A Box About Boxes

(Chapter 7, Box 28 Action)

When I visited my parents in January, I came across a box of old letters that had been given to my father (Brian Jasch) after my great-grandmother (Nettie Ludington) passed away in 1998. The most logical arrangement for this collection was to arrange the letters chronologically according to the date they were posted.

April 9, 1951: postcard to Nettie from Chuck (my grandfather).
September 15, 1954: hospital bill for my father when my grandfather decided to keep him.
1956-59: Brian's immunization card.
May 9, 1965: homemade Mother's Day card made for Nettie from my father.
1972?: my father's enlistment card for 2 years of Regular Army Enlistment.
Unmarked: postcard to Nettie from Brian.
January 16, 1973: letter to Nettie from Brian.
February 5, 1973: postcard to Nettie from Brian.
February 24, 1973: postcard to Nettie from Brian.
March 7, 1973: letter to Nettie from Brian.
June 1, 1973: letter to Nettie from Brian in which he mentions his girlfriend, Sandy.
June 2, 1973: letter to Nettie from Brian.
June 8, 1973: letter to Nettie from Brian.
June 29, 1973: letter to Nettie from Brian in which he tells her of his upcoming engagement to Sandy.
August 16, 1973: letter to Nettie from Brian.
September 25, 1973: letter to Nettie from Brian in which he tells her to not tell Sandy about his "German chick."
October 4, 1973: letter to Nettie from Brian in which he tells her to apologize to Sandy about his German chick; he wants to be with Sandy when he returns home.
October 12, 1973: letter to Nettie from Brian in which he talks about the German chick and tells Nettie once again to not mention his girl on the side to Sandy.
November 5, 1973: letter to Nettie from Brian.
November 15, 1973: letter to Nettie from Brian.
December 21, 1973: letter to Nettie from Debbie regarding the twin boys she had with my
father and her plans to marry him when he returns from Army service.
February 11, 1974: letter to Nettie from Brian.
March 22, 1974: letter to Nettie from Brian.
September 11, 1974: letter to Nettie from Brian.
November 14, 1974: letter to Nettie from Brian in which he tells her of his plans to move out when he returns home.
March 31, 1980: Nettie's invitation to Brian and Joyce's (my mother) wedding.

Though the contents of the box were originally haphazardly strewn inside the airmail box they originally arrived in back in 1998 (many letters needed to be matched to their corresponding envelopes), organizing them for the first time made many things clearer for me. Most importantly, I found proof that my father had two children with a woman immediately before entering the service. He had apparently promised to marry her when he returned. However, throughout his time stationed in Fort Polk, LA and in Germany, he had promised two additional women he would marry them. He had a long-term girlfriend with whom he broke up and got back together with several times over the two year span of letters. He also had a German girl on the side.

I was surprised that my father confided all of this in Nettie (his Ma). What must she have thought of it all? All I know is that Grandma Nettie could hold her secrets--she took as many as of them as possible to the grave. My dad, of course, just snickers and turns red when I confront him about all of this. His nose flares and twitches in a way that prepares me for a lie or a cover-up of some sort. My mom just pretends she doesn't hear it all. I guess what surprises and frustrates me most of all in this family history research-business is how strongly people want to cover up and/or deny their pasts. All I want to do is figure out where I came from before it's too late. At least this box of letters tells me a few things no one else is prepared to.

Women and Genealogy

As I began working on my family history project (and I still feel as if I'm quite new to it), I quickly discovered three family members who have done some research in the past. My great-aunt Ginnie was the first person who introduced me so-to-speak to my great-great grandparents Freyer. Through a few lengthy phone conversations and one five hour visit that almost never happened, I discovered within Aunt Ginnie a desire to pass down the stories and facts that she had acquired over the past nine decades. She spoke to me with urgency, yet simultaneously with an immense sadness. "So many things I wished I could have asked your gram, Hidi. You know? Back then, no one ever thought to ask these sorts of things," she said more than once as she drove me through the neighborhood in which she has spent her entire life.

At the end of our visit, Aunt Ginnie pointed me in the direction of her sister-in-law, Caroline (Rebac) Jasch, who has also been practicing genealogy for sport over the past twenty-five years. Though I have yet to see the culmination of her research, it was fun to speak with her over the phone. I think the last time I had spoken with her was as a shy 8-year-old on Easter Sunday. My mother would dress me in these frothy pastel nightmares and in stockings that ran just by pulling them on and then parade me in front of relatives at Aunt Caroline and Uncle Ed's. Aunt Caroline scared me back then. She was always yelling at someone as she filled tables with dish after dish of food I was not about to ingest. I ate a plateful of dinner mints. Now, on the other end of the phone, there was Aunt Caroline yelling, "Ed! Get down, Adolph! Get the damn dog outta here! I gotta get outta this room. Yer Uncle Ed's got the set turned so loud, I can't hear a thing. He's trying to make me watch those shows and I don't want to watch those shows. That's better. Your Aunt Gin tells me you're doing a project. Now, you, see I've got a lot of information over the past twenty-five years. I can e-mail it all to you..." Yes, all of this and I hadn't said a word to her since Uncle Ed had passed her the phone. I could only smile to myself thinking about how little she'd changed.

