Telling Grandpa’s Story

(Through searching for my grandfather’s roots, and writing this blog, I was invited to speak at the 150th anniversary event for the New York Foundling Home which operates today as “The Foundling.” It continues in operation, serving those with special needs, including: foster care, developmental disabilities, and child abuse and neglect. Below is the text of my remarks. I will be writing more soon about my experience meeting other descendants of orphan train riders–one of the most moving days of my life.)

Good Morning! I’m honored to be speaking today for the 150th anniversary of the New York Foundling Home, now the Foundling Hospital, or just “The Foundling.”

I want to begin by asking you to think about what brought you here today? What is your connection to the Foundling—is it relatively recent or long ago? Have you ever talked about that connection?

Stories are powerful things—researcher and writer, Brene Brown—says that “our brains are wired for stories,” particularly stories about overcoming adversity, stories of courage, stories that inspire us. Stories give us hope and remind us of what is possible.

Today, I’m going to tell my grandfather’s story, which is also my story. And, in some ways, it is the story of all of us here today.

Here I am with Juanita Tate. Juanita’s grandmother was at the Foundling at the same time as my grandfather. Her grandmother rode the Orphan Train to Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania.

As long as I can remember, I knew my grandfather came from the New York Foundling Home, to Central Missouri, on an orphan train. As a kid, I didn’t think a lot about it. I never thought about the empty space in his heart, of not knowing how he came into this world, of not knowing the beginning of his own story.

All I knew back then was Grandpa was the best. He made me feel loved and special. When I was three years old, my family moved back to Jefferson City MO from St. Louis. Jefferson City was where Grandpa lived and where my Dad grew up. My parents bought a two-bedroom house for our family of seven.

Grandpa was very handy, and he finished off the attic to be the bedroom for me and my two brothers. For a while, Grandpa also shared that room. It was tight, but I loved him being there.

I could go on and on with memories of Grandpa, but let me just say he was always fun and funny.

Grandpa died suddenly when I was 11. His belongings got divided up among my Dad and my Dad’s two sisters. Dad got the nametag Grandpa had worn on his clothing on the orphan train in 1901. I hadn’t seen that before, and now, seeing that name scrawled on a piece of fabric, Joseph Aner (or was it Auer?—no one knows for sure—various records interpret the cursive handwriting differently)—that nametag suddenly made his background more real to me. Who was he really?

As I grew up, I remained curious about his origins, but I had no way of exploring them. In the 1990’s when, I first got the internet, I dialed up and searched for the surname “Aner” and found a few people in Philadelphia, but that was it. Who knew if there was any connection…

Then, a couple years ago, I took an Ancestry DNA test. I still couldn’t find any connection to anyone named Aner, or Auer. After what seemed like a lifetime of searching, I found a birth certificate, with a child born April 30, 1896—that was Grandpa’s birthday. The child was Joseph Auer, born to Joseph King and Adelaide Auer, born at a Catholic Hospital serving poor, unwed mothers. Records indicate Joseph Aner arrived at the Foundling a couple days after being born, apparently with clear expectations that his parents would never be found.

It’s not surprising that parents would use made-up names when giving a child to an orphanage. A child born out of wedlock was a significant “stain” on a family at that time. An unwed mother, even under the best of circumstances, would have difficulty providing for a child. Women generally were not employed at that time, and having a child could even disqualify them from getting a job. Having a child could also limit her chances of getting married in the future.

I looked through every available online record, trying to piece together what I could about Grandpa’s life. I found his first World War I draft registration. Under Place of Birth, it said, “Unknown.” I don’t know why, but this one word hit me in the gut—it was so sad. It also didn’t make sense to me—he knew he was born in New York and that he came from the Foundling Home.

I became obsessed, knowing that DNA testing had the potential to connect me to his origins. I felt pressure to hurry—I belong to the last generation that knew him. And with each passing generation the DNA trail fades just like an old photograph. That word “unknown” gnawed at me. I didn’t want that word to be associated with Grandpa any more.

I learned more about his life by scouring old newspapers. He was among the first young men from Central Missouri drafted into World War I. I talked to my older brother about this—my brother was named after Grandpa and they did some carpentry and painting work together. They talked a lot. Grandpa wouldn’t talk about the war though—he hinted at traumatic experiences.

