I wasn’t really sure what to write about this week when I received the prompt of this ancestor went to market, I do have some ancestors that took wool and cloth to market, I have a few siblings of my direct ancestors that worked in the town store, one brother of my great-grandfather owned and operated a bookstore, but the week was passing by and nothing really grabbed my attention to write about, then I happened upon a newspaper article I had shared prior about my grand-aunt Goldie May Cole and her friend Rosie Venck, regarding them shoplifting during the holiday shopping rush. I thought to myself, well they did go to market, or rather stores, it’s just a different take on the writing prompt.

The newspaper clipping is above. It was published on 31 December 1909 in Fort Wayne, Indiana in the local newspaper, The Fort Wayne Daily News. Goldie was aged ten years, and her friend was aged fourteen. They shoplifted three muffs, several yards of silk ribbons, a prayer book, and other articles from downtown Fort Wayne stores during the holiday shopping rush. The high temperature that Christmas in Fort Wayne was 24 ° and the low was 10 ° with no snow or rainfall. I envision carolers singing as the girls mingled in the chilly weather among the multitude of shoppers rushing to get last minute gifts. At least in Goldie’s case, she and her mother would have been quite poor during this Christmas holiday, her mother did have some kin living 27 miles away and a few others living 40 miles away, so if they were able to travel that far, they could have had a Christmas dinner by going to be with relatives, if not, they would have been depending on the goodwill of others, or a charity to provide a Christmas meal. I am sure that all the items in the many downtown stores were like glittering objects she knew she would not be receiving as gifts. I don’t know the full financial situation of Rosie’s family, but the girls couldn’t seem to help themselves. They stored the stolen goods at each of the girl’s houses, Rosie’s parents are the ones that turned them in, knowing their daughter did not have the funds to purchase the items, nor were they gifted to her. Rosie’s older sister found her at Goldie’s home and forced her to return home after being away for a few days. They were brought to the police station and the girl’s confessed, and they were put in the charge of Probation Officer Patton until they could be sent to The Indiana Industrial School for Girls.

According to the article, Rosie Venck was born about 1886, and she lived with her parents and had at least one older sister and the family lived on John Street in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Her parents tell the newspaper that they have been unable to curb her wayward tendencies and are anxious that she be sent to the Industrial Home (in Indianapolis). I must assume that possibly the newspaper spelled her last name incorrectly. The Cole home was on Murray Street. The distance between Murray Street and John Street is less than a mile, so the girls lived near each other and spent time at each other’s homes.

More recently I was able to find a bit more about Rosie Venck. Firstly, she was born Rosa “Rosie” Ciernack/Charniak about 1895 in Poland (in an area also listed as Austria at that time). The surname spelling is taken from the 1910 Census, it may have been Cierniak or even Czerniak. According to the marriage record for her sister Anna S. Czarniak, they were the daughters of John Czarniak / Charniak and Mariana Sophia “Mary” Nadoshon/Nadospon/Niedospal. Her stepfather was Michel “Mike” Wnek, his surname is spelled various ways in different records as Venck, Vneck, Venck, Vnuk, Venck, and Vueck, but it appears the correct spelling was Wnek, later descendants spell it Wenk. She had an older stepbrother named Joseph Wnek, two full siblings: older sister Anna S. Ciernack/Czarniak and younger sister Stephanie Ciernack, and five half-siblings: Frank, Lewis, John Michael, Francis Agnes Wnek, and Michael A. Wnek. Some family trees also list an additional stepsister named Esther Lillian Wenk.

According to the 1910 US Census and the birth certificate for Francis Agnes Wnenk (who was born in February 1910), the family resided at 2005 John Street, Fort Wayne, Indiana. Her mother marries a third time on 23 November 1914 in Fort Wayne, Allen, Indiana, to Nicodemus/Nicholas Pogorzelsky. I find her with this husband in city directories in Fort Wayne for many years, and I find them in the 1920 census with her stepson Joseph Wneuk. I find them in the 1930 census living together with her son John Venck, he is spelling the surname as Wneuk. Rosie is not found living with them.

