The McDades - Part 1, The Brothers

From family history, I know Wm J McDade came from Scotland. He is Alexander, Eleanor's husband's Father. Wm J lived in Fayette County, Pennsylvania working as a coal miner. From the censuses, he came to the US about 1884. Also from family history, I know he had a brother named Patrick Allan or Allan Patrick. Patrick was the namesake for Wm's youngest son, Allen Patrick. This was told to me by one of Allen Patrick's sons. This is pretty much the extent of what I know about my McDade ancestors.

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Unfortunately, the 1890 census was mostly destroyed in a fire. It would answer many questions I have. Since it is not available, I turned to the 1900 census. In 1900, in all of Fayette County, Pennsylvania, there were 15 McDade's.

Wm J and his family
    Sarah Wife
    William Emmitt Son
    Catherine Daughter

Alexander and his family
    Mary Wife
    Alexander Son
    Margaret Daughter
    Mary Daughter
    William Son
    James Son
    Robert Son
    Peter Son

Mary McDade, a 52-year-old widow

Mary McDaid, the 14-year-old niece of William  and Elizabeth Goodburn

With so few McDades in the area I felt William and Alexander had to be related.

Researching Wm about 5-years ago or so, I found an entry in a book for Alexander as the Treasurer of the local Ancient Order of Hibernians Division 5 of Uniontown. The Ancient Order of Hibernians is America’s oldest Irish Catholic Fraternal Organization founded concurrently in the coal-mining region of Pennsylvania and New York City in May 1836. The AOH still exists, so I emailed the Historian to find out if they had any family records. He said they didn't, but offered this;

I have searched the national archives for any information on Alex McDade and found nothing except for the directory information you already have.  Application forms for the AOH do not ask for information on parentage nor Irish County of origin – at least today they don’t.  Not having the records of the early Pittsburgh Divisions, I am afraid I can’t be of much help to you, but I wish you luck in your quest.  Know that to be a member of the AOH around the turn of the century in Pittsburg took a good deal of courage.

               De Bard

The AOH is a faith-based, Roman Catholics of Irish descent, organization and their divisions are based out of churches. The church used by the Fayette County division that Alexander was the Treasurer of was St. John the Evangelist Parish in Uniontown. I contacted the church and asked if they could provide any information. They sent me a letter that Wm's children William Emmett and Catherine were baptized there and Alexander's children, Robert, Peter, Joseph, and Eugene were baptized there as well. But they had no information tying the families together.

Due to the number of children being named after someone else, specifically William and Alexander at this point, I'm going to give them different names to distinguish them.

        William John - Eleanor's Father-in-law will be Wm.
        William Emmett - Wm's oldest son will be Emmett.

        Alexander - Wm's brother will be Alex.
        Alexander - Alex's oldest son will be Alex Jr.
        Alexander - Wm's second son, and Eleanor's husband will be Red.


The first bit of information to confirm my thoughts was a newspaper article I found a couple years ago. Wm's second son, Red, got into some trouble, armed robbery. There were three that participated in the robbery, but of note was Red (Alex) and his cousin James McDade. James is one of Alex's sons.

The Evening Standard, (Uniontown, Pennsylvania), 02 Jun 1931, Tue, Page 1

As I continued to search for more information - more confirmation, I found another obituary for Alex that I hadn't previously uncovered. In this one, the last line says, "He also leaves one brother, William McDade, of Uniontown."

The Morning Herald, (Uniontown, Pennsylvania), 09 Sep 1916, Sat, Page 3

That's two incidents that indicate they are brothers, but I also came across this newspaper story of Wm's funeral. "Pallbearers were all nephews of the deceased and were Robert, James, Lambert and Joseph McDade, William Cosgrove and James Catney." Robert, James, Lambert, and Joseph are Alex's sons. William Cosgrove and James Catney are Alex's sons-in-law. William was married to Margaret and James was married to Mary.

The Evening Standard, (Uniontown, Pennsylvania), 02 Jul 1927, Sat, Page 16

I'm going to conclude Alex is the older brother of Wm and Patrick.

