On this page we explore the early years of the marriage of Sophia and Ludwig Kurlandski, my great-grandparents on my father's father's side.

Before 1910

In 1901, Ludwig Kurlandsky left Poland via Antwerp and joined his brother in St. Louis. Probably he became part of the Polish immigrant community on the North Side. If he was like most Polish Catholic immigrants of the time, much of his social life would have centered around St. Stanislaus Church there. (For more see Wikipedia: "St. Stanislaus Church".)

When I originally wrote this page, the years prior to the 1910 Census were entirely a matter of speculation. Since then, Cousin Stan Piekarski has shed considerably light on those murky times.

Stan's Help

According to Stan, it turns out that Ludwig married a certain Katharzina Jasinska in 1903, and their daughter Katie "was born 14 October 1906 and baptized 'Cath. Helena (Teresian) Kurlandzka.'"

Regarding Sophia, originally my research had her first marriage as being to someone named John Wroblewski. Stan has corrected me, thus:

Sophia's first husband was Mike (Michal) Wroblewski, not John. They married 4 June 1895, he died in 1907. Ludwik and "Zofia" married in 1908.

1910

As documented elsewhere on this website (1910), the 1910 Census has the family living in St. Louis's Fourth Ward. It appears that by this time my great-grandfather had changed the spelling of both his first and his last name: Ludwig Kurlandsky, immigrant, had become Ludwik Kurlanski, head of household. We will probably never know how this happened. Did he really did change these spellings, or were these changes the result of an unintentional census-taking error?

At this time he was living with two children of his own, and with two children by Sophia's first marriage. The couple's eldest child is listed as Katie. Until recently in my genealogical quest, I had heard no mention of her in our family's oral history. She would be listed as Catherine in the 1920 Census, and at that point she disappears. But now I have heard a couple tidbit of information that are so enticing that, with optimistic abandon, I have decided to dedicate a Katie Kurlandski page to her alone.

In 2013, when I originally discovered the 1910 Census information, the information on the Family Search website was a bit scanty. It did not even include their address, only giving their home as in the Fourth Ward. Yet good fortune made it easy for me to gain access to the actual census record for Ludwig and Sophia's household. At the time, my new job was in downtown Manhattan. As I looked out of the software developers' window on the eleventh floor of our building, I could see the Statue of Liberty and, on its right, Ellis Island, where Ludwig had arrived over a century previously. And when I stepped outside, I was but two blocks away from a National Archives office.

The office is in a beautiful building which now houses the New York City branch of the National Museum of the American Indian. Originally the edifice was built for the U.S. Custom offices in New York City. Construction began in 1900 and finished in 1907--though the cornerstone I passed nearly every day for two years reads 1902. It is likely that Ludwig, if he had paid a visit to New York City before boarding the train that took him to St. Louis in 1901, would have passed by the location and seen only a large pit and just the beginnings of the exterior walls. Wikipedia: "Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House" has it that a New York newspaper described the pit as "the biggest hole that was ever made in this city over which to erect a building".

In late 2013, I paid the National Archives office there a visit, and within 45 minutes I left with a photocopy of Sophia and Ludwig's page in the 1910 U.S. Census.

I had some issues with scanning the photocopy for this web page. The image above captures the top part of the photocopy, but misses the right-most column. For the record, here's a link to another scan which captures that column (though it doesn't have the very top of the page).

Family Information

The family-oriented information the census provides is given in the table below.

This information is valuable, but it forces us to ask a couple questions.

The first questions revolve around the "M 2" describing Ludwig's marital status. We know this was Sophia's second marriage (see On the Trail of Sophia & Louis), so it seems reasonable to conclude that "M 2" means that the person is in his or her second marriage. When I was first confronted with this question, however, it seemed to me unlikely that Ludwig's marriage to Sophia was his second, if only because he arrived in 1901, and wouldn't have had much time to get married twice between then and the the 1907 birth of Katie with Sophia. But thanks to Stan Piekarski I stand corrected. (See above.)

Another set of information corroborates Stan. It comes from Frank Kurlandski's daughter, Georgia Lee (one of Ludwig's granddaughters). She writes:

Dad says Grandpa Kurlandski was born in Leningrad. He came from Russia and Grandma came from Germany. Both had been married before (widowed).

So now the oral family history supports the evidence of the 1910 Census regarding Ludwig's multiple marriages. But note that the short paragraph above contains one fact which we know to be false—Ludwig was not born in Leningrad. (See the extended discussion of Ludwig's origins in Przasnysz.) The same set of papers from George Lee contains a copy of his birth certificate, which clearly states he was born in Przasnysz.

As I wrote above, the 1910 Census forces us to ask many questions—Ludwig's marital history being only the first. The second set of doubts relates to the information given in the next column to the right. First of all, on the form the top of the column is a little hard to read, so I can't be absolutely sure that the question concerns the number of years of the person's present marriage. But if that is indeed the question, I also have to wonder about the answers given: if Sophia and Ludwig had been married only two years by 1910, that would mean that three-year-old Katie had been born out of wedlock.

But Stan's Help, above, also assists us here. Katie wasn't Sophia's daughter; rather, she was Ludwig's daughter by a previous marriage. Katie's pedigree is assured.

This puts some of my questions to rest—thank you, Cousin Stan—though there is still plenty more to be mulled over. (See Katie Kurlandski for some of it.)

Ethnicity Data

The next set of data in the 1910 Census form pertains to our relatives' ethnicity and origin.

1: "Place of birth of each person, and parents of each person (illegible). If born in the United States, give the state or territory. If of foreign birth, give the country.""

2: "Whether able to speak English; or, if not, give language spoken.""

