Can she read? No. Can he write? No. The United States decennial census repeated the questions, once in 1900 for my great-grandmother Victoria Walkowiak and twice in 1900 and 1910 for my great-grandfather Stanley Augustyn before their early deaths nine years apart. In 1903, puerperal fever burned out Victoria’s child-bearing body, six births in fewer than ten years. Two days later, John, her sixth infant, sought again the dark comfort of an earthen mother. John’s death completed one sibling trio and left a second living trio behind. Catherine, Victoria’s oldest, had drowned as a small child in a whirlpool. Cholera infantum […]
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