Part 2 -> The Family

The McDades - Part 2, The Family

As I said in my last post, I don't know a lot about Wm, only that he came from Scotland and had a brother named Patrick Allen or Allen Patrick. But now I know that Alex is Wm's brother there is another branch to trace. Alex came over the year before Wm and Patrick in 1883 according to the censuses. Since Alex was already married to Mary McMahon and his oldest son, Alex Jr, had been born I was able to search for them in Scottish records.

I was able to find Alex and Mary's marriage record. They were married April 25, 1881, at St Margaret's Roman Catholic Church in Johnstone, Renfrewshire. Alex's parents are William McDaid and Mary Stephenson. Alex, Wm, and Patrick, changed the spelling of McDaid to McDade when they emigrated. It also has Mary McMahon's parents as James McMahon and Mary McClain.

Their oldest son, Alex Jr, was born on December 18, 1881.

Referring back to my naming chart, I will add William the father as William.

        William - Alex, Wm and Patrick's father will be William

William John - Eleanor's Father-in-law will be Wm.

        William Emmett - Wm's oldest son will be Emmett.

        Alexander - Wm's brother will be Alex.

        Alexander - Alex's oldest son will be Alex Jr.

        Alexander - Wm's son, and Eleanor's husband will be Red.

William and Mary were married on January 24, 1856, at St. Mary's Roman Catholic Church, Hamilton, South Lanarkshire.

In 1861, the family was still living in Johnstone, Renfrewshire. We find that William was born in Co Donegal, Ireland. He was working as an ironstone miner. Their first three children, Margaret, Alex, and Catherine had been born in the five years since their wedding.

With William being born in Ireland and the wedding in 1856, I suspect he emigrated due to The Great Famine, 1845 - 1852.

1861 Census

In 1871, William was still working as a miner. I know from the birth records he still working as an iron miner. Two more children, Mary and Wm, had been born.

1871 Census

In 1881, William has switched to coal mining. He switched to coal mining sometime between 1871 and 1877 when Annie was born. Two more children have been born, Allen and Annie,  and Margaret, the oldest, has left home.

1881 Census

As can be seen, they were not good at keeping dates straight in their time. The censuses were every ten years, but their age was never ten years between the censuses. I haven't found birth records for William and Mary yet, but I have found them for the children. There are a few items of information that is useful from them. I'll summarize what I found.

Margaret	03 June 1857	Abbey Paisley, Renfrew
Alexander (Alex)	03 January 1859	Houston & Killellan, Renfrew
Catherine	18 January 1861	Hamilton, Lanark
Mary	13 January 1863	Dalry, Ayr
Sarah	11 February 1865	Dalry, Ayr
William (Wm)	21 October 1869	Abbey Paisley, Renfrew
Allen  Patrick	17 June 1871	Abbey Paisley, Renfrew
Annie	24 November 1877	Johnstone, Renfrew

A summary of things I was able to learn from the Birth records besides William leaving the iron mine to work in the coal mine are;

• The witness for Mary's birth was Margaret McDaid. It says she's an Aunt, so it must be William's Sister.
• The witness for Wm's birth was Margaret Stevenson. It says she's a Grandmother, so it must be Mary's Mother.
• I believe Patrick's given name is actually Allan. Allan Patrick.
• Catherine and Mary were born in different counties than where they were living, so they possibly had family in those towns.
• If you notice they had a child every two years except the six years between Mary and William and the six years between Patrick and Annie. I suspect they had children that didn't survive during these periods.
• Update 2018-10-31: William and Mary had a daughter Sarah born in 1865. The record indicates the witness was an Uncle - Peter McDade

A few years after the 1881 census on January 10, 1883, William died. The cause given is Acute Bronchitis - Miners' Asthma (Black Lung). The age is given as 48-years-old, making his birth year as 1835. The censuses have the years of 1831, 1833, and 1836. This makes 1835 pretty close. Alex was the informant. He recorded William's father as Alexander, a mason and for his mother, only her maiden name, Gillespie. I think this makes her name Mary Gillespie putting together the death record and Annie's birth record.

