I don’t remember many stories being told of my great-grandfather, Isaac Staats. My grandmother did not spend a lot of time at home with her father. As a child, she grew up in an orphanage only visiting with her father, at most, a couple of times a month a few hours at a time. As an adult, her husband was in the Air Force which led to the family moving frequently. They ended up in Texas, far away from the east coast; not close enough to spend a lot of time with family. Using records and the few family stories I have, we can piece together Isaac’s life.
Isaac’s early life:
Isaac Staats and his twin brother, Abram, were born 7 May 1884 in North Plainfield, Somerset County, New Jersey. Their parents were Abram Staats and Mary Trayne. Abram and Isaac were the 7th and 8th child of Mary Staats.[1] The family has not been located in the 1900 census but at some point before 1910, Isaac along with several siblings moved from New Jersey to Brooklyn, New York where he met and married Anna T. Raisbeck. They were married on 22 January 1910.[2] At this time (1910), Isaac was living with his new bride and several siblings. His occupation was listed as a conductor on a streetcar,[3] possibly like the 1908 streetcar pictured below.
Hard times
By the 1915 New York state census, Isaac had changed jobs and his occupation was listed as “parquet flooring.” The family lived in a small apartment building and they had two children, Victor and Lydia.[4] The next few years would be hard on the family. They moved from the apartment into a tenement building and, in the summer of 1917, Lydia had caught the measles. This developed into pneumonia and Lydia died at the age of 3 years, 6 months.[5] Anna had two other small children (Victor age 6 and Warren age 1) and was pregnant with my grandmother (Ruth) at the time of Lydia’s death. The family continued to press on, they had two more children and had moved again, out of the tenements back into an apartment.
Tragedy struck again in 1924. Anna became sick. She had tuberculosis and went to the Sea View Hospital (pictured below) along with many other New Yorkers stricken with the disease.
With Anna sick in the hospital, what was Isaac supposed he do? How was he to take care of five children, earn a living and find time to visit Anna in the hospital? Was family an option? No, his brothers and sisters had their own families to try to support, there just wasn’t room to add more children that needed care. I can only imagine the heartache my great-grandfather was feeling. In March 1924, the four younger children were removed from the home.[6] On 22 May 1924, the Children’s Court of the City of New York committed the children to the Brooklyn Home for Children for improper guardianship.[7] The oldest child, Victor age 12, stayed with his father.
The children were:
- Warren – age 8
- Ruth – age 6
- Vivian – age 4
- Rita – age 2
Less than two weeks later, on 4 June 1924, Anna died in the hospital.[8] Times were hard for Isaac. He had lost his wife and four of his children were now in a children’s home because he was unable to support them on his own. Isaac did not dissappear, he must have loved his children very much as he visited them during their time in the children’s home. Records show he came almost every month from 1928-1935, except for a one-year gap (November 1929 to December 1930).[9] In 1933, Warren was released from the orphanage at the age of 18. In 1935, Ruth, Vivian and Rita were released to Isaac.
[1] New Jersey, Somerset County Index Register of Births, unpaginated list arranged in semi-alphabetical order by first letter or surname, entry 48-49, Abram & Isaac Staats (twins), 1883-1884; New Jersey State Archives, Division of Archives and Records Management, Trenton.
[2] Kings County, New York, Certificate and Record of Marriage, no. 884, Isaac Staats to Anna T. Raisbeck, 1910; City of New York Department of Health, New York.
[3] 1910 U.S. census, Kings County, New York, population schedule, Brooklyn, Enumeration District [ED] 394, sheet 5A (penned), dwelling 38, family 86, Isaac Staats: digital images, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : accessed 14 July 2018); citing National Archives microfilm publication T624, roll 966.
[4] 1915 State Census, Kings County, New York, population schedule, New York City, enumeration district [ED] 5, page 16 [penned], line 49, Isaac Staats; digital image, Ancestry.com (http://www.ancestry.com : 14 July 2018); citing State population census schedules, 1915, New York State Archives, Albany, New York.
[5] Kings County, New York, Death Certificate, number 15114, Lydia Francis Staats, 1917; Department of Health of The City of New York, Bureau of Records, New York.
[6] Physician’s Certificate of examination, March 1924; Ruth Staats file, Brookwood Collection, Box 33; Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis.
[7] Remand commitment, 22 May 1924; Ruth Staats file, Brookwood Collection, Box 33; Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis.
[8] New York, Death Certificate, number 1007, Anna Staats, 1924; Department of Health of The City of New York, Bureau of Records, New York.
[9] Brooklyn Orphan Asylum visitor log, 1928-1935; Ruth Staats file, Brookwood Collection, Box 33; Social Welfare History Archives, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis.