Uncle Joe's Abandoned Davis Women

Crapper Jack's Saloon in Cripple Creek, Colorado, 1890s (Western Mining History)

Mayme Dean wanted to find her father and brother. When she last heard from them, she was an 11- or 12-year-old girl, and now she was a 28-year-old married woman and mother. Did she want her three children to know their grandfather and uncle? Was she in economic need? Whatever her reason, it compelled her to either visit, telegraph or write from Kansas City, MO to detectives in Spokane, WA. The Spokane Spokesman-Review published an article on April 16, 1913 which is a haunting read for a genealogist: 

Wants Father Found.

Seventeen years have elapsed since Mrs. L. Dean, 317 Eighteenth street, Kansas City, Mo. heard from her father, according to her appeal to the Spokane police, and she asks the aid of detectives in finding him. The father, Joe Davis, is believed by the daughter to be with her brother Alex Davis. When last heard from they had left Cripple Creek, Col., on their way to Spokane.

Amazingly, 111 years later, I may have the answer to Mayme Dean's question. I lack definitive proof, but I have built a strong case that her father was my great-great-great-uncle Joe Davis (c.1852-1934). Much like finding Mayme's probable sister Ida Epstein, the faint connections between Joe Davis and Mayme Dean would have been impossible to find without modern digital archives and search engines. On top of geographic distance, there was another strong taboo keeping the father-daughter relationship estranged: Joe Davis was probably a bigamist, and Mayme belonged to his abandoned family. 

When Slander Starts to Look Like Truth

Newspapers.com was my crucial source in piecing together these disparate clues, helping me find mentions of "Joe Davis" and "Joseph Davis" in Washington State and Montana newspapers. Admittedly I'm making a major assumption that a Jewish man named "Joe Davis" in Montana, Washington State, and Colorado in the 1890s was the same person. But beyond a common Anglo name that could easily be a pseudonym, there are overlaps in these separate threads that are starting to form an bigger picture.

My great-great-great-uncle Joe Davis 

"Uncle Joe" was clearly the black sheep of my Davis family. The first in his Russian Jewish family to come to the United States, he probably helped fund his siblings' immigration by being a "traveling man," moving from town to town every year or two and running a pawnshop or second-hand good store for miners, speculators, farmers, townsfolk. It seems Joe didn't ask too many questions when people brought in items to pawn, and scores of articles, particularly in Missoula, MT and Spokane, WA, repeatedly accuse Joe of dealing with stolen goods.

In early 1891, Joe Davis fled Spokane after his estranged wife Bettie accused him of stealing jewelry. A certain Joe Davis resurfaced in Fairhaven, WA that June, reportedly saving a Russian Jewish woman named Esther Feigle from a life of prostitution. One of the alleged pimps, Harry Zettler, tried to discredit him, saying Joe Davis was a bigamist searching for a third wife. The Tacoma Daily Ledger quoted Zettler:

"I recognized [Joe Davis] as a Jew who came over from Russia with me nine years ago. The government sent us to Manitoba, and there Joe Davis remained two years and then cleared out... Davis is a bigamist and has a bad record. When he left Manitoba he returned to Russia, taking back with him his wife and two children. These he deserted there and came back to the states, bringing with him wife number two. This one he also deserted and the woman is now living in Montana. Wife number one came back to the United States looking for Davis and is now located in Chicago, while Davis is now here running this woman Esther with a view to making her wife number three."

Harry (born Hersch) Zettler was among the 340 Russian Jews permitted by the British government to settle in Winnipeg, Canada in May and June 1882, following a year of pogroms in Russia. He appears on a Canadian passenger list, arriving at Quebec from Liverpool, England on June 14, 1882. The Jewish refugees intended to start an agricultural colony, but their flimsy "emigrant sheds" and other living conditions were so difficult that most the group either moved away or avoided becoming homesteaders. Zettler lived in Seattle by 1886.

