The Deans of Orangeburg & Muses Mill

I found my Dean ancestors in the rural spots of Orangeburg and Muses Mill,  in Kentucky, because of the information provided by my great grandfather, John Dean, on his and Nellie’s marriage record.

I located his parents, my 2^nd great grandparents, Elisha and Elizabeth (Betsey) Dean, in the 1870 Census.  John, however, listed his mother's name as Betsy Jacobs, and for a long time I was unable to find any information on her.  As I prepared to post this chapter here on the blog and include it in the book manuscript for printing, I finally gave in and changed Betsey's last name to "Jenkins," the name that kept popping up and which I repeatedly ignored.  After all, John may have told the court clerk Jenkins, and the clerk heard Jacobs.  Just goes to say, you have to dig deep in genealogy.  

No sooner than I changed the name, and I got a hit.  The best hit, Betsey's parents.  And Betsey is really Sarah Elizabeth Jenkins.  

As John’s marriage information states, his parents resided in Mason County, Kentucky.  The town, it turns out, was Orangeburg, at least when I first found them.  Later I'd clear up the issue of people by the same name appearing in Muses Mill, Flemming County, Kentucky, which I'd also repeatedly ignored.    

I also turned up sublings for my great grandfather John, though their parentage is split between different fathers, an issue that drove me almost insane for over a year.  The above pedigree chart shows John's brothers, Daniel, James, and Leander, and a daughter Mary Dean.  

On the 1860 census for Morgan County, Orangeburg, Daniel and Mary are identified with the last name, Martin.  Elisha, my great grandfather, is the only Dean besides his mother Elizabeth.  Two additional residents of the 1860 home include Elizabeth "Leakins" age 30, and James N. Leakins, age 9.  Another Ancestry member changed the last name of these two to "Jenkins."  All future records reflect Jenkins.

1860 United States Federal Census about Elizabeth Dean

Name: Elizabeth Dean Age in 1860: 80 Birth Year: abt 1780 Birthplace: Virginia Home in 1860: Division 2, Morgan, Kentucky Gender: Female Post Office: West Liberty Value of real estate: View image Household Members: Name Age Elisha Dean 35 Elizabeth Dean 80 Daniel Martin 45 Mary L Martin 7 Elizabeth Leakins 30 James N Leakins 9

Elizabeth Leakins, or Jenkins as it should be, is eventually shown on further records as Elizabeth, or Betsey, Dean, wife of Elisha.  James N. Leakins (Jenkins), it can be concluded was born to Elizabeth and given her maiden name.  Is Elisha the father?  It looks likely, since Elizabeth and the child are living with Elisha along with his mother and brother.

James eventually becomes James Newton Dean, identified trough multiple other Ancestry family trees.

James Newton Jenkins Dean,
prior to his death on July 26, 1927,
in Kankakee, Illinois

The Martin children of Elizabeth Dean are later also identified as Deans, though Daniel, in the 1850 census bore the last name Dean.  Here in 1860, he is Daniel Martin, and in 1870 he is still Martin, age 55, as head of household, still residing in Orangeburg, listed right above Elisha and Elizabeth Dean.  The Martins and the Deans stayed together throughout most all census records.

1870 United States Federal Census about Daniel Martin

Name: Daniel Martin Age in 1870: 55 Birth Year: abt 1815 Birthplace: Tennessee Home in 1870: Orangeburg, Mason, Kentucky Race: White Gender: Male Post Office: Orangeburg Value of real estate: View image Household Members: Name Age Daniel Martin 55 Jane Martin 26 Hartle Martin 4 Wolford Martin 3 Ariary Martin 2

Jane is identified as Daniel's wife in a later census, though on this one for 1870, I was unsure because of her young age.  In the 1880 census, Daniel's birthplace is listed as Kentucky, but I've found that a lot of residents  list the state they're living in at the time as their birthplace, or they are not sure, and the census taker lists the state for them.  Every other record for Daniel states Tennessee as his birthplace.

Daniel's wife Jane is actually Jane Jenkins, Sara Elizabeth's sister.  I finally discovered this from another Ancestry member who is researching the Martins.  

