Sunday Drive: El Monte County Park - 1961

This photo was taken at the St. Rita's Annual Picnic the year we were in eighth grade. (Michaelyn* is on the left and Judy on the right--and Mother is barely visible standing next to our truck. Both girls were also in the picture I posted of my First Communion.)

[From my personal collection]

Those green pants were not one of Mother's successful sewing projects...


*After having lost touch in the late 1960s, Michaelyn and I are now Facebook friends.


© 2018 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Monday Is for Mothers: Bernice E. Grenfell - 1922

Remember double exposures?

[From my personal collection]

Someone forgot to advance the film after taking a photo.

This was taken about three months before her marriage to Harold Currey.



© 2017 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

San Diego Will and Probate Files ARE Available at Ancestry Through the Browse Option

When it finally dawned on me to use the Browse option for the Wills and Probates earlier this week (instead of the search function), I discovered that San Diego is represented, contrary to what I thought in an earlier post.  Yay!

These are the record sets available:
Index to Orders and Decrees, Vol 4-6, 1886-1888
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 13-15, 1890-1895
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 16-18, 1893-1899
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 19-22, 1895-1898
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 23-26, 1897-1902
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 26-28, 1901-1904
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 28-30, 1902-1905
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 31-33, 1904-1907
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 33-36, 1907-1908
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 36-39, 1908-1910
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 39-43, 1910-1911
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 43-44, 1911-1912
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 45-46, 1911-1912
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 4-6, 1886-1888
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 46-51, 1912-1914
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 52-56, 1913-1915
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 57-60, 1915-1916
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 61-64, 1916-1917
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 65-68, 1917
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 6-9, 1888-1890
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 69-72, 1917-1918
Probate Orders and Decrees, Vol 9-12, 1890-1898
Record of Wills, Vol 3-7, 1897-1918
Record of Wills, Vol 7-10, 1903-1920

© 2015 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Finding Old Probate Files in San Diego

I wonder what the story is behind this?  Arthur, son of my 3rd great grandfather, Henry Charles Tibbetts, was appointed a guardian in San Diego in 1892, even though his father didn't die until 1902.  What, if anything, did Arthur and his siblings get when their father did die?  If I could look at H.C.Tibbetts' will/probate, if there is one, I might find out.  from "Local Intelligence. In General," San Diego Union, 2 Jul 1892, pg 5, col 1; digital image, accessed 1 Oct 2015 from GenealogyBank.com

San Diego County appears to be completely absent from the recent Ancestry Probate and Wills recent release.  Since I have numerous direct ancestors who lived and died in San Diego since the early 1880's, this is a problem, and my hopes that the release would include those are dashed.

According to FamilySearch, San Diego probate records began to be recorded in 1855, and that San Diego probate records are available at the Main County Courthouse.  I discovered that the older records ("case indexes dating from 1880 to mid-1974") are available at the Central Division Records:

Older/Archived records for the Central Division are housed in Central Records. Central Records also houses more recent Civil, Domestic, Criminal, Mental Health, Habeas Corpus, Deposited Wills, and a few Probate cases. In addition, Central Records has some sealed records. (A court order is needed to view any sealed document or file by a person that is not specifically authorized by the court order.)

Case indexes dating from 1880 to mid-1974 are available on large, hardbound books located at:
Central Courthouse Older Records
220 West Broadway,
Basement, Room 042
San Diego, CA 92101
Mon-Thurs: 8:30 a.m. - 3:30 p.m.
Fri: 8:30 a.m. - 12:00 p.m.

Older records are microfilmed and available to view and copy. The court does not accept fax and telephone requests for copies. The cost to copy is 50¢ per page. Certification is $15.00 per document. Copies can be made up until 3:30 p.m.
There is no cost for telephone requests for searches up to 10 minutes. If the request will take longer than 10 minutes, the cost is $15.00.  

I'm not sure what the availability for probate files between 1855 to the early 1880's is?  I am assuming that the "older records" may be those that are microfilmed.


 An alternate to a field trip to Downtown San Diego would be to order FHL microfilm from FamilySearch:

I live in San Diego and have no excuse, except that I hate parking Downtown.  But no more excuses!  I'll park at Horton Plaza, get a refreshing caffeinated beverage, and walk the measly 2 city blocks to the office.

How lazy am I?  Only a 17 minute drive away and I still haven't done this.

Edited to add:  The California GenWeb San Diego site has a page outlining probate holdings at the San Diego History Center's library HERE.



© 2015 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Sunday Drive: Rough Road Ahead

When our ancestors set off on their Sunday drives in first decades of the 20th century, most of them were probably envisioning traveling along roads like the one below.

[Road Trip 1 of 2-San Diego County (1900-1920) California State Library]

But they could never be sure what the condition of the road would be around the next bend.*

[Road Trip 2 of 2-San Diego County (1900-1920) California State Library]

Of course early automobile manufacturers had to take bad roads into consideration in their car design. The video below shows what some cars were capable of.**

["Oilfield Dodge" Promotional Film]

As far as I can tell, the Dodge in the video above was this one, although it could be a later model.

[1919 Dodge Brothers Ad]

Since the "Oilfield Dodge" film was shot in the silent movie era and some stock music has been added as background, I thought it would be fun to see if I could find out what the car would have sounded like and the internet didn't let me down.  You can read a modern review of  a 1922 Dodge car here which includes the video below.

[Driving around in a Dodge Brothers car]

*I don't think these two photos from the Robert Ford collection at the California State Library show the same car.
**Although the video is described as a promotional film, I wasn't able to find out where it originated or if there is any connection to the Dodge Brothers or their car company.



© 2015 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Book Shelf: Plat Book of San Diego County, California

Title page of William E Alexander's plat book on San Diego county, published about 1912 by the Pacific Plat Book Co. in Los Angeles, available through the online Maps division of the Library of Congress.

This Plat Book of San Diego County, California (1912) is a great snapshot of the county for anyone with ancestors in the area then.

Using my 1st cousin 3x removed Frank Paul Hartley as an example, I will try to locate where he or his closest relatives (his mother Hannah L (Mount) Hartley and Wilmer Hartley) were.

Hannah and Wilmer were in the General Land Office Records of the US Department of the Interior, Bureau of Land Management (BLM)

Using BLM records to determine what Township and Range owners were in, I cross-referenced this in the index of the plat book:

Note that this means page 138 in the book, not page 138 as designated by the LOC

The names on the land are for "W. Hartley" and "F. P. Hartley," undoubtably Wilmer and Frank Paul Hartley.  I don't know where Hannah would be (she died only about 3 years after this plat book was published).

There they are in the lower left hand.  Note that there are Salazars nearby, I wonder if they are the same ones the Curreys knew?

© 2015 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.

Sunday Drive: Currey

On the back of this snapshot of Harold D. Currey and his son Junior standing alongside their Chevrolet* is written "Near Suncrest 1925".

[From the Currey photograph album in my private collection.]

Suncrest was merged with its neighbor La Cresta in the 1960s to become Crest. Here's a 1938 Union Tribune story about the place.

[Friday, November 11, 1938. Paper: Evening Tribune (San Diego, CA) Page: 17  

This entire product and/or portions thereof are copyrighted by NewsBank and/or the American Antiquarian Society. 2004.

Source: GenealogyBank.com]

*Certainly this is the same car I posted about several weeks ago.

© 2015 Copyright, Christine Manczuk, All Rights Reserved.