I can’t always explain why one old postcard grabs me, and another doesn’t.
The photo I shared last month of the “5 headaches” with its many oddities, for example, was an easy yes. By contrast, I’m not sure what compelled me to pick up this 1914 postcard of the Erie Home for the Friendless–unless it was that word itself. Friendless. It tugs my heart even now.
Even so, I have a strong bias in my “rescue projects” for ephemera I can identify. I’m always hoping for a story at least, if not a happily ever after. The faded pencil message isn’t impossible to read, but it is quite difficult, and when I imagine myself standing in the booth of the antique market trying to make out the words, I’m not altogether sure what persuaded me.
The presence of a fairly legible name and address probably tipped the scales in this case, but before delving into the records in search of Miss Gertrude Lillie of Conneaut, Ohio, let’s see what we can learn about The Home for the Friendless at Erie, PA.
Historical Notes on the Erie Home for the Friendless
The first and perhaps most surprising thing I found is that it continues to serve Erie and the surrounding area to this day. Both the Sarah A. Reed Children’s Center and Sarah Reed Senior Living grew from the same root. According to the Senior Living facility’s History page, the Home was founded in 1871 for the “care and shelter of unfortunates of all ages.”
How was the institution financed? In 1875, a former Senator, M. B. Loway, gifted a house and grounds worth $15,000 to the Erie Home for the Friendless [source: The Herald, Honesdale, Penna., Sept 23, 1875, via fultonhistory.com].
I also discovered the Home named in an appropriations bill [source: The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia, Penna., June 5, 1883, via fultonhistory.com] and private donations [source: Watertown Daily Times, Watertown, NY, Sept 19, 1905, via fultonhistory.com]. The latter article indicates that Miss Sarah Reed, as president of the Home, sacrificed personally for the good of those she served, as well.
Further reading: A resident of the children’s home wrote an account of her time there.
Digital Enhancements
I scanned the postcard in hopes that magnification would help with legibility, but the writing was still rather difficult to read. As an experiment, I tried tracing the words on the screen using a stylus, and finally, the message came to life.
Miss Gertrude Lillie
438 Madison St
Conneaut
Ohio
Erie Pa
Dear Little Granddaughter
I received your letter and was glad to here f(rom?) you I am some better glad to here that you (?) will hope you will not get the Dipthera glad Little sister is better are you at aunt Mauds yet be a good girl and come down tell aunt Maude that Grandma will rite as soon as she gits able rite soon and rite al the news to me
good by
Aunt Mary
The detail that the message is addressed to a granddaughter and signed from an aunt would have bothered me more before I started lobbying for position as “Aunt Brandy” to my friend’s child. Now, I take it as a clue, but only a clue. After all, my grandmother called her cousin “Sis,” and my grandfather’s in-family adoption made a great-aunt his mother, his grandmother an aunt, and his birth-mother a cousin. Families are complicated.
Nonetheless, the first step in the search for the writer of this note is to locate the recipient.
Who is Gertrude Lillie?
According to her birth record,: Gertrude C. Lillie was born to Carl C. Lillie and Martha Westcott on February 23, 1904 at Conneaut, Ohio. She was christened at Ashtabula.
The census records shade in some details for us. In 1910, Gertrude and her younger sister, Charlotte, lived with both their parents, who married in about 1902. Martha was the mother of three, though; they had a stillborn daughter in 1909.
Martha died on March 18, 1919 from Ptomaine poisoning (an outdated term for food poisoning). By 1920, Gertrude lived with her widowed father, sister Charlotte, and a younger brother named Laurence at 438 Madison Street, Conneaut OH, in a household headed by John and Maud Wallace. Here is Aunt Maud(e) from the postcard–Carl Lillie’s sister.
With this, we have enough details to jump backwards in time.
Who is Aunt Mary?
It’s important to note that Conneaut OH and Erie PA, although in different states, are only about 30 miles apart. I found myself climbing both sides of Gertrude’s family tree in search of Aunt Mary.
The Lillie Branch
Gertrude’s father, Carl, was born in June 1879, the first son of Charles and Emma Lillie. In 1900, Carl lived at home with his widowed mother, Emma, and younger sister, Maude. Going back to 1880, the young Lillie family lived in the same dwelling as John Bogart (age 62), his wife Sophia (55), and Frank Bogart (15).
Though my initial search for “Emma Bogart” came up blank, the birth record for Maud May Lillie saved the day. It names “Emma Carr” as her mother. This Erie marriage record from June 9, 1920 also affirms Carr as Emma’s maiden name.
With a bit more scratching around in the records and a hopeful glance at Find-a-Grave, I found Emma’s probable parents, Calvin and Sophia Carr, in 1850 and 1860.
The Wescott Branch
Moving toward the maternal side, Gertrude’s mother, Martha Wescott Lillie of Geneva PA, was a daughter of Richmond Wescott and Theresa Amsden.
The variety of creative spellings makes it a trick to follow the Wescott (Westcott, Nescott, Westcoat, Wescote) family through time. However, the 1880 census listing contains a promising name: Mary Wescote, born in September 1879.
Mary married Alden Roy Burgett first and Charles Ernie Waid second. Her signature appears on the second marriage license, and the handwriting neither confirms nor rules out that she may have been “Aunt Mary.”
The capital M’s in the two Marys are not quite the same…
… but the rather distinctive lowercase g formation gives me pause.
For a moment, I thought I found our Erie Home for the Friendless resident. However, Mary wasn’t widowed again until Alden died in 1928. “Aunt Mary” sent the postcard in 1914. And she would have been 33, too young to be positioning herself as a grandmother.
By this time, I was feeling lost in the weeds and uncertain of who or what I was looking for. I needed a theory to test.
When in doubt, go back to the source material for another look.
I tried a closer reading of the postcard, lingering over a thought buried in the middle of the message.
“Tell aunt Maude that Grandma will rite as soon as she gits able.”
What does this mean, exactly? Is it possible that Aunt Mary wrote this reply to Gertrude on Grandma’s behalf while she was unwell?
I decided to work with the idea that “Aunt Mary” was indeed Mary Luella Wescott, 1914’s Mrs. Burgett and the eventual Mrs. Waid, and that “Grandma” was Gertrude’s grandmother and Mary and Martha’s mother, Theresa Amsden Wescott.
A nearly-overlooked detail of Theresa’s 1934 death certificate seems to support this idea. The signature of the informant belongs to Mrs. C. E. Waid.
Mary.
The personal details sections of Theresa’s death certificate grant us a bit larger handwriting sample, but more importantly, Mary’s signature on this document suggests that she was close to her mother as a daughter and/or as a caregiver. If Theresa was not feeling up to writing a letter in 1914, it makes sense that Mary would fill in for her.
Again, the capital M’s are not a match.
However, the figure-8 style of the S’s and the open lowercase b’s do match…
… and while the capital L’s are not the same, the double tt’s are very similar, including the high cross bar.
The word “Ohio” has more flourish on the postcard, but is otherwise very close.
One caveat
However, Theresa was not widowed by 1914 either–she and Richmond lived in Geneva PA in 1920–which begs the question of whether they both stayed at the Erie Home for the Friendless for a time.
Or perhaps my assumption has been wrong all along, and the author of this note to Gertrude Lillie never found herself “friendless” at all.
A photo of the Wescott family, including Richmond, Theresa, Mary, and Martha, can be viewed on Find-a-Grave.
Thanks for reading!
