Clark Center, Pioneer Citizen of Sandusky

Clark Center was one of Sandusky's leading citizens. A biography of Clark Center from Harriet Taylor Upton's HISTORY OF THE WESTERN RESERVE states that he was "among the honored pioneers of Sandusky." He was born in Wayne County, New York in 1833, the youngest child and Mr. and Mrs. James H. Center. Clark's mother died when he was just three years old. In 1836 James Center moved his family to Huron County, Ohio, where he settled on a farm located on the Huron River.

After moving to Ohio, Clark worked for various farmers, and eventually learned the machinists' trade. He began working as a machinist in Sandusky in 1854. When the Civil War broke out, Clark Center had a vital role in raising Company I of the Third Ohio Cavalry. He recruited men from Erie, Huron, and Ottawa Counties. He had to stop his wartime service temporarily, when he was afflicted with typhoid fever. At the end of the Civil War, Clark Center resumed his work as a machinist in Sandusky. In 1872, he was appointed a revenue collector for the U.S. Government. Clark Center had also served as Sandusky councilman for twelve years. During his time on council, Mr. Center secured an investigation of the financial affairs of the city, which concluded in the arrest of a city clerk on embezzlement charges.

Mr. Center's obituary, which appeared in the October 10, 1914 Sandusky Register, reported that Clark Center was a "unique character." He often was seen on the streets of Sandusky wearing tall silk hat and a boutonniere. Clark Center died on October 9, 1914. He was survived by his wife, the former Caroline Bauer, and a son, E. B. Center. Clark Center is buried in Oakland Cemetery.

Mrs. Susan Follett, wife of Foster M. Follett

Susan Follett was the wife of Foster Morse Follett, a Civil War Veteran, and former Mayor of the city of Sandusky. Foster M. and Susan Follett were the parents of Helen, Sarah, and Foster Valentine Follett. Mrs. Susan Follett became a widow in October of 1862, when Foster M. Follett died. She survived until October 5, 1884. The final burial place of both Foster M. Follett and Susan Follett is the family lot at Oakland Cemetery in Sandusky, Ohio.  Foster and Susan's daughter Sarah Platt became the second wife of William Augustus Platt, whose first wife had been Fanny Hayes, the only sister of former President Rutherford B. Hayes.

Joyce's Confirmation at St. Paul Lutheran Church in 1945

According to the Lutheran Book of Worship, Confirmation in the Lutheran Church is a public profession of faith prepared for by long and careful instruction. In English, it is called "affirmation of baptism", and is a mature and public profession of the faith which "marks the completion of the congregation's program of confirmation ministry." (You can read more about Confirmation within the Lutheran Church at Wikipedia.)

Along with several other teenagers, my mother, whose name was Joyce Parker at that time, was confirmed at St. Paul Lutheran Church, located at Central Avenue & Tyler Street in Sandusky, Ohio, on March 25, 1945.

Though my mother had been baptized at the Methodist Church, her great grandfather's second wife, Emma Larkins, introduced her to the Lutheran faith. Rev. J.A. Griffith was the minister who officated at the confirmation service. Rev. Griffith had also confirmed Joyce's mother, Doris Wheeler, at the very same location in 1923. Doris died before Joyce was confirmed, but both mother and daughter respected and loved their Lutheran pastor very much. (You can read my mom's middle name, Emada, on her confirmation certificate. Doris made up this unusual middle name, a combination of Emma and Ada, the first names of Joyce's maternal step great grandmother, and her paternal grandmother.)

On July 1, 1950, Rev. Griffith performed the wedding ceremony of Paul Orshoski and Joyce Parker, and later he would baptize several of the children of Joyce and Paul.


















After a long battle with cancer, and my mother knew her days here were soon to be over, she called on the present pastor of Sandusky's St. Paul Lutheran Church to be the minister at her funeral service, along with the pastor of the church where she had been been attending for several years. Joyce took her confirmation seriously, and she never forgot the tenets of faith that she learned from Rev. J.A. Griffith that were based on the Lutheran catechism. She passed on many of the Christian values and scripture verses that she learned to her children, grandchildren, and great grandchildren.

Ohio Genealogical Society's 2010 Fall Seminar

On October 2, 2010, I had the pleasure of attending the OGS's 2010 Fall Seminar, held at the Samuel D. Isaly Library of the Ohio Genealogical Society in Bellville, Ohio. The library just opened in July of 2010. Curt Witcher, Genealogy Center Manager and Senior Manager of Special Collections at the Allen County Public Library in Fort Wayne, Indiana, was the speaker for four separate presentations.

