we leave behind all the detritus of life - receipts for things you don't own anymore, rubber bands, spare glasses.  And someone has to come in and decide what is important and what isn't.  When we're alive, we think it's all important.  I have a fabulous collection of plastic bags I use to take out the kitty litter.  Do I need 8,000 plastic bags?  Well, I guess I'm planning ahead in case tomorrow the world suddenly stops manufacturing them and after all, I need some way to get the kitty litter out of the house.  Did I mention I use recyclable bags and paper bags only now?  I don't even bring new plastic bags into the house and yet the piles of them never seem go down down.

I'd be mortified if something suddenly happened to me and my family came into my house and had to make decisions about what to keep and what to toss.  I'd probably have to haunt one of them if they threw something vital out, like my important collection of wheat-back pennies in the console of my car.  There's at least 5 of them there, and a 1976 quarter too.  I just know my mom would gather it up and put it in a regular coin jar or something!!!  And someone would just SPEND it WITHOUT knowing!

So yes, my point here really is actually that yes, as a genealogist I do have a very high-level view about life and death.  I see my families where children have died as babies, I see my families where a spouse passed away while still young, I see families that never had children and I fret for them, wondering who took care of them when they were old, even though they died more than 100 years ago.  I know death happens, it has happened for always, and it will keep happening.

But it is hard when it's so close and personal, and you actually have custody of someone else's belongings.  I feel a responsibility for all those papers I carefully packed away.  And yet I hesitate to look at them because, well, they aren't mine.

A while back, my Grandfather allowed me to take a box of old letters to scan.  When I went through them, there was one that was from my Grandfather to my Grandmother.  He was away on a business trip, this was back in the early 1960s.  He wrote stuff for the whole family and then he wrote in the letter that the rest of it was for "Mom" only to read.

So you know what I did of course?  I folded it up and put it back in the envelope.  Maybe one day I will read it, maybe never.  I'll have to figure that one out.

Taking a peek into someone's life when they lived 200 years ago is fascinating.  The distance in time makes it so interesting.  Taking a peek into my grandparent's life, when they aren't here to frame the discussion for me, well, that's harder.   

In the meantime, this stuff will sit for a bit in my living room, getting accustomed to its' new custodian.  When it's ready, it will welcome me in.