1883 - Death Record

Time to update the naming chart. Alexander, William's father will be Alexander.

        William - Alex, Wm and Patrick's father will be William

William John - Eleanor's Father-in-law will be Wm.

        William Emmett - Wm's oldest son will be Emmett.

        Alexander - William's father will be Alexander

Alexander - Wm's brother will be Alex.

        Alexander - Alex's oldest son will be Alex Jr.

        Alexander - Wm's second son, and Eleanor's husband will be Red.

Charles Grant Clemens - Part 1

Many family researchers use someone else's research as the source for their family tree without questioning whether the other person has documented the relationship. I've been guilty of this a well - at least for Charles Grant Clemens. Since the Clemens had many children – at least as far back as John and Mary Catherine – and each of the children had many children, there are many researchers and most of them have Charles Grant Clemens conflated with Charles Gerald Clemens. I believe this is as well-documented and correct as we may ever know.

Most family trees have Charles G Clemens married to Jessie (nee Rostron) Clemens in Eastern Pennsylvania in the Montgomery County / Philadelphia area. While this is true; there is plenty of documentation, it is not Charles Grant Clemens. It is Charles Gerald Clemens. Charles Gerald Clemens married Jessie Rostron in 1917.  This date helps unravel the mystery.

What started me down this path was mentioning to my Mom that I found an obit for Charles G's son and I was going to try and track down a living male Clemens to take a DNA test. I told her Grant moved east, married, lived there, and was buried in eastern Pennsylvania. She said, "Huh, Mom always told me he went to Ohio." and "No one knew why he didn't come around [the family]."

After that, I was thinking about it and I remember talking to Grandma (Eleanor) about the family in the Fall of 1992. She told me that she had a brother in Iowa that she hadn't seen in over fifty years. (NOTE: In the fifteen years I've been researching the family history, I haven't made any connection to Iowa and I think she meant Ohio.) I'm pretty certain she was talking about Grant. I feel like I can remember her using the name Grant when she talked about him.

I started re-checking the documentation that I do have and found on Grant's WWI Draft Card that he was living in Cleveland, in 1917. He said he's married with a four-year-old as his reason for being exempted from the draft. I'll write more about his wife and child later. But he's not in Philadelphia getting married to Jessie Rostron.

WWI Draft Card

Also, his mother Anna Belle (nee Marshman) Clemens' obituary has him still living in Cleveland, Ohio in 1930.

Altoona Mirror, 3 January 1930

Finally, the obituary that I mentioned at the top, says that one of Charles G's sons was named Charles Gerald Clemens Jr. I have found other documentation indicating Charles Gerald is the name the person in the obituary. But at this point, it's two different Charles G Clemens.

Charles Gerald Clemens can be traced back to his birth in Philadelphia and I do not believe he is any relation so I will not mention him again to try and prevent confusion.

                |          Part 2

Charles Grant Clemens - Part 2

Grant and Elenora

The back of this photo says, "a bird dumped on my face haha Grant and Eleanor". I suspect the caption is due to the damage of the photo on his face. I believe this is really his wife Elenora because this is a pretty intimate pose and there is a 21-year difference between Grant and his sister Eleanor. This couple seems to be about the same age.

As indicated in the Part 1 post for Grant, he was not married to Jessie Rostron. While looking through the Lafferty-Tobias Funeral Home 1907-1918 book in the Blair County section of the Genealogical Department at the State Library I happened upon an entry for the death of Grant's infant daughter, Mary Belle.

Lafferty-Tobias Funeral Home 1907-1918

In the obituary, the mother is named as Emma, but I suspect this is just a nickname. Elenora is her given name, as it is the name used on censuses and the funeral home register. Her maiden name is Pressel.