In "The Road Not Taken," Mr. Witcher suggested searching online by geographic location, ethnicity, occupation, and religion, as well as by the surname of a particular family. He pointed out several bibliographic databases to consult: The National Union Catalog of Manuscript Collections (NUCMC for short); The Archival Research Catalog of the National Archives; The Access to Archival Databases at the National Archives; The Catalog of U.S. Government Publications; and Worldcat. While these sources may not lead to direct genealogical information for researchers, the search results retrieved may lead us to other sources that do have important genealogical data.

In the session on "Doing Effective Research in Libraries," Curt Witcher suggested always visiting a library virtually, before actually making a trip to the library. State Libraries, State Archives, and Special Focus Libraries often have specialized collections that can aid in research within a specific state or area.











In the session entitled "Fingerprinting Our Families," Mr. Witcher stressed how understanding what was happening in both the home country as well as the new new homeland of our immigrant ancestors, can help us gain deeper insight into the reasons that our ancestors left one country to migrate to another.









The last session of the Fall Seminar was "Using Periodical Literature and PERSI in Genealogical Research." Curt Witcher stated that we could be missing significant sources of genealogical information if we don't look in periodical sources. He told us about using the * as a wild card, and ? for an unknown letter within a word, when conducting PERSI searches at Heritage Quest Online. The day in Bellville was well spent, and I look forward to returning to the Samuel D. Isaly Library to do more research!

Note: The Dutch Heritage Restaurant, located very near the Samuel D. Isaly Library of the O.G.S. is a very delightful place to have a meal, following a busy day of genealogical research.

Sentimental Sunday: Articles about the Yeagers' Anniversary Celebrations

In this article from the October 4, 1928 issue of the Sandusky Register, the headline states that Mr. and Mrs. Andrew Yeager were celebrating fifty years of marriage. However, they were actually celebrating their twenty fifth wedding anniversary in 1928. (They were married in September of 1903.)



Over one hundred guests celebrated with Andrew and Lena (Piehl) Yeager at their home in Huron, Ohio. Guests came from Kelleys Island, Cleveland, Oak Harbor, Bay Bridge, and Fremont. The decorations were silver and white, and there were two cakes in honor of the happy couple. Sadly, in 1929, Mr. and Mrs. Yeager's daughter Norma Ernst would become a widow, and in 1930, Andy and Lena's youngest daughter Hilda would die from influenza, at the age of four.





Twenty five years later, the Sandusky Register Star News of September 24, 1953 featured an article about Andrew and Lena's Golden Anniversary.

















At the celebration in 1953, their son Andrew had died, and their daughter Norma had remarried. Of course many, many more descendants had been added to the Yeager Family Tree. Wilma Voight, who had been a young girl at the Silver Anniversary, was all grown up, and she helped prepare special dishes for the Golden Anniversary celebration.



Andy and Lena both worked very hard, and shared a lot of joys and sorrows together. I was delighted to track down these newspaper articles about their anniversary parties. Andrew Yeager died in 1958, and Lena Piehl Yeager died in 1978. They are buried in the Union Corners Cemetery just off Route 250 between Sandusky and Milan, Ohio.

Newspaper Index at Mansfield/Richland County Public Library

A very helpful resource from the Mansfield/Richland County Public Library is the Newspaper Index. To access this free resource, go to this url:

http://search.mrcpl.org:84/


After I entered the keywords Sandusky and Deaths, these results were retrieved.












The index provides the citations for the newspaper articles. A photocopy of the newspaper article can by obtained by contacting the Sherman Room at the Mansfield/Richland County Public Library by telephone, (419) 521-3115, or by email at: genealogy@mrcpl.org.

Thanks, Mansfield/Richland County Public Library for this outstanding genealogy resource from Ohio's Heartland!

Elvira Dibble Bell

Elvira Dibble Bell died on October 5, 1887. She is buried in Oakland Cemetery in Erie County. Elvira was born in Connecticut, and moved to Sandusky in 1832, She married Stewart E. Bell on May 8, 1834. A 1900 "Firelands Pioneer" article had this to say about Elvira Bell: "Elvira Dibble, was an active member of the Underground Railway and assisted many runaway slaves on their way to Canada."

See the whole article in the "Firelands Pioneer" to read more about Elvira's husband Stewart Bell, and the account of how his parents left Connecticut with several other families, traveling by wagons and oxen to settle the Firelands of Ohio.

A pedigree chart on Ancestry World Tree shows that Elvira Dibble was the daughter of Jonas Dibble and Naomi Dee. Another child of Jonas Dibble and Naomi Dee was Daniel Dibble, who was known for building ships