We can surmise that her older sister, mentioned, but not by name, in the newspaper article, was Anna Ciernak, who was eighteen in 1910. In the 1910 Census, I found the family with a date of census as April 1910. Interestingly, I do find Rosie in the 1910 Fort Wayne, Indiana, City Directory. She is listed by the name Rosie Ciernack, and is working as a clerk, and living at the same address as her mother, stepfather, and siblings. In the 1910 census she is listed as aged 15 and working as a bottle cleaner in the medical works industry. She could read and write and had a 4th grade education. I do not find any other records for Rosie Ciernack. Due to her being some years older than ten-year-old Goldie Cole, and already showing she could work, the court may have not sent her to The Indiana Industrial School for Girls, although the newspaper article does indicate that both girls were going to be sent there.

I discovered a snippet in the 1912 newspaper article above regarding her stepfather. It appears he raised her from a young age and considered her to be his daughter. It seems they did not send her off to The Indiana Industrial School for Girls, or if they did, it was for a short period of time. For as you can read above, her stepfather was distraught because his sixteen-year-old daughter (who could only have been Rosie) stayed away from home for two weeks, and friends told him that she was a “a bad girl”. Sadly, Mike Wnek committed suicide outside his grocery store in Fort Wayne.

As stated in the newspaper, Goldie was only ten years old, but that in spite of her tender years is said to have been mixed up in several petty thieveries before. I must point out here that Goldie’s childhood was one wrought with poverty and parental alcohol abuse, along with lots of drama, which was often detailed in the very same newspaper. She was the daughter of Joseph Edward Cole and Anna Cora Prindle. Her parents had divorced by 1910. By the 1910 census, her father had already migrated to Detroit, Michigan. He is found there working as a laborer in an auto factory, living with him is found his son Jesse Cole, aged twenty-two, working as a tailor in a tailor shop. I am unable to locate Goldie or her mother Anna Cora Prindle Cole in the 1910 census, but from the newspaper article we know they were living on Murray Street in Fort Wayne. Goldie’s older brother Loren Richard “Dick” Cole, aged twenty-four was also already living in Detroit in 1910. Her nineteen-year-old brother Durward Edward Cole had been sent to the Indiana Boys School in Guilford, Indiana, where he is found living in 1910. Her sister Mabel R. Cole, aged fourteen, is found in 1910 living in Detroit with her aunt Ona Belle (Prindle) Danner. Also, her sister Gladys Cole had died earlier in the year at age seven. Her two siblings Ida Cole and Carl Cole did not live to adulthood but may have been alive at the time, and if so would have been aged four, and twenty months. So, it appears most of Goldie’s siblings, and her father, were not living with she and her mother in 1910.

Goldie Cole was sent to the Indiana Industrial School for Girls in Indianapolis. Her friend Rosie may have been sent there as well for a short time. Above is a photo taken in 1910 of girl’s playing in the yard of the school with the school building in the background.

Interestingly, this school was still in use as of 2003. The Indiana Girls’ Industrial School started off with just one building but as it changed to Indianapolis Girls’ School, as of 2003, there were a total of 7 housing cottages, a school, a clinic, a cafeteria, and a church also on campus. (1)

Although I do not know what became of Rosie Ciernack/Charniak Wnuk after 1912, I can tell you about the life that my grand-aunt Goldie Cole lived. How long she was at the Indiana Industrial School for Girls, I do not know. But it is known that ten years later, by the time she was nineteen, she had migrated to Detroit to join her father and siblings. Her mother had migrated by this time to Phoenix, Arizona. She married for the first time on 20 January 1919 in Detroit, Michigan to Manville Harold Dewing. He was the son of Frank E. Dewing and Florence Wills; he was born in Detroit. Her groom was only sixteen years old! The marriage ended with an annulment on 26 April 1920.

The marriage appears to have been very short-lived for on 13 January 1920 Goldie is found in the census living with her father Joseph, her brother Durward and his wife Glenna, and Glenna’s sister Marie D. (Kennedy) Alexander. Her occupation is listed as laundry presser. She is listed as married in the census, but from the above annulment record, her husband filed for an annulment on 26 May 1919, and it was uncontested and granted on 26 April 1920. Interestingly, in the annulment record it includes his mother as a party, and she is listed as “Florence DeWing, his next friend”. I am not sure why she is listed that way, but it makes sense his mother would have had an issue with the marriage. He went on to marry three more times and had luck with his last marriage and had two children in the 1930s.