The third woman in my family who works on genealogy is my great-great aunt Bernice. (I should add that she is not likely a Jasch by blood, but was raised as one, and as far as I am concerned, she is a Jasch). I have never met or spoken with my Aunt Bernice. My Aunt Ginnie tells me that she lives in Utah and has done a lot of work on the Freyer side of the family.

In my family, these three women are the only people who actively engage in genealogical research, either through historical societies, like Aunt Ginnie, through online resources, like Aunt Caroline, or through libraries, like Aunt Bernice. This leads me to believe that genealogy, at least in my family, is a gendered practice. That said, there are many factors that lend this "hobby" (as they define it) well to females. Most of these women spent the majority of their lives raising few to no children, only one that I know of was ever seriously employed outside of the house, and none of them have been employed over the past several decades. Also, my family of origination is very traditional in the sense that there are women's things and there are men's things. The passive practice of passing written and spoken things down from generation to generation has always fallen under the category of women's things, whereas the active practice of hunting and fixing things has generally fallen within the scope of men's things. From this, I will assume that, traditionally, genealogical practices are typically gendered.

Freyer School

Of the 40 acres owned by my great-great grandfather, Robert Freyer, one acre was deeded to Michigan School Township on May 3, 1915. This plot of land was developed that year as a one-room schoolhouse fittingly named "Freyer School." My great grandmother, Nettie Freyer, and her siblings, as well as my grandfather, Charles Jasch, and his siblings and cousins all attended Freyer School before it was sold.

Yet to be posted is a late-1930s class picture including Nettie and Edward's oldest child, my great aunt Ginny.

Today the Freyer School still stands on the corner of Freyer and Eastwood now converted and expanded into Emmanuel Baptist Temple, 820 Eastwood Road.

Freyer Homestead

In 1914, my great-great grandfather, Robert Freyer, built the Freyer Homestead (pictured at right) on what is now the corner of Freyer and Herman in Michigan City, Indiana. Robert and his wife, Dorothy ("Dora" Wilke), raised the majority of their 21 biological children on this property which encompassed 40 acres (from Eastwood to Schnicke).

As the children reached adulthood, each was entitled to one acre upon which to build a home of their own. My great grandmother, Nettie Clara Freyer, married Edward Charles Jasch on June 1, 1925 and soon acquired an acre of her own on what is now Schnicke Road. A few decades later, this neighborhood became affectionately known as "Freyer-ville."

Nettie and Edward's second child, Charles "Peanut" Harry Jasch, later had an affair in December 1953 with an unknown but married woman. Two days after the birth of their son (my father, Brian Charles Jasch), the woman put the baby up for adoption. Later that night Peanut arrived at the house on Schnicke Road with my father, who was then raised by both Peanut and Nettie. (Edward had passed away on May 27, 1934, and Nettie had divorced both William Schnicke and Harry Ludington before my father's birth on September 13, 1954.)

Rumor has it (according to my great aunt Ginnie) that my paternal grandmother's family is Woodruff from Michigan City. However, my father's birth certificate is allegedly signed once as "Virginia Jasch" and another time as "Virginia Hopkins of South Bend, Indiana" (according to my mother Joyce). Without locating a copy of my father's birth certificate, I cannot confirm this; however, I can consider this a starting point.

Just in case anyone is curious about Robert and Dora's phenomenal amount of children, of the 21 born, there was only one set of twins. Including the twins, four other children died at birth and went unnamed. The 15 children are as follows: Lillian (1896), Martha (1897), Herbert (1899), Clarence (1901), Edgar (1904), Nettie (1906), Lena (1907), Minnie (1908), Ruth (1909), Eva (1912), Florence (1913), Dorothy (1916), Lester (1919), Willis (1921), and Marietta (1923). Between the ages of 17 and 44, a time span of 27 years, Dora had given birth 20 times!

Introduction

In this blog I will be keeping track of my research progress. I will be recording personal notes and reflections on readings related to "Literacy and Family History."

For the next eight or more weeks, I will also post the stories, photos, and/or interesting documents I come across during my interviews with my great aunt, Virginia "Ginny" (Jasch) Keen, and my father and mother, Brian Jasch and Joyce (King) Jasch. Ideally, I want to discover who my paternal grandmother was/is, but many of these stories seem to have died along with my great grandmother, Nettie (Freyer) Ludington, in 1998 and my paternal grandfather, Charles Jasch, in 2005. Therefore, I will most likely center my research on family stories that were passed down to my great-aunt Ginny and those which took place during her lifetime.

I'm excited to see what I find. Last weekend's trip to Aunt Ginny's (Michigan City, Ind.) and my parents' (Fennville, Mich.) was canceled due to bad weather, so my fingers are crossed for clear roads this upcoming weekend!