After the war, Grandpa married into a prominent family in Jefferson City and he started his own family. He also started a business, as an automobile dealer. Newspapers show he was doing well, when in 1929, the stock market crashed, and his business gradually disappeared.

As I continued to search through thousands of DNA matches on Ancestry.com, I found a cluster of people not related to my mother, nor to Grandpa’s wife, meaning they were the first line I could identify as being my grandfather’s. I found Grandpa’s father was a Van Sten from Brooklyn.

I still did not have any leads for his mother, though. As I was talking about this with my brother one day, Jack told me: “He always said his mother was Abbie Doyle.” (Later one of my cousins told me the same thing.) I was stunned for several reasons…how would Grandpa know this? I remember my mother, Grandpa’s daughter-in-law, once telling me that Grandpa had gone to New York and found his mother, or did he just find out who she was… Mom wasn’t sure. But Mom knew that he had found something about his mother when he went to New York. Family lore says that Grandpa returned to Missouri and announced, “I am a Markway.”

Jack said Grandpa was clearly bothered by what he had learned in New York, and would start to talk and then stop. As a psychologist, I know that feelings of abandonment can be overwhelming. These feelings are real and deep, and they can last for generations. Grandpa had them, and they took away his voice, preventing him from telling all that he knew about his story. Being a secret hurts.

I searched everywhere for signs of Abbie, or Abigail, Doyle. I learned that searching for Irish names in New York in the late 1800s doesn’t narrow things down much. Why did they name their kids Mary Margaret, Margaret Mary, Daniel, Michael, and Joseph…and then the next generation had the exact same names? I then gave up for a few months before starting over. I finally gave up on the idea that he really knew his mother’s name. I could believe he had gone to New York to look for her, but…actually finding her seemed… unlikely.

As I went through my DNA matches again, I found a group of people that matched no other lines in my family. They had to be connected to Grandpa’s mother, but I couldn’t even see how they connected to each other…Then, as I was looking through one family tree, I saw a name, Abbie Camille Doyle.

I can’t yet say with absolute certainty that this Abbie Doyle was his mother, but other descendants of her are showing up as sharing the appropriate amounts of DNA with me. I’m working on tracing all the information I can, both DNA and paper trails, to prove one way or another. I know I’m very, very close. And soon I hope to eliminate that word “unknown” from Grandpa’s history. Or, perhaps, he already did so…

I have learned a lot about the Abbie Doyle who may be my great-grandmother. Some of it is entertaining—for example, she had a granddaughter who dated Elvis Presley. But the more I learn about her, the more I see her as a human being and not just a branch on my family tree. She was the youngest of 8 children. Her father was wounded in the Civil War. There are many signs that her life was not easy. Her sister died at age 26. A brother died at 22. I have no idea how she ended up in New York City after growing up outside Springfield, Massachusetts, but there are documents placing her in New York… And then having a baby…giving up that baby must have been traumatic for her…while, at the same time, hoping that the he would be better off…

Despite all his trauma, Grandpa was able to love. There are so many memories—my cousin Shelley remembers him teaching her to waltz, to dance. I remember coming to visit our house every Tuesday night and always bringing me a bag of peanuts. Hi ability to love—Was it the care he received at the Foundling Home? A natural, inborn resilience? His adoptive family? He has many grandkids, many great-grandkids. From what I’ve learned Abbie has many, many descendants, and her life turned out well, but she had struggles of her own.

Our society has made it a pleasant pastime to investigate where we’re from and who our people are, to see them as names on a computer screen. We are so fortunate that with DNA we can now truly know much about our history. But most Orphan Train riders never knew. I believe it’s our duty as their offspring to find the puzzle pieces and put them together. It won’t help with their feelings of abandonment, but it might help us. There is a basic human need to know who you are, and how you connect to this world.

Scientific research shows that telling our story can have healing effects. By telling our story, we make sense of the world, we figure out how we fit into that world, and we honor the person we are talking about. That is why I felt an overwhelming need to be here today. And I suspect, in some way, that’s why you’re here today as well.

Every one of you has your own story to tell—a story of confronting adversity, and overcoming it in some way. Once again, I ask that you consider telling whatever part of that story that you know, so that we can preserve your memories, and honor the reason why you came to this event.

Thank you.

The Mystery of Joseph Auer–The Father Found

For the past two years, I’ve been searching for clues regarding my paternal grandfather’s origins, and I can now say, with a reasonable degree of certainty, that I have found his father.

