Ancestor Relocation Information in US-City Directories

In my previous blog post, I shared that death dates can be found in US-City Directories. I also said that I would write a blog post about another interesting and helpful item that can be found in US-City Directories. Today I'm going to tell you about that helpful item.

While indexing the record set, US-City Directories, 1902-1935 [Part I], at FamilySearch.org, I noticed that instead of a street address, the words "removed to" followed by a specific place were listed next to some people's names. "Removed to" next to a person's name means that they moved away from that particular city. In other words, if a person moved from Kalamazoo, Michigan that person may not have been excluded from the Kalamazoo City Directory. Instead, the city directory may include that person's name and the place to where that person moved. How cool is that?! So, if you've been wondering why you can't find an ancestor in the place you think they should be, a US-City Directory may be able help you find them.

Here is an example from the 1891 Seattle, Washington, US-City Directory.¹ James S. Adams is listed with an occupation as a printer who "removed to S F, Cal." (By the way, this is not my ancestor.)

I did a search for James S. Adams in San Francisco, California and found a James S. Adams in the 1891 City Directory for San Francisco California, living at 743 Pine.² His occupation was listed as a compositor. Wikipedia has several definitions of Compositor, one of which is the following: "Compositor may refer to: Compositor (typesetting), a person or machine which arranged movable type for printing."³

This James S. Adams, compositor, living in San Francisco, at 743 Pine in 1891 very well could be the same James S. Adams, printer, in the 1891 Seattle, Washington, City Directory, who removed to San Francisco, California.

US-City Directories are very valuable resources for family history research. Removals (where someone "removed to") are just one of many items listed in the Potential Content section of the FamilySearch Research Wiki article, United States Directories.

Have you been able to trace your ancestor using US-City Directories?

Thanks for stopping by!

Jana

© 2024 Copyright by Jana Iverson Last, All Rights Reserved

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1 U.S., City Directories, 1822-1995, image 70 of 597, James S. Adams; image, “Seattle, Washington, City Directory, 1891.”, Ancestry.com (www.ancestry.com : accessed 11 October 2024).^↩
2 U.S., City Directories, 1822-1995, image 101 of 1668, James S. Adams; image, “San Francisco, California, City Directory, 1891.”, Ancestry.com (www.ancestry.com : accessed 11 October 2024).^↩
3 Wikipedia (www.wikipedia.org), “Typesetting,” rev. 20:27, 25 August 2024.^↩

Death Dates in US-City Directories

Last week I was doing some indexing at FamilySearch.org. One of the record sets I indexed was US-City Directories, 1902-1935 [Part I]. While indexing this record set, I noticed that some of the entries included the age of the person and a death date. Here is a screenshot of one of them.

Wow! I don't remember seeing this kind of vital event information in US-City Directories before during my personal family history research.

I looked up United States Directories in the FamilySearch Research Wiki and saw that death dates are included in the long list of potential content found in directories.¹ How awesome is that?!

These death dates should be taken as clues that can help us find the actual death record for an ancestor. While preparing this post, I did more research in US-City Directories and found another person with a death date and age next to their name.² (This is not one of my ancestors.)

Highlighted in this directory is a Bernard M. Desenberg (aged 74) who died on September 14, 1901. I did a search for his death certificate and found it in Ancestry.com. His death certificate listed his death date as September 27, 1901.³ So, yes, the death date listed in the US-City Directory is a helpful clue, but as you can see, his death day was incorrectly listed as 14 in the directory instead of 27.

I was curious about the source of the death information found in US-City Directories. And I found my answer at the Library of Congress website. I learned from their US-City Directories Research Guide that "City directories are compiled through door-to-door surveys...."⁴ Interesting! So, it's possible that whoever was providing information to the survey-taker that day gave the wrong day of death for Bernard M. Desenberg. But, they were correct about the month and year of Mr. Desenberg's death.

US-City Directories are fantastic resources. I found another interesting and helpful item that can be found in US-City Directories. I'll share more about that in an upcoming post.

Thanks for stopping by!

Jana

© 2024 Copyright by Jana Iverson Last, All Rights Reserved

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1 FamilySearch Wiki (www.familysearch.org/wiki), “United States Directories,” rev. 03:29, 21 March 2024.^↩
2 U.S., City Directories, 1822-1995, image 121 of 355, Bernard M. Desenberg; image, “Kalamazoo, Michigan, City Directory, 1902.”, Ancestry.com (www.ancestry.com : accessed 4 September 2024). ^↩
3 U.S. City Directories, Library of Congress, (www.guides.loc.gov/united-states-city-telephone-directories/city-directories, accessed 4 September 2024).^↩
4 "Michigan, U.S., Death Records, 1867-1952," database with images, Ancestry.com (www.ancestry.com : accessed 4 September 2024); certificate image, Bernard M. Desenberg, 27 September 1901, no. 400; citing Michigan Department of Community Health, Division for Vital Records and Health Statistics; Lansing, Michigan.^↩