My Ancestry friend claims Mary L. Martin, seen above in the 1860 census, is the daughter of Daniel.  This makes sense because on that census Mary age 7, is listed right below Daniel, age 45.  

The two brothers, Elisha and Daniel, and both their children are living together, along with the children's grandmother, Elizabeth, and Elisha's child's mother, Sarah Elizabeth Jenkins.  But there are several listings of Mary Dean and/or Mary Martin, and I wonder if they are all one and the same girl.  

• The first occurrence of Mary is in 1860, identified as Mary L. Martin, born in 1853, age 7 
• The next census, 1870, lists a Mary Dean, born in 1854, age now 16
• The 1880 census lists E. Mary Dean, born in 1860, age 20

 It's confusing, to say the least, and therein lies the challenge of genealogy.  I will at some point combine the three Marys and see where that leads, but for now I'll leave it as is.

The 1880 census shows James N. Dean living in Fleming County, Muses Mill, married to Sarah Dean and a son, Elisha, age two, most likely named after his grandfather Elisha Dean, even if James started out being a Martin.  The adult James lists Elisha as his father until his death (although it appears as "Elijah" one time).  

Young Elisha, born in 1878, probably in Muses Mill, appears in later census records including his obituary on September 18, 1958:

Elisha, Sr., had a son, Elisha Edward Dean, Jr., who died this year.  I wish I'd discovered this lineage before so I could have known him.

Elisha Edward Dean, Jr.
1933 - 2012
Brooksburg, Jefferson County, Indiana

Elisha and Betsey
My Grandfather Frank Dean's Grandparents

Elisha and Betsy Dean were the parents of James, Mary, and my great grandfather John.  Elisha was born about 1827 in Tennessee, where I now live.  I like that.

I know that Elisha Dean served in the Civil War.

U.S., Civil War Draft Registrations Records, 1863-1865 about Elisha Dean

Name: Elisha Dean Residence: Sub District, Kentucky Class: 2 Congressional District: 9th Age on 1 July 1863: 40 Estimated Birth Year: abt 1823 Race: White Place of Birth: Kentucky

View original image

My 2nd Great Grandfather's mother always listed her name on census records as Elizabeth Dean, though one record shows Elisha giving her the name Elizabeth Martin.  He does not specify his father's name, nor have I been able to pin it down.  As already discussed, the Martin family boasts of many members and were closely connected to the Deans all through the 1800s.   The families appear on records living together or in the dwelling next door or a few doors away.  

What exactly the connection to the Martins is can only be completely solved by discovering the person Elizabeth Dean married before calling herself a Dean and giving birth to a Dean child.  

She was born in Virginia about 1780 and gave birth to children in Tennessee, and then moved to Kentucky.  I've been unable to locate a for-sure husband in any of those states.  

The name Willis Dean keeps popping up on Ancestry, and who indeed takes up a lot of genealogical geography on the internet.  Many of his ancestors still reside in Tennessee, in cities and towns rather close to me.  I wish I could prove relationship to this large family, but so far I've not been successful.

I did finally discover, just recently, 2nd Great Grandmother Betsey Jenkins' parents, Solomon Jenkins and Laney Ellis.  Solomon was born in 1796 in in North Carolina, and died in 1870 in Morgan County, Kentucky.  Laney Ellis, daughter of Willis Ellis, and Elizabeth, was born in 1799, in North Carolina, and also died in 1870, like her husband, in Morgan County.  Eventually, armed with these facts, I may be able to delve further back in history and discover new ancestors.

Perhaps more research eventually will carry me back to some exciting bygone era, but for now I’m ready to publish what I have managed to excavate out of a very large genealogical mountain.

The Deans and the Cramers

John and Nellie

Using the information my grandfather Frank provided about his parents at the time of his marriage to my grandmother, I discovered a marriage record for Hamilton County, Cincinnati, for his mother and father, Nellie and John Dean, dated June 18th, 1900.  This was three years after Frank was born. 