Of course I have some questions about all this. I'm not sure what the "O" in "Ger-Polish O" means. An internet search has revealed only the fact that other researchers have been equally mystified. The same internet search produced the following instructions for the census takers of the 1904 State of Michigan Census:

In case a person speaks Polish, as Poland is not now a country, inquire whether the birth place was what is now known as German Poland, Austrian Poland or Russian Poland, and enter the answer accordingly as Polish (Ger.), Polish (Aust.), Polish (Rus.). (1904 State of Michigan Census instructions)

Perhaps the entry in the census means something like, "Born in Germany, of Polish origin."

We note the error in the next column, regarding Ludwig's year of immigration, and move on to the column after. Here the question concerns whether the person is naturalized (i.e., has become a citizen) or alien. All the other answers on this page are either "Na" or "Al". Yet the answer in Ludwig's row is unmistakably "Pa." I'm not sure what to make of this.

Another obvious question concerns why there is no entry for Sophia's citizenship. Notice that, on the entire page, this entry applies only to the heads of household. This may be related to a fact that W. Daniel Quillen points out, in his book Mastering Online Geneology: before 1922, women and minors could become citizens when their husbands and fathers did (p. 122).

As a final point, it's worth noting that the census also suggests that Ludwig's English might have been minimal; at the very least we can say that Sophia's was probably better.

Apart from whether the individual can read and write--Ludwig and Sophia both answered Yes--the remaining questions of interest ask about financial concerns, and were answered only for Ludwig. We'll deal with that in a separate section below. But right now we're going to discuss what the census reveals about their home and neighborhood.

The Neighborhood

The left-hand side of the census page shows that the family was living at 1920-A Carr Street. If I read the numbers right, my guess is that they lived in a six-flat building with the following addresses:

• 1920-1/2 (the four-member Preuss family).
• 1920-1/2 A (represented by a couple named Lowe)
• 1920-1/2 Rear (consisting of a family of three named Erikson)
• 1920-1/2 A Rear (containing six Dawidowskis)
• 1920 (housing five people, the Wehmyers and the Christians)
• 1920 A (the Kurlanski/Wroblewski household, consisting of six people)

The neighbors in this and nearby buildings included American-born citizens as well as immigrants hailing from Ireland, Germany, Sweden and Poland. So the Kurlandskis did not live in an all-Polish ghetto.

Fortunately, I was able to find a very old photograph taken of a shaving parlor just nine blocks away from their home. It gives us a good sense of what the neighborhood looked like. To me, the two- and three-story brick structures are very reminiscent of South St. Louis, where the family would move a few decades later. And note the horse. (Thanks to Carr Street Photo at Flickr.)

For a map of their Carr Street neighborhood, see the section 1918: Frank is Born below.

The next photo was taken at Olive and Seventh. Being a 25-minute walk away, it does not at all reflect the look of their neighborhood, but it does give you a taste of the times—or, at least, of the times as they had been ten years before, at the turn of the century. (Olive Street from Seventh Street photo at Flickr)

If you'd like a real-life view of Sophia and Ludwig's neighborhood as it looks today, do a Google search on "1015 Carr Street" and click on the Street View option. There doesn't seem to be a 1015 Carr Street any more, but this will get you close to that number. Get a 360-degree perspective by clicking on the view and sliding your cursor to the left or right. Here is one shot of what you'll see.

For a hint of what has happened since those days, have a look at the following brief history of the neighborhood.

The depression and World War II brought blacks into the area in large numbers. They moved into decrepit buildings. These were structures which were erected in the days before indoor plumbing and central heating and were "remodeled" by their landlords into even smaller crowded living units. Large portions of these slums were replaced by public housing projects, beginning with Carr Square Village in 1942. Some of these complexes acquired slum-like status by the mid 1960's, leading to the ultimate demolition of the Pruitt-Igoe Apartments. The eventual re-use of these sites is presently undetermined. Urban renewal in the DeSoto-Carr area and construction of the new Convention Center are expected to lead to a rejuvenation of the portion of the area south of Cass Avenue. (Old North St. Louis history on stlouis-mo.gov)

I don't know when the above was written. But a contemporary aerial view of the street suggests that the renewal has already been accomplished.

Ludwig's Profession

The 1910 Census has Ludwig employed as a blacksmith. I have enough information on this and his other occupations to merit a separate page. Click on the link "Ludwig Kurlandsky Careers" link at right.

1918: Frank is Born

Sometime between the 1910 Census and 1918, the family moved to 1613 Helen Street. The map below, from the modern-day perspective of Google Maps, depicts their neighborhood, and shows how this 1/2-mile move did not take them far away from their local friends and family. Notice St. Stanislaus Church, slightly to the west but equidistant from the two homes.

Sophia and Ludwig's sixth child together, Francis, was born in 1918. I knew him as Uncle Frank, though in fact he was my great-uncle. I think of Uncle Frank and Aunt Georgia as, first and foremost, poker players. I remember once they arrived at our house in St. Peters with a deck of cards--and left with most of the money on the table. But I'm getting a little ahead of myself here.

Rene Kurlandski, Frank's daughter, has shared some interesting information from her father's birth certificate. It shows they lived at 1613 Helen Street when Frank was born, and that at the time "Louis" was 41 years old and Sophia was 43. Rene reports that the certificate has both of them being born in Germany, which agrees with the 1910 census, but contradicts what was reported in the census of 1920 and all those after. (See On the Trail of Sophia & Louis.)

Rene also has her father's birth certificate, showing that he was bapitized at St. Stanislaus Church on October 28, 1918, just three days after he was born. His sponsors were John Soldynski and Monika Wroblewski.

Some interesting points about this information include:

• By 1918 Ludwig had begun calling himself "Louis."
• Most records have Ludwig as being one to two years older than Sophia, not the other way around.
• Finally, Monica Wroblewski must have been from the family of Sophia's first husband. I have no record of her.