Thursday, November 3, 2016

Seavers in the News - Who were Edward E. Seaver's Parents?

I found an obituary for Edward E. Seaver, who died on 15 May 1949 in Watertown, New York, in the Syracuse [N.Y.] Herald Journal newspaper on Ancestry.com.


1)  The obituary says:

"Edward E. Seaver, Watertown, Dies

"WATERTOWN -- Edward E. Seaver, 66 of 147 Charles st., died yesterday at Mercy Hospital where he had been a patient for one week with a heart ailment.  He was a mechanical draftsman and toolmaker.  His wife, the former Miss Mabel Curry, is among the survivors.

"The funeral will be held on Wednesday at 10:30 A.M. from the Church of the Redeemer, with burial at North Watertown Cemetery."

The obituary provides a name, a death date, a death place, a wife's maiden name, and the burial location.

2)  I looked in my RootsMagic database, thinking I surely had information about this Seaver person.  Nope.  I don't have him in my database.  Who were his parents?

So I went searching on Ancestry.com and found:

a)  A Find A Grave memorial:


This is obviously the same person, and provides a bit more information:

"Edward Seaver, a native of Watertown was married on Oct. 4, 1904, in Trinity Episcopal Church.

"They lived here while Mr. Seaver worked at J. B. Wise, Inc. and Eager Electric Company.

"Moving to Rochester in 1922, Mr. and Mrs. Seaver both worked at Eastman Kodak nearly 25 years.

"They returned to Watertown in 1947 and purchased the Charles street house.

"Mr. Seaver died May 15, 1949, aged 66."

In the Find A Grave memorial, he is linked to his wife, Mabel Curry Seaver but not to parents, siblings or children.

b)  I found Edward and Mabel Seaver in the 1910 U.S. Census at 834 Cooper Street in Watertown, New York; in the 1920 U.S. census, they resided in Rochester, New York;  in the 1930 U.S. Census, Edward E. Seaver (age 48, born N.Y.) resided in Watertown, listed as son to head of household Sarah Henderson.

c)  There are records for Edward Everett Seaver, born 22 November 1882  in the World War I Draft Registrations in 1918, the World War II Draft Registrations in 1942, and the U.S. Social Security Applications and Claims Index, 1936-2007.

3)  The 1930 U.S. Census provides the key clue, along with another newspaper article, which I reported on in "A Terrible Accident" (posted 21 April 2008).  In this article, Edward E. Seaver (1859-1882) is reported dead by a swing saw accident in a wood mill on 8 May 1882.  He had married Sarah Heintzelman on 2 January 1882 according to my database.  The article says that the widow was "enciente" meaning "carrying an unborn child."  Could the Edward Everett Seaver who died 15 May 1949 (the Syracuse article above) be the son of Edward E. and Sarah (Heintzelman) Seaver?  

4)  With that hypothesis, I wondered what happened to Sarah (Heintzelman) Seaver, who was a widow at age 20.  In the 1900 United States census, the Wm. H. Henderson household in Watertown, New York, included Sarah Henderson (born Sep 1863, age 36, married 14 years).  The oldest child in the household is Edward Henderson (step-son, born Nov 1882, age 17, born N.Y., parents born N.Y.). 

5)  I think that I have evidence that the 17-year old Edward Henderson in the 1900 U.S. Census is Edward Everett Seaver (1882-1949), the son of Edward E. Seaver (1859-1882) and Sarah (Heintzelman) Seaver (who married William Henderson in about 1886).  He married Mabel Curry in 1904, and had no children enumerated in the census records.

I still have more research to do on this Edward Everett Seaver, and his mother, but I think I have sufficient evidence to add him as a child to Edward and Sarah (Heintzelman) Seaver of Watertown, New York.

6)  It's amazing how much information we have on the Internet today.  I started this blog post about 90 minutes ago when I found the newspaper article at the top of the post, and wondered who his parents were.  Over the next hour, I was able to find all of the records noted above.  The key was the earlier blog article I wrote back in 2008 - I searched Genea-Musings for Edward Seaver and Watertown and found the earlier blog post.  Serendipity?  Good luck?  A decent family tree database?


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Copyright (c) 2016, Randall J. Seaver

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