The document states that John had been divorced prior to this marriage, and it may be that he was not free to marry Nellie before then, even when she became pregnant with their son. 

The 1900 Census, dated June 7, 1900, just 11 days prior to her marriage to John Dean, shows Nellie Cramer living with her mother, Ellen Cramer, and sisters, Lottie, Laura, Tillie, Mary, and two boarders, at 1030 Sixth Street.  

The two listed boarders are Dean Sheldon (could the census taker have reversed the name, and should be Sheldon Dean?), age 13, and Frank Cramer, age one year. 

Obviously, Frank Cramer is Nellie’s and John’s son, Frank, my grandfather.  Nellie had given birth to a child fathered by a married man, most likely, and either gave him her own maiden name, or the census taker had reason to list him as a Cramer.  After his parents’ marriage, all future records are in the name of Frank B. Dean.

The 13-year-old boarder, Dean Sheldon, who I questioned as having his name reversed, does later show up 
in the 1926 city directory as an attendant at Cincinnati General Hospital, no home address noted.  Since no other Dean Sheldon appears on further records, this most likely is the 13-year-old laborer in a saw mill from 1900, living with the Cramers.
 

Ten years later, the Williams Cincinnati Directory for 1910, shows Nellie residing at 658 West Fifth Street, which would be at the corner of Fifth and Central Avenue, downtown.  The listing reads: 

"— Nellie wid  John T h 658 W  5th”

Nellie is the widow of John T. Dean, living in a home (“h” as opposed to “r” for renting) at 658 West 5^th Street. 

Before the couple’s tenth anniversary, John apparently died.  

Nellie and Joseph

On March 30, 1910, Nellie married Joseph O’Flaherty. She signed the document as “Mrs. Nellie Dean,” and she asserts that she’s had a prior marriage.  

On the census that year, after Nellie’s second marriage, Frank, now age 10, is living with his mother Nellie and his step-father, Joseph J. O’Flaherty, at 1062 Cutter Street, in the West End, along with his younger sister Ettie Dean, age eight, who was born in 1902, no month or day given.  She was born two years after her mother and father, John, got married. 

The 1910 census is dated April 29^th.  Joseph and Nellie O’Flahrety had been married a month. 

Eight years after her marriage to Joseph O’Flaherty, Nellie died on June 19, 1918.  Cause of death is listed as mitral valve insufficiency.  She died at St. Mary’s Hospital in Cincinnati.  At the time of her death, she and Joseph were living at 1511 Cutter Street in Cincinnati, the same street as in 1910 but a different number. 

One month after Nellie’s death, her son Frank married Clara Wehrle, on May 6, 1919.  She didn’t live to see the birth of her first grandchild, my father Raymond.  She died two years before her daughter Ettie is listed as an inmate at the Institute for Feeble Minded Youth. 

Two years after her death, according to the 1920 Census, Joseph James O’Flaherty is living with a couple, William and Allie Allen, and their two children, Robert and Ethel, in Cincinnati’s Sixth Ward.   Ettie is not listed and so must have already been placed in the Columbus Institute. 

Nellie O’Flaherty is buried in New St. Jospeph’s Cemetery.

The 1920 Census shows Nelly’s daughter, Ettie Dean, an inmate in the Columbus Institution for the Feeble Minded.  

Sixth inmate down from the top, "Etta" Dean, 1920 Census of the Institute for the Feeble Minded

Researching the institution, I find that children and youth with learning disabilities, probably similar to  today’s ADHD diagnoses, were placed here.  Some sources stated that also unruly children and young adults, run-aways, etc., were placed in the Institute.  The census reflects that Ettie, or “Etta," as she is listed, was able to read and write and was born in Ohio.  Her father was born in Kentucky, and her mother in Ohio.

The Institution for Feeble-Minded Youth enrolled both boys and girls. These children struggled in the public schools of their own communities, and the institution gave the children a chance to enroll in a more supervised and stringent setting. The Institution for Feeble-Minded Youth also provided the children with vocational training, with the boys working on a farm owned by the school and the girls performing domestic duties. This institution helped provide students with various learning and social problems with the skills necessary to lead productive lives. ~ Ohio History Central.org.