My grandfather, Joseph Auer came to central Missouri on an Orphan Train from the New York Foundling Home and was adopted by the Fred Markway and Catherine Schnieders Markway family. Joseph longed to find his birth family, but that was not possible in that era. The Foundling Home asked no questions when a child was left in its care, and the culture of the time required secrecy.

For a while, I have known that my grandfather’s origins could be traced back to the Van Sten family of New York City two brothers possibly being my great-grandfather.

Fortunately for me in my search, multiple descendants of the Van Sten family took DNA tests with Ancestry, and this allowed me to compare my DNA (as well as my brother Jack’s) with that of my fellow Van Sten descendants. Through multiple DNA tests, I have verified that I am descended from a male member of the Van Sten family–so Catherine could be eliminated as a potential great-grandparent. There were three males of that generation, one of whom died in childhood, leaving James and George as possibilities.

DNA testing results showed that Jack and I shared slightly more DNA with descendants of Catherine than with descendants of James (the differences are small statistically, but strongly suggest that James is not our direct ancestor). That left George. He never married, and has no other direct descendants that I’ve been able to identify.

So, what do I know about George and the rest of the Van Sten family?

The first definitive documentation I can find on this family is a James Vansten, born in Ireland in 1809, marrying Sarah Murphy, also born in Ireland (in 1810). They were married at St. Nicholas Catholic church in Liverpool. James’ occupation is listed as a “cordwainer,” or shoemaker.

Screen Shot 2018-12-16 at 8.58.29 AM — James Vansten listed in the marriage record of St. Nicholas Parish

Screen Shot 2018-12-16 at 9.04.58 AM — Sarah Murphy listed in the marriage record. Prior to the wedding, she and other women in the record are listed as “spinsters.”

James and Sarah had a son, Richard born in Liverpool, England in 1834. The family left England for the United States when Richard was two-years-old. James and Sarah had a total of five children. Sometime before 1855, it appears, Sarah may have died (she is not listed in the New York Census record for that year).

Screen Shot 2018-12-16 at 9.13.39 AM — The Vansten family in 1855 (New York state census)

Richard Van Sten had a brother that was not listed in the census record above. That brother was named George, but this George died near the end of the Civil War after serving in the Union Army. I do not know if he died as a result of the war, or from other causes.

Richard’s wife, Mary Ann Ryan, was born in New York. She was seven years younger than Richard, and they married when she was about 18. They had four children. Catherine came first in 1860. Then there was James in 1861, followed by Richard Jr. in 1864–but the family endured a tough time when Richard Jr. died four years later. Then, in 1868, George arrived, apparently named after his late uncle. George lost his mother when he was just five. George’s father found a housekeeper, Annie McCaffrey, to help with the children. George’s father died in 1888 when George was 20.

Throughout his life, George was involved in social activities. In 1891, at the age of 23, he was elected Chair of the Dramatic Committee of the Booth Dramatic Society in Brooklyn. In 1901, he was playing Euchre at the Flatbush (Brooklyn) Knights of Columbus and he won a prize. In 1918, he attended a Knights of Columbus dance in Brooklyn.

In 1915, George was involved in a lurid lawsuit after his fiance married another man. (I wrote about that in more detail here.)

George died in Philadelphia, of chronic bronchitis) in 1934. He is buried in Calvary Cemetery in Brooklyn.

In talking with people who are very distantly related to me, many generations back, I have found various potential branches of the family. The Vanstones came from Devon, England. That is likely the origin of the Van Stens, with the spelling changing for unknown reasons–perhaps it was just a transcription error.

So where does this leave me in my journey? Well, I still have no clear leads on my great-grandmother. There my be clues in my DNA connections, but I have not yet identified them. But…I’m still looking.

Soon, I will write about my maternal side. I have found some wild and fascinating stories about Mennonites getting taken hostage by their church in Switzerland and forced to leave the country, about families being invited by William Penn to come to Pennsylvania, and about descendants of these families coming to Missouri when they are given land. They end up in Cole, Miller, and Moniteau counties.

Thank you for reading.

The Mystery of Joseph Auer–Part V

Screen Shot 2018-11-30 at 10.41.02 AM

My grandfather, Joseph Markway, came to central Missouri on an “orphan train” and was adopted by the Fred Markway family. Joseph’s surname at birth was Auer (or possibly Aner–it shows up both ways in available records).