Altoona Tribune - 12 Apr 1913

Altoona Mirror - 12 Apr 1913

The change in surname indicates that she and Grant were married. She was also named as Mrs. Clemens in her Father's obituary. Her Father's obit also says the family was members of Grace Methodist Episcopal Church which closed in 2009. I would suspect this is where they would have been married. Perhaps one day the church records will be available.

Altoona Tribune - 19 Jun 1915

Grant said he was married with a four-year-old on his WWI Draft Card. Was he referring to Emma and Mary Belle hoping it wouldn't be checked? Mary Belle would have been about six-years-old when he filled out his draft card. I have not been able to find any records or newspaper articles that show he had another child. In fact, the 1920 Census shows him having a wife named Elizabeth. They were living with others as lodgers and the owner probably provided the information to the census-taker. Did she not know Grant's wife's name? Was he no longer with Elenora? The ages are correct for it to be Elenora.

1920 Census

<- Part 1          |          Part 3 ->

Charles Grant Clemens - Part 3

Grant

Why did he alienate himself from the family? Why did he not come around? These are questions I can't answer; I can only speculate. I can tell you what happened to Grant and while he ended up in Eastern Pennsylvania, he wasn't buried in Montgomery County.

There are a few things I noticed while researching Grant. While I have not found a record of his birth or a birth announcement, both of his draft cards have his birthdate as September 12, 1892. Most of the other records corroborate this or are close enough to believe it's an accurate date.

I found a couple articles about Shade Family Reunions that have Bruce and Anna Belle's wedding date. It has their wedding date as November 23, 1895. The Shade's are Bruce's Mother's family. Click the images for the entire article.

Shade Reunion -Altoona Tribune, 09 Aug 1897

Shade Reunion - Mount Union Times, 16 Aug 1901

Notice Grant is not listed. He would have been the oldest child. I wanted a better confirmation of the wedding date. I was unable to find any church records and the State and Counties were not registering marriages in 1895. So, to the paper! It was in both the local papers about two weeks later on December 5, 1895. The Lewistown Gazette had a typesetting error;

The Lewistown Gazette, 5 December 1895

But The Lewistown Democrat & Sentinel got it right;

The Lewistown Sentinel & Democrat, 5 December 1895

I don't really find it unusual there was not an announcement for a child born out of wedlock in this time period. I did find this in the County News section of The Lewistown Gazette on September 16,1892, four days after his birth. Anna Belle did have two younger brothers, James, 12-years-old and Andy, 10-years-old. when Grant was born. Maybe one of them is an 'interesting boy'?

The Lewistown Gazette, 16 September 1892

We know he was living with at home in 1900. Since the Census Day in 1900 was June 1st, he would have been 7 years old.

1900 Census

According to both Bruce and Anna's obituaries, they moved from Newton Hamilton / Wayne Township, Mifflin County to Altoona, Blair County about 1901. The next record I could find for Grant was the 1910 Census and he had already left home. He was living with another family, the Hoover's, a few miles away in Tyrone, Blair County. He was working as a clerk at a drug store.

1910 Census

So was Grant adopted? Was Bruce not his biological father? Did he feel unwelcome? Maybe one of these reasons or a combination of them is the reason he alienated himself from the family? We'll likely never know.

Part 2          |          Part 4

Charles Grant Clemens - Part 4

Grant

So what happened to Grant? We know by his WWI Draft Card by 1917 he's living in Cleveland. And as we saw from the 1920 Census he's living as a lodger with an Elizabeth (Elenora/Emma?) in Cleveland. On the 1930 Census he's still living in Cleveland, but he's moved and is living as a lodger with other people and now it says he's single. What happened to his wife? I've not been able to find her yet, so I don't know if he's separated, divorced or a widower.

1930 Census

One of the questions on the 1940 Census was "Where were you living in 1935?" In 1935 Grant was back in Pennsylvania; Conemaugh, Cambria County to be exact. By 1940 he had moved to Pittsburgh. He was in a homeless shelter named Improvement of the Poor. He is now shown as a widower.

1940 Census

It seems to be about 1938 when he went to Pittsburgh. He spent October 1938 in jail for vagrancy.