Ettie presumably died at the Columbus Institute.  I’ve found no further records for her.  She was, by all reports, Frank’s only sibling.

John Cramer and Ellen Cornell

In 1910 census, Nellie lists her parents’ names as John Cramer and Ellen Cornell, both having been born in New York.  However, Ellen lists herself on all documents as being born in Ohio.  With this information, I turned up a petition by Ellen for replacement of her March 16, 1874 marriage certificate which had been among those destroyed in the Hamilton County Courthouse fire of March 29, 1884.  

Request for Marriage License by Ellen Cramer

"The Cincinnati Riots of 1884, also known as the Cincinnati Courthouse Riots, were caused by public outrage over the decision of a jury to return a verdict of manslaughter in a clear case of murder. A mob in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA attempted to find and lynch the perpetrator. In the violence that followed over the next few days, over 50 people died and the courthouse was destroyed. It was one of the most destructive riots in American  history." 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cincinnati_riots_of_1884

My 2nd great grandfather on Nellie’s side, John Cramer, remains the sketchiest of the ancestors. I know only that he was born in New York and married Ellen Cornell on March 16, 1874, in Cincinnati, Hamilton County, Ohio.  In the 1903 Cincinnati directory, Ellen is listed as a widow of John M. Cramer.  My search for him continues.  

Ellen, on the 1900 census, lists both parents being born in Pennsylvania.  I found a grave  for an Ellen Cramer in Old St. Joseph’s, engraved with a birth date of 1847 and death February 10, 1910.  Is this my 2nd great grandmother, Ellen Cornell Cramer?  I can’t say with one hundred percent accuracy due to the discrepancy in birth dates.  It’s possible, however.  Why wouldn’t John have been buried in the same cemetery, though?  Unanswered questions as of this date.  

Next up:  The Deans of Orangeburg, John's family.

Clara and Frank

Learning about my father’s family was a huge stride in trying to understand him.  And I did have a big need to understand him. 

Grandma’s stories about Dad’s childhood gave me insight into his early struggles in life.  Spending as much time as I did with my aunts and uncles told me even more about the family I was born into.  But something was missing.

I’d never seen my grandfather, to my recollection.

 

What role did Dad’s father play in making him the man he was?  The man who had to drink, who couldn’t sleep more than a couple of hours at a time, who worked hard to help take care of his family.  A man who so wanted to have a normal life, a home for his wife and children, while at the same time ruining the very life he wanted. 

There was no way when I was a child that I could have put together a kind of character profile or synopsis of the life of my paternal grandparents.  It remained a mystery to me.  When my grandfather Frank showed up on Sander Street when I was 12 years old, watching him through the living room window only added more to the mystery. 

I had heard some, but not enough.  Now there he was standing on my sidewalk.  Why could he not come in our house?  Why was Grandma hiding with me behind the window?  Why was my father so nervous, and why did he come in and literally beg Grandma to come out and see her long-ago husband? 

Grandma wouldn’t go out of course.  “I told you, Raymond, I never wanted to see him again.” 

If she was angry at Dad for allowing the man to come to our house, she didn’t act it.  I think she rather enjoyed seeing him from a distance, though she did not want him to see her.  Was this some kind of closure for her? 

I would have given anything to break loose of Grandma’s hand on my arm, to run out the door and down the long wooden porch to stand up close to the man who was my grandfather.  I would have watched and listed to the interaction between my own father and his father.  I wanted to know how they felt about each other, if they loved each other.  He'd come to see us, hadn't he?  Did that mean he cared?  Did this stranger who was my grandfather care about me, his first grandchild?  And my sisters and cousins?  He wasn’t allowed to see us, so how could I know.

I was old enough to understand this was a form of punishment for my grandfather.  His family felt he didn't deserve a regular visit.  He’d failed in the worst way.  Once again it was my father who had the burden of dealing with the situation.  Just like he’d had to throw his father out of the house so many years ago, now he had to deal with his return.  He had to protect his family from his own father again.  It was easy to see my father was not happy in this role.  