Winnipeg fantasy: Postcard promoting immigration to Manitoba (source)

Winnipeg reality: 1904 street scene (source)

So far, I have no definite records of Joseph Davis's whereabouts before 1889. His daughter Ida was born in Russia (supposedly Kiev) around 1879 and her marriage record lists her mother as "Rebecca Rabanow." Joe then married Bettie Benedict, a woman from Austria-Hungary, and they had two daughters: Rose, said to be born in 1884 in Spokane Falls, WA, and Sade, said to be born in 1885 in Butte, MT. Joe said he was naturalized in 1888 in Spokane, and he definitely lived in Missoula by 1889. If Zettler's story is true, then Bettie is clearly the second wife in Montana.

At first I dismissed Zettler's claims as unable to be substantiated, but looking into "Mrs. L. Dean," the 1913 resident of Kansas City, started to change my mind. A number of L. Deans appear in the 1910 Kansas City census, but one family lived in the same address listed in the article: 317 18th Street. 

• Louis Dean, age 29, was an "expressman" from Illinois. 
• Wife: Mamie, age 26, gave her birthplace as "Can-Yiddish," implying she was Jewish and born in Canada.
• Children: 6-year-old Annie (born in Illinois), 5-year-old Herman (born in Illinois), 3-year-old Bessie (born in Missouri)

FamilySearch has more on Mayme Dean (the spelling on her tombstone): her 1937 Social Security application lists her name as "Mamie Davis Dean" and her parents as "Joseph Davis" and "Anna Berliant," and her Social Security and California death records said she was born on June 20, 1884 in Winnipeg, Canada! So Mayme was born in the same town at the same time that Harry Zettler knew Joe Davis. Another sobering fact is Mayme's birthdate is five days after the birth of Joe's other daughter Rose over 1,100 miles away in Spokane. If both dates are correct, then by this point Joe had clearly abandoned his family in Canada. 

FamilySearch also indexed Louis and Mayme's marriage record from 1902 in Chicago: Louis Dean's 19-year-old bride had the name "Mamie Brotsky." The surname discrepancy becomes a little clearer in the 1900 census, looking at Mayme's likely family at 242 South Center Ave. in West Town, Chicago. The head of the household said he was married for far fewer years than his wife: 

• Jos (Joseph?) Brodsky, age 36, born in April 1864 in Russia to Russian parents. He immigrated in 1882 and was married for 12 years.
• Wife, Annie Brodsky, age 40, born in April 1860 in Romania to Romanian parents. She was married for 23 years. 
• Daughter, Mamie Brodsky, age 18, born in June 1881 in Canada. 
• Son, Nathan Brodsky, age 11, born in January 1889 in Illinois.
• Daughter, Alta Brodsky, age 3, born in September 1896 in Illinois.  

The conclusions I draw are Mrs. Annie Brodsky was married around 1877 [give or take], birthed Mayme in Canada in 1881 [probably 1884, given Mayme's subsequent records], married Mr. Brodsky around 1888, and then had two more children in Chicago in 1889 and 1896. Mayme was from Annie's earlier marriage in Winnipeg, Canada! Though raised as a "Brodsky," Mayme identified as an adult as a "Davis." "Anna Berliant" came from Canada to the U.S. in the 1880s and lived in Chicago by 1891, which matches Zettler's story. (And she died by 1903, if Mayme's daughter Annie is named after her.)

Chicago, intersection of State and Washington Streets, 1890s. (source) 

Two more details check out: Mayme said she had a brother, Alex, and an 1894 article about Joe Davis's separation from his wife Bettie mentions: "Bettie is also given the custody of two minor children, Rosie and Sadie, aged 11 and 9... There is a boy, Alex, a bright lad about 14 years old, of whom no mention is made. It is supposed that Joseph will take care of him, as Bettie is his stepmother." I found no other mention of Joe Davis having a son named Alex, but that could explain Mayme saying that Joe and Alex lived together around 1896. Mayme's story also matches my great-great-great-uncle Joe Davis having lived in Cripple Creek, Colorado in 1896!

A Year of Three Marriages?