Prison Register 3 October 1938

Prison Discharge Register 1 November 1938

In 1942 he registered for the WWII draft as was required. I know this is his draft card because the person he has listed as a permanent contact, Mrs. L. B. Hartman, is his sister Effie Clemens. From his WWI draft card and the prison registers, he was tall - 6'. He put his height as 5' 4" on this draft card. I think this was another attempt to make sure he wasn't drafted.

WWII Draft Card

In 1949 he was arrested for vagrancy again. I know the name is spelled differently, but the description is the same and the life he was living makes me believe this is him.

Prison Register 15 June 1949

Sadly, he died in 1951. The 1950 Census has not been released to the public to learn if he's still in Pittsburgh, but I'm pretty certain this is his death certificate. There are a couple of reasons. He seemed to be mostly homeless while in Pittsburgh. The address listed as his Usual Residence is a doctor's office. The Doctor's name is James William MacDonald. The Informant did not have much information about his family, for instance, his birthdate or his parent's names. Her name is Marie MacDonald. I suspect she is the Doctor's wife.

Doctor's Office Address

And his death certificate.

Death certificate

The "Name of Cemetery or Crematory" is shown as SAB Phil. SAB is "Sent Anatomical Body". In other words, his body was donated to medical science.

This is the story of Charles Grant Clemens as best as I can tell. These are the best pictures I have that have identified him.

Part 3          |                

Debiah Elizabeth (nee Clemens) Yohn

My first encounter with Mrs. Debiah E Yohn was on Mary Catherine Strausser Clemens' death certificate. Mary Catherine's death certificate is another story in itself, but Debiah was the Informant.  I had no idea who she was. John and Mary Catherine did not have any children named Debiah listed on the censuses. I did some research but was unable to learn much about her at the time except her husband was William H Yohn. She and William were neighbors of John and Mary Catherine on the 1900 censuses. They had four children die in a three-week span between March 24, 1890, and April 14, 1890. Later research indicates the children died of diphtheria. Another researcher suggested that perhaps her maiden name was Clemens and she was the Elizabeth Clemens on the 1870 census. I thought it was a possibility but was unable to find any documentation at the time.

Recently I was looking through Presbyterian Church records on Ancestry. From the Wayne Township/ Newton Hamilton area of Mifflin County and I found numerous Clemens' records. In the records, I found a marriage record for Debiah E Clemens to William H Yohn. It reminded me of the death certificate and I decided to see if I could solve this mystery.

Marriage Record

On Find-A-Grave I learned she died in 1915 from her tombstone. Since the State started keeping Death Certificates in 1906 I was able to find her death certificate, but like her mother's, Debiah's is wrong as well. Whoever filled out the certificate wrote her name as Rosanna Yohn. All of the other information was mostly correct; where she lived, date-of-birth, the Informant is her husband and her parent's names. Her mother's maiden name was given as Kelley, probably from Grandmother's maiden name - Keely.

Death Certificate

Since I now had the date of her death, I was off to the State Library to look for an obituary. There were two newspapers published in the area at this period of time, The Lewistown Gazette and The Democrat & Sentenial. These two newspapers were published weekly at the time. The papers printed the week after her passing had her obituary.

Her death was mention in the 'County Correspondence' section. This article is not quite correct. While Hannah and Clara are both nieces, Clara's last name is Strauser. Her mother is Margaret (nee Clemens) Strauser. The G. B. Clemens mentioned is George Benton Clemens, Debiah's brother. Hannah Clemens is G. B.'s daughter.

Lewistown Gazette September 2, 1915, Page 2

Her actual obituary. As I said, they had lost four children to diphtheria, but they did have two children that lived; Roselia G. (b. 1880) and Edward L. (b. 1889).

Lewistown Gazette September 2, 1915, Page 2

 From the list of deaths in the paper.

Lewistown Gazette September 2, 1915, Page 5

The obituary from Lewistown Democrat & Sentinel. This is the final confirmation for me to believe this is the same person.

Democrat and Sentinel September 2, 1915, Page 8