Hidden Photograph

I was browsing my mother's papers and came across her diploma for 8th grade graduation in 1965 from Our Lady Help of Christians School in East Orange, Essex County, New Jersey.  I took the diploma out of the cover to scan it and out popped the class picture!  The tip here is to look behind framed papers and photographs for additional treasures.

Whoever thought to have all the children sign the back of the picture did a great service to those of us viewing this picture almost fifty years later.  The names as best as I can read them are:

William Ilg

Janet Kinahan

Jairo Jimenez

Kathy Russell

Michael King

Marianne Prokop

Repsi Sneed

Helen Lopez

Raymond Bonanno

Denise Bradley

Gregory Flemming

Louuis Hoyos

Maria Bryan

Paul Sullivan

Cheryl Jagoo

James Cullen

Kathy Mager

Kathy Drust

Robert Bartley

Christine Bailey

Michael Wiedaseck

Thomas Frunzi

David McKnight

Mary Ella Gally

Dennis Kamowski

William Jenkins

Judy Haas

Bruce Lane

Loretta Maloney

Judy Hoy

Patti Schaible

Michael Alexander

Mabel Wong

Richard Throckmorton

Ethel Brown

Henry Santurste

Ana Maria Fernandez

Barry McGrath

Andrea Godlowa

William Barasco

Find A Grave mobile app

I used the new Find A Grave mobile app!  This is an eagerly awaited, highly useful tool.  The website and app are both free.

I have not posted much on cemeteries lately because of the perpetual blanket of snow on the ground.  Most of the snow has melted now.

You can use the app to locate a cemetery using the map feature.  You can also add new graves and add information to existing entries, including GPS coordinates.

Pick a location and see all the cemeteries nearby

Find A Grave mobile app
Click on a tombstone on the map to see the name of the cemetery,
number of memorials, and number of pending photo requests

I visited Mount Hebron Cemetery in Montclair, New Jersey.  I found a new occupant and used the app to see if a memorial had been added.  It had not.  So I went ahead and created a new memorial right there in the cemetery using the app.

I added the name, birth and death dates, and a photo- at which point the phone became stuck on the upload.

Then it started to rain.

I snapped a picture of the surrounding area, which is a good idea to make it easier to locate the grave for anyone's future visit.

At home, on a wi-fi signal, I tried uploading the photo again and received a Successful message.

This is the web version of the new memorial.  GPS coordinates are automatically included!  You can add GPS coordinates for an existing memorial using the app, but make sure you are standing at the gravesite when doing so.  There is a built-in protection so that you cannot add GPS coordinates if you are not near the cemetery.

Preserving abandoned stories

Someone shared with me records from a locally abandoned prison complex, Essex County Penitentiary, later used as the Annex, in North Caldwell, New Jersey.  After people ceased to use the buildings, they fell into disrepair and people took unofficial tours of the historical grounds.  Records were left behind and sometimes people find them at garage sales in the area.  Great pictures of the buildings before demolition can be found on Abandoned But Not Forgotten; about halfway down are pictures of records left behind.  These lost records tell personal stories of local history.

The records are files of two inmates who arrived at the penitentiary on the same day, March 6, 1931.  These would be wonderful for their families to see.

Elizabeth Jackson, age 22, of 42 Shipman Street in Newark, was sentenced to four months for the crime of fornication.  (Can you imagine a time when this was a crime punishable by jail time?  This woman's jail records paint a personal picture of this prosecution.)

Sarah Steward, also known by other names, including Watkins and Douglas, age 25, of 274 Prince Street in Newark, was sentenced to three months for the crime of adultery.  (Makes you want to know who the married man was and how this act was discovered.)

Sarah Steward's troubles continued after her release.
In this letter from a nurse in New York City, we are provided with a more specific birth location:  Chrisfield, Maryland.

The staple in the upper left corner of the letters caused rust to stain the other documents in the file.

In researching both women, I found only one other record for Sarah Steward.  In the 1930 federal census, she was also in this jail, as per the warden's letter, and is enumerated on that schedule.