Searching for articles about Joe Davis in Spokane, I found that he divorced another wife, Margaret Ann McDonald, in 1900. The divorce trial coverage lasted for months, and at one point three local Jewish men accused Joe of thinking "the decree of divorce was not binding upon him, that he was a Jew and did not consider the orders of this court legal or binding." Margaret's descendants found this information on my Davis family history site, reached out to me, and I learned they had preserved a copy of the divorce decree but had no idea that their ancestor Joe Davis was Jewish. 

The Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection including a line in the Rocky Mountain News from August 16, 1896 about Joe and Margaret's marriage in Cheyenne, Wyoming: "Joseph Davis and Margaret Anna McDonald of El Paso county, Colo., were married in this city yesterday by Judge Glafcke." Amazingly, Margaret's descendants also have a strange clipping from September 1896 describing Joe Davis as a denizen of the red-light district of Cripple Creek, CO: "a well known character upon Myers avenue... Joe, so Dame Rumor whispers, is a 'gay boy' and is prone to mixing up with the opposite sex in an undue degree."

At the time, Cripple Creek, west of Pike's Peak, was ground zero for one of the last major Wild West gold rushes, with hundreds of mines extracting over 22 million ounces of gold in a quarter-century. Land that once belonged to the Ute Indians and was an isolated ranch in 1890 turned into a boomtown of over 6,000 inhabitants within five years. One of the ranch owners, Myers, gave his name to a street that became full of brothels, which were not outlawed in Colorado until 1915. Joe's store was along this thoroughfare, at 237 East Myers Avenue.

Construction in Cripple Creek following major fires in April 1896 (Western Mining History)

A great-nephew of Joe, Mark Axelrod, wrote to me that he heard growing up how Joe's store "did a brisk business in outfitting miners on their way to the gold mines. Where you have miners living far from home, you also have hookers. Uncle Joe capitalized on that opportunity by selling risque outfits and lingerie to the hookers. That turned out to be a significant source of income for Uncle Joe." It's easy to see how Joe became a fixture of the red-light district.

Looking through digitized Colorado newspapers, I was shocked to find in the Cripple Creek Weekly Journal that Joe Davis had a Jewish wedding ceremony on April 4, 1896, only four months before marrying Margaret!

At the residence of the groom this evening at 5:30, Mr. Joe Davis, a well-known gentleman of this city, was married to Miss Jessie Ritchie, a charming and very popular young lady. The happy couple were united by Justice of the Peace Peavey, after which the impressive Jewish ceremony was performed by Rabbi Jacobs of Minneapolis... Immediately after the ceremony, Mr. and Mrs. Davis left for Colorado Springs. The Journal wishes them success through life. 

That's not all — the Rocky Mountain News said on March 10, 1896, less than a month before the Jewish wedding, that "Joseph Davis of Cripple Creek" and Belle Sabol got a marriage license. So far, I have no further details about Belle Sabol or Jessie Ritchie and their ill-fated marriages. Could it really be that Joe Davis got married three times within five months?!?

Before this month, I had tracked down four spouses of Joe Davis:

• Rebecca Rabanow (fl.1879) — 1 daughter, Ida Epstein (1879-1949)
• Bettie Benedict (c.1867-1935) — married c.1883, divorced 1895, 2 daughters: Rosie Weinberger (1884-1973) and Sade Frank (1885-1923)
• Margaret Ann McDonald (1877-1961) — married 1896, divorced 1900, 1 son: Reuben Irvin (1898-1989)
• Emma O. Hedberg (1878-1963) — married c.1910?, divorced 1925, 1 daughter: Jeanette B. Davis Van Oss (1913-2004)

Now the list could possibly expand to include:

• Anna Berliant (c.1860) — 2 children: Alex Davis (c.1880) and Mayme Dean (1884-1962)
• Belle Sabol (fl.1896)
• Jessie Ritchie (fl.1896)

One more story hints that there could be even more women and children. 

Two Long-Lost Daughters

Much like Cripple Creek, Missoula had its own red-light district along Front Street, including a multi-story brothel and Chinese immigrant businesses. Joe Davis ran his pawnshop on Front Street in the early 1890s, and disturbingly his own daughter may have returned to the same area as a prostitute.