She married second on 28 January 1921 in Detroit to Albert J. “Bertalan” “Click” Kaskeny. He was the son of Joseph “Jozsef” Keskeny and Elizabeth “Erzesbeth’ Pavel, and was born in Hungary. He immigrated to the USA at the age of six with his parents. This marriage lasted fifteen months before he filed for divorce on 25 April 1922 on the grounds of extreme cruelty. The divorce was granted on 5 September 1923. He married second in 1924 and had six children from this second marriage.

The above photo is of my grandmother Glenna Annette Kennedy Cole (wife of Durward Edward Cole) and her sister-in-law Goldie May Cole. The photo was taken some time around 1920. My grandparents left Michigan by 1926 where they are found in Phoenix, Arizona, visiting his mother Anna Cora Prindle Cole, she had migrated there prior. They migrated to Amarillo, Texas, then to Oklahoma, where they lived for ten years, before eventually ending up in San Diego, California in 1941. The father Joseph Cole died in 1924. Goldie and her brother Jesse remained in Detroit, Michigan. Sibling Loren Richard “Dick” Cole also stayed in Michigan until at least 1935 but lived in Pontiac. By 1940 he was living with his brother Durward and his family in Oklahoma, he lived near his mother in Phoenix briefly but then followed his brother Durward onto San Diego.

Goldie married a third time sometime after her divorce is final in September 1923 and before the 1930 census to Joseph Ventrallo/Vantrallo. He was the son of Peta Vantrallo and Annie Gurrio. He was born in Bari, Puglia, Italy and came to the USA at age fifteen, and was a baker by trade. This marriage lasted longer, they are found together in the 1930 and the 1940 censuses and in city directories. But the marriage ended in divorced after the 1940 census and by April 1943, for he marries to another in May 1943, and had at least one child from this second marriage.

Goldie married a fourth time before 1945 in Michigan to Rudolph H. Tolliver. His parentage is unknown, he was born in Germany about 1891. The only record I could locate about him was that he is found in the 1940 census living as a lodger in a household in Sterling, Macomb, County, Michigan. He is working as a farm helper. He is listed as a naturalized American citizen. By 1950 he either died or the marriage ended in divorce.

In 1950, she is listed as Goldie Tolliver and is found living in Port Huron, St. Clair, Michigan, and lists herself as widowed. She is working as a kitchen helper in a lunchroom. She is listed as a roomer. I do know that this was her last marriage. My second cousins that live in Michigan and remember her, told me her last name was still Tolliver in the 1960s. She eventually ends up living with her niece (daughter of Jesse Cole) and my cousins remember her living with them. They have fond memories of her; they did say she liked her drink! And that she fell down the stairs and that resulted in her death. I have been unable to locate her death record, but they remember it being around 1968. So, she would have died when she was in her late 60s.

What can be gathered about her life is that as a child, she had been a shoplifter on more than one occasion. She grew up poor, and I am sure that, along with her home life, added to her childhood penchant for thievery. She had a rough childhood and upbringing; she ended up in the Indiana Industrial School for Girls. She doesn’t appear she had any brushes with the law after she became an adult. Her emotional maladies from her childhood carried over into issues in her adulthood. There was a history of alcohol abuse on the Cole side, and according to family in Michigan, she did drink a lot. Her second marriage ended with her husband accusing her of extreme cruelty. I am sure that her drinking added to the reasons why she was married four times, but she did seem to find at least some happiness and marriage longevity in her third marriage.

She had an 8th grade education according to the censuses and could read and write, and worked as a laundry presser, then was able to be a housewife for some years when married to the baker Joseph Ventrallo/Vantrallo, before she is found working as a kitchen helper in a lunchroom. She never had any children, it appears she was unable to have children, for her first three husbands all had children with other women in their later marriages. She was close to her brother Jesse. Family members in Michigan (children and grandchildren of her brother Jesse Cole) have fond memories of her and loved her, and she ended up living with family in the last years of her life.

References:

1. Family Tree: The Indiana Girl’s School | Posted by Krystal Becker | Feb 2, 2013. historicindianapolis.com

Other than the short use of this reference above regarding The Indiana Girl’s School, the remainder was written based solely on my own research and experiences.

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