Have you ever tried to piece together a giant jigsaw puzzle without the picture and not knowing if you have all the pieces? In searching through family history it’s not hard to come across such puzzles regularly. Here’s a picture of one such puzzle.
I know it doesn’t really look like a puzzle. It’s a list of jobs. These are the occupations held by my grandfather, Everett Zinn. So what’s the puzzle? The conundrum is the chronological order of these occupations and how they fit together in Everett’s lifetime. You see, in making this list, my mother was just trying to list all the jobs her father held, but I want to know how they fit together in his life.
I began to piece it together by going through all the evidence I had in my collection; records, letters, journals, and books.
The easiest place to start was the census records. Here I found in the 1925 census that Everett was farming and the 1940 census listed his occupation as auto mechanic. There’s two pieces of the puzzle.
Next, I remembered reading in Grandma’s journals when she mentioned specific items about Grandpa.
Journal Entry from July 25, 1922 – Renting a farm
It was awful hot for awhile today until a rainstorm came up and cooled things off some. Had a letter from Everett. He is pretty much excited. He had seen his Uncle Duane, and Mr. Ott had seen him. He will rent Everett the place I guess if he wants it. I am so excited about it for I can hardly think. I think that would make us such a cozy little home. Now this evening Mr. Bealer has called him again and altho Everett hadn’t got to talk to him yet, I expect he wants to rent Everett that place, so it’s hard to tell just which one he will land yet.
Journal Entry from February 4, 1943 – Work
Everett is going to work again today at Brown’s garage. They have decided to reopen it. So he quit at the defense work. He is quite thrilled about it for that is really his line of work.
His “defense work” must be the cable spinning during WWII that Mom listed.
Another piece of the puzzle came in a letter the Everett wrote to Ursula when she was in Dodge City, Kansas visiting her half sister, Dell. In a letter dated June 17, 1928, he shares:
“Well Kiddie I guess I will be thru at Glyn’s this wk. I expected to be thru in about 2 wks, but he isn’t going to do much more spraying. I guess they will start harvesting this wk so I suppose I will be shocking wheat again.”
Add to that the treasure trove found in the city directories for the Topeka area. I love that in the 1950’s, they listed what position a person held as well as the company they worked for. A new job popped up here that Mom hadn’t listed for Hygrade Food Products Corp.
1921 – Laborer
1931 – Employee – Hygrade Food Products Corporation
1942 – Auto Mechanic – Brown Brothers
1952 – Mechanic – Brown Truck Co..
1954 – Mechanic – Harold’s GMC Trucks
1955 – Mechanic – Clarence Hood Garage
The book, History of Grantville, Kansas, 1854-1976, reported that Everett ran a garage from their home for a time in the 1930’s and 1950’s, and that he was a custodian for the Grantville Grade School from 1959- 1966. I also have his contracts with the school district, but only from 1960-1966.
From stories that my mother told, we know that she and her Dad both worked at John Morrell & Co. at least for part of the time together because they would ride into work together. Mom worked there during the summers of 1948, 1949, and 1950.
From my own knowledge, I know that he and grandma were both salesmen for Standard Life Insurance and Fuller Brush Company in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s.
Let’s take a look at the puzzle now. Not all the pieces are put together, but the illustration is more complete now.
Can you put some other pieces in place? What are your favorite memories of Everett related to his work? Please share them in the comments below.
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To see the Zinn family tree click here.
To learn more about Everett click here.