I have tested through Ancestry.com, 23andMe, and Family Tree DNA (FTDNA), and have spent many hours poring through DNA connections and public records. I have narrowed down his birth father to being one of two men. Today, I’ll tell the story of one of them, George Van Sten.

Genealogy can involve lots of tedious work, finding minor details, but occasionally I find something quite interesting. George Van Sten was involved in a lawsuit that must have been quite the talk of Rochester, New York. Rather than trying to explain it, I’ll let the Rochester Post-Express from December 1915 tell the story:

SISTER WROTE BILLETS DOUX

NEW YORKER WINS SUIT TO GET BACK PRESENTS

WOMAN SAYS “FIANCE STALLED”

Declares in Defense That She Made Gifts, Too—He “Postponed Marriage”

A jury in Municipal court decided that when a woman breaks an engagement to marry, it is up to her to return the presents given to her by her fiancé if he wants them back. In the suit of George Van Sten of New York against Mrs. Maude Waddell of this city to recover engagement presents valued at $450 (over $11,000 value in today’s dollars), the jury, after listening to the testimony found for the plaintiff and if the defendant is unable to restore the gifts the plaintiff may recover $415. Judge Delbert G. Habbard presided at the trial.

Mrs. Waddell and Van Sten had been engaged for five years. The engagement was broken early in September, this year, and on September 23d, the defendant was married to Eugene P. Waddell. Van Sten asked that his presents be returned. She is said to have refused and he brought suit, in reply in the suit in his action s he set up a counterclaim for $2,000. Eugene Van Voorhis appeared for Van Sten and Mrs. Waddell is represented by William Baker.

Van Sten testified that he had set the date for their marriage to take place “sometime after the holidays” to which the present Mrs. Waddell had agreed. Under examination he said he had received a letter from Mrs. Waddell dated September 25, 1915 stating she had married Eugene P. Waddell Thursday, September 23d.

In explaining the events preceding his receipt of this letter, Mr. Van Sten said that when in Boston last summer, Miss Spencer told him her father objected to her marrying him for various reasons; that he wanted her to marry some one else. He also testified that at one time last spring, he had received no letter from her for three weeks. This he said was unusual.

Woman Takes Stand

At this point, Mrs. Waddell took the stand. She testified that Mr. Van Sten had set the date of their marriage several times, but that each time he postponed the event, giving “business reasons” as his excuse. She said he was “stalling her for time.”

She also said she gave him gifts equal in value to those which the plaintiff gave her. She says she gave him a diamond stickpin, an Elks ring, a gold fob and chain and a silver cigar case.

Sister Wrote Letters

Asked to present letters to support her testimony, Mrs. Waddell she said she destroyed all the letters shortly after receiving them. Mr. Van Voorhis brought out the fact that all the letters Miss Spencer was supposed to have written to Van Sten were written by no one else than her sister, Grace Spencer, who was authorized to do so by Mrs. Waddell.

She testified she gave up her position early in September to go to New York to marry Van Sten, upon arriving there, she said, Mr. Van Sten postponed the marriage again. Growing impatient, she returned to Rochester and finding herself without a position, she decided to get married to someone. She had known Mr. Waddell four years and married him September 23d.

Loves Husband, She Says

“Not very much love there?” inquired Mr. Van Voorhis of Mrs. Waddell. Flushing and looking at Mr. Waddell, who sat next to her mother, Mrs. Madeline Spencer, she replied, “I love him.”

She testified, however, that she had objected to the postponements.

Mrs. Spencer, and Miss Grace Spencer, Mrs. Waddell’s sister corroborated her statements.

The newspaper leaves out important details, though…What presents did George give the defendant? Was it just a beautiful ring and a few small items? Or did he give her a number of expensive presents? Why had the engagement lasted five years? At the very least, he had some commitment issues.

I researched the fiance and found that she was about 20 years younger than George. I imagine her father DID want her to marry someone else, particularly after such a long engagement. With her, it seems suspicious that she suddenly grew tired of waiting and married someone else just a few days after leaving George. It certainly seems that some romance must have been brewing there…

I have found other information about George…

George was born in November of 1868, most likely in Brooklyn. The 1870 United States Census lists George’s father as an “agent” for Knickerbocker Ice Company, and his mother as “keeping house.” George had two older siblings at the time, a 10-year old sister, Catherine (or “Cassie”), and a nine-year-old brother, James.

Just three years later, George loses his mother (Mary) when she dies at age 32. I have not yet found any record of what happened. George’s father finds a housekeeper, Annie McCaffrey, to help with the children. George’s father dies in 1888 when George is twenty. His father, Richard, was 54.

George disappears from the records for several years, but in 1905 he shows up in the City Directory of Atlantic City, New Jersey, as the manager of a creamery. In 1907, the local newspaper in Elmira, New York, reported George spent Thanksgiving with friends there. (Elmira is in south-central New York on the Pennsylvania border).

George apparently recovered from his contentious romance in time. Records show that he took a trip to Barbados and Tobago in 1921.

George died in Philadelphia, of chronic bronchitis) in 1934. He is buried in Calvary Cemetery in Brooklyn.

After reading the newspaper story, I’m considering a new career…maybe I should write romance novels based on old newspaper stories…

The Mystery of Joseph Aner–Part III

grandpa ww1 — Joseph Markway (right), in his World War I Army uniform, with his friend, Lawrence Prenger.

In Parts I and II, I told the story of my grandfather, Joseph Aner Markway, and how he came to mid-Missouri on an Orphan Train from the New York Foundling Home. I had found some distant relatives through Ancestry DNA who did not connect to any know part of my family tree, and the common thread was a Van Sten family from New York, where Grandpa Markway was born.

Through further DNA testing with Family Tree DNA (ftdna.com) which offers a test that traces the male lineage within a family (Y-DNA testing), I found others who share male ancestors named Vanstone, from Devon, England. My research has found that Vanstone likely is the Anglicized version of Van Sten, a name that appears to have come from Holland and Belgium (countries were not well-defined hundreds of years ago as they are now).

I found another surprise with the Y-DNA testing, though–two of the three male relations that showed up were Vanstones, but one was not. The woman managing that DNA test told me that the descendants of her great, great grandfather do not genetically match with the descendants of his “brothers,” suggesting that he likely was adopted. In other words, he was a descendant of the Vanstones.

Anyway, back to my grandfather…yesterday, I may have found his birth certificate online. For the past 18 months, I have searched for any records of Joseph Aner (the name he was known by at the Foundling Home), Joseph Doyle (family lore was that his mother was named Doyle), and Joseph Van Sten (the family name of his apparent father). Nothing ever showed up in the New York records.

I searched other genealogy web sites that sometimes have different information. Yesterday, on Family Search, sponsored by the Church of Latter Day Saints, I was searching for Joseph Aner, when the site also showed birth records for the surname, Auer, and up popped a birth certificate for Joseph Auer with a birth date of April 30, 1896 (one of two birth dates I have seen for him–the other being May 1). The certificate showed the parents were not married. The mother’s name was Adelaide Auer and the father was listed as Thomas King, perhaps a fictitious name as often happened in out-of-wedlock births.

My grandfather reportedly had gone back to New York as a young adult trying to find his mother and had been told her name was “Abby.” Might it had been Addy? I don’t really have any information on this yet. Adelaide Auer disappears from the records at this point–she is not listed in the census records of the U.S. or any state. All I know is that she supposedly was 24 years old at the time of his birth, and that she was born in the U.S. The father supposedly was 38, assuming anything about the father on the birth certificate is accurate.

In all my research, I also found that when Joseph Markway registered for the draft in World War I, he was living in Nebraska and living as a farm laborer. I have no idea why he had traveled so far to work. Surely there was farm work in Cole and Osage counties at the time. Did he go to Nebraska because that is where he had first been adopted off an Orphan Train? (He reportedly had been returned to the New York Foundling Home when the mother in that family had died and the father could not take care of him.) Did he go to Nebraska with a friend as part of some adventure, or did he go on his own?

Screen Shot 2018-09-03 at 11.11.22 AM

I had heard that Grandpa Markway had owned a car dealership in the late 1920s and early 1930s. In searching the website, newspapers.com., I found advertisements for Cole County Motors, selling Hupmobiles, DeSotos, and Plymouths, with Joe Markway as the manager. My father had told stories of that time, where you not only sold a car to the customer, but you also had to teach them how to drive it.

Apparently the Great Depression was not kind to auto dealers, as the business disappeared, and he later became a mechanic for Arthur Ellis.

I have learned so much about Grandpa in my search, and I’m not finished. Along the way, I have also discovered some amazing stories about other parts of my family–stay tuned, those bits of history are coming soon!