That was the first and last time I saw my grandfather Frank.  I’m not sure if it was the last time for my father and Uncle Norb, who had also stood on the sidewalk that night with his father.  I just know Frank Bernard Dean died shortly after that night.  I’m positive it was the last time Grandma saw him.  She did not go to the funeral, nor did either of her daughters.  My mother and father, and Uncle Norb and Aunt Vera all went.  I was certainly not allowed to attend, though I pleaded with Mom and Dad to let me.  It was Grandma who decided my fate, however.  I believe Dad would have taken me with them had Grandma let him.  She came and watched me, my sisters, and cousins, the day of the funeral. 

From that time on, at various times my curiosity resurfaced and then lay dormant for long stretches of time.  I never anticipated I would find anything more about my grandfather.  I never intended to really.  It just happened. 

I picked at shreds of information over the last few years and then just let it be for a while.  I finally gave up diligently seeking and dabbled with research off and on.  Then it took on a life of its own.  

Revelations appeared when least expected.  I began feeling like I was meant to discover the story, find the answers to the long-held questions.

In the process, I discovered my family history, my ancestors, and then slowly the pieces all came together to knit a story. 

I’d already been writing, small pieces here and there, a chapter for a nonfiction book, an online guest blog, so I knew I had to write this family story.  

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Frank & Clara                                            

   

A year before my paternal grandparents, Frank Dean and Clara Wehrle, were married, Frank Bernard Dean  joined the ranks of the Ohio Soldiers, fighting World War One, serving as a Private in the 10^th Company Pensacola Coast Artillery Corps at Fort Barrancas, Florida.

        Ohio Military Men, 1917-18  Frank B. Dean

Name: Frank B. Dean Serial Number: 413152 Race: W Residence: 1214 Freeman Ave., Cincinnati, O. Enlistment Division: Regular Army Enlistment Location: Fort Thomas, Ky. Enlistment Date: 30 Apr 1918 Birth Place: Cincinnati, O. Birth Date / Age: 20 4/12 Years Assigns Comment: 10 Co Pensacola Coast Artillery Corps Fort Barrancas Fla to 12 July 1918; Battery E 49 Artillery Coast Artillery Corps to Discharge Private American Expeditionary Forces 5 Oct 1918 to 8 March 1919. Honorable discharge 22 March 1919. Volume #: 4

Frank was awarded an honorable discharge on March 22, 1919, and one month later, on May 7, 1919, he married my grandmother, Clara Wehrle. 

Frank’s address at the time of his marriage was 314 Main Avenue, Elmwood Place. 

Clara Wehrle’s address was 1216 Poplar Street, Cincinnati, in Over-the-Rhine.  The Williams Cincinnati Directory in 1919 lists Joseph Wehrle, Clara’s father, a “laborer,” living at the same address on Poplar Street.  Clara was living at home with her family when she married my Grandfather Frank. 

Clara Wehrle, Probably as a Bride in 1919

The above photo, from my Aunt Dot’s collection, was likely taken for a special occasion.  The white dress shoes, or boots, and white embellished dress tell me this was probably one of my Grandma’s photos taken the day of her wedding to Frank.  I would imagine, knowing my grandmother like I did, that any pictures including my grandfather would have been either destroyed or given back to him after he left.

Frank was 21 years of age on December 23rd, 1918.  His occupation then was woodworker. 

Clara, age 23, was working as a "Box Maker," or "Marker."  The handwriting is not clear, nor is the document.  For the actual book, the record will be enlarged to full page size, which is easier to read.

This document was the missing link to finding my grandfather online.  Frank's parents are recorded as John Dean and Nellie Cramer.  With that information, I was able to find records for both of them, which led to records for their parents, meaning Frank's grandparents, both paternal and maternal.  

I'd already discovered Grandma Clara's parents and grandparents.

Chapter 5 will be "The Deans and the Cramers," and Chapter 6," The Wehrles."

Stay tuned also for an updated Table of Contents.  We're getting close to finishing.