Friday, February 10, 2012

Austrian Ancestor

     I had written about my maternal great-grandmother, Josephine (Duper) Davis and her mother Teresa (Devine) Duper but I hadn't written about Josie's father.
     Stephen Duper was born in Austria in the year 1873.  He arrived in 1888, according to the 1920 census, and eventually met and married Teresa Devine.  Teresa was born in Stuyvesant Falls, NY in Columbia county.  I don't know where my great-great grandparents met but they were living in Rosendale, about 49 miles southwest in Ulster county in 1894 when my great-grandmother was born.  There were four more children following Josephine but I don't know where they were born.
     I have not yet found Stephen or Teresa Duper in the 1900 U.S. Federal Census.  Maybe they didn't participate? Maybe the names were misspelled as they were in the 1910 and 1920 censuses.  I found my great-grandmother Josephine in the 1900 census with the rest of the students at the Institution for the Improved Instruction of Deaf Mutes located in Manhattan.
     The 1910 census has Stephen and Teresa with tthree children, 13 year old Stephen, 8 year Theresa and little Albert who was just 2.  Baby Gerald was born later that year in September.  My great-grandmother, Josie was 16 and still at the deaf school.  The rest of the family was living in Putnam county, in a town called Philipstown.  Ten years later the Dupers are living in Brooklyn, according to the 1920 census.  The oldest two children are out of the house and Josie is married with two children of her own.  My great-great grandparents still had Theresa, Albert, and Gerald to keep them company.
     Stephen Duper died on the 16th of July in 1931 at home in Brooklyn.  So if my great-great grandfather was at home in 1931 then where was he the year before his death?  He wasn't recorded with the others in the 1930 census.  I found Teresa in the 1930 listed as married and living in Brooklyn with her sons Stephen and Gerald, and granddaughter Eleanor.  I guess Stephen (son) was living at home because he was separated from his wife, Mary.  Gerald was still single.  Eleanor's younger sister died tragically three years earlier and I believe her mother may have been too stressed to care for all her children.  Where was my great-great grandfather, Stephen?  My grandmother, Eleanor's cousin told me in a letter that her grandfather was a dynamite foreman and helped build the Storm King Highway (Route 218).  She said that the rock dust had gotten into his lungs and contributed to his death.  I found a site which gives the history with photos of Storm King Highway.  The article states that the highway opened in October of 1922.  So where was Stephen Duper in 1930?, was he working somewhere else?  His obituary has him at home so maybe he was indeed home at the time of his death.  I don't know but I need to order his death certificate.

                               Stephen Duper      born 1873  Austria
                                   ♥R.I.P.♥             died  16 July 1931 Brooklyn,NY

http://thecountysbest.com/route218/index.html

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