Missoula police arrested Henry Adkins for pimping his former girlfriend, Grace Brown, in November 1907. Adkins, who the Missoula Herald unsubtly called a "young Jewish parasite," was able to live comfortably in a nice neighborhood off of Grace's earnings, while Grace remained on Front Street. Investigators found that Grace was actually 17 years old, her real name was Grace Davis, and she was "a former Missoula girl, the daughter of Joe Davis, who formerly conducted a store in this city but who now resides in Seattle. The girl is under 18 years of age and disappeared from Seattle some time ago, since which time the father has been prosecuting a search for her."

Through an intermediary, Grace Davis petitioned the mayor of Missoula to free Adkins. Upon his release in December 1907, Adkins left town, but he returned a day later to Grace's boarding room on Front Street and threatened to kill her. Grace went to the police, and Adkins was re-arrested, tried, convicted, and served a month in prison for his threats.

Front Street, Missoula (source)

Unfortunately, I do not currently know whether Grace Davis was reunited with her family in Seattle or if she rid herself of Henry Adkins. I also do not know whether Mayme Dean found her brother and father. Historical newspaper articles can cast light on riveting, specific events, but there can be a shadowy lack of answers in between. 

Newspapers.com, FamilySearch, and the Texas Digital Newspaper Program provide a rough outline of Mayme's family story. After marrying Louis Dean, a son of Russian Jewish immigrants, Mayme had two children in Chicago, Anna (1903-1979) and Herman (1905-1975), and one daughter in Kansas City, Bessie (c.1906). By 1920, Louis Dean had become an optometrist, and Anna married Jack Katsh, also a Russian Jewish immigrant, in 1925. 

The following year, Jack and Anna Katsh moved from Missouri to Borger, a Texas panhandle boomtown that attracted tens of thousands of people within months with the promise of striking it rich with oil. Rather than drill wells, the Katsh family ran the area's main clothing store, echoing what Anna's probable grandfather Joe Davis did in his own boomtowns of the Gay Nineties.

The Roaring Twenties in Borger must have felt like the knife's edge of civilization. A local town history wrote about Anna Katsh: "Anna said the dirt streets in Borger became deeply rutted. Boots above the knees had to be worn to cross the muddied ruts. The sidewalks were wooden and it was dangerous, especially at night, to walk among the roughnecks who crowded the sidewalks. Killings were frequent; the law was whatever the majority ruled, right or wrong. Anna never went out at night."

Nevertheless, Jack and Anna Katsh said they made many friends and "fond memories" during their 19 years in Borger. The painter Thomas Hart Benton, who toured America for slice-of-life scenes, also passed through Borger in 1926, and felt an unusual mixture of anarchy and optimism. He noted that outside the town "a great thick column of black smoke rose as in a volcanic eruption from the earth to the middle of the sky", but he then said: "One did not get the feeling, in spite of the rough shacks and dirty tents in which the people lived, of that narrow cruelty and bitter misery that hovers around eastern industrial centers. There was a belief, written in men’s faces, that all would find a share in the gifts of this mushroom town… Borger on the boom was a big party… where capital… joined hands with everybody in a great democratic dance." Benton's 1928 painting Boomtown captures the jumbled, wriggling energy of Borger and its stoicism in the face of environmental havoc. Perhaps all of 21st century Earth will need to adopt the energy of 1920s Borger.

"Boomtown" (1928), Thomas Hart Benton's depiction of Borger, TX.

Dr. Louis and Mayme Dean moved to Borger shortly before Louis's sudden death in 1940. Mayme and her daughter Anna's family moved back to Los Angeles in the 1940s, and Herman Dean lived out his days in Borger. While Mayme died in Los Angeles, her obituary ran in the Amarillo Globe-Times on May 10, 1962, saying she was a "member of a pioneer family" of Borger. Mayme's final resting place is in Llano Cemetery in Amarillo and her grandchildren lived further afield — Encino, CA and Denver, CO. Economic opportunity sent Davis descendants throughout the country, and brittle family ties often became casualties of this perpetual motion. 

Questions? Comments? Please email me at ruedafingerhut (at) gmail.com.