Searching for Bonnie's Norwegian Grandmother, Inga

In 2005 a genealogical search was begun to learn about Inga's origins and her life after leaving Edward Held. Inga Jakobsen Held left her second husband Ed Held in about 1920, when her son was two years of age.

Both Bonnie and father Edward Leroy are only children to their parents.

Throughout Bonnie's life little was known and shared about her father's mother, Inga Jacobsen. This gap in family background is what prompted Bonnie to persue her search for her grandmother Inga Jacobsen, a native of Norway.

The 1918 Washington county birth record of Edward Held shows his mother as Inga Jacobsen, birthplace Norway. The record also shows that Edward was the third living child for Inga. Bonnie has the baptismal paper for her father. He was baptized in West Bend Wisconsin at the Methodist church. Shortly after the baptism, Inga left her husband and child.

In 1930 the Held family had a new birth record created for Edward listing the mother as Ida Behrens Held, in Barrington Illinois, and bearing the seal of the state of Illinois. Apparently this was the result of the adoption of Edward by Ida, Edward Theodore's second wife, a common practice at that time. Previous to recent research, Bonnie was not aware of any family information on the whereabouts of Inga Jacobsen after the baptism of Edward at about age two in 1920 or of the previous two live births by Inga Jacabsen.

The search to learn more began with checking numerous Held family hits in the US Census' for 1900 and 1910. We found one 1900 census record that matched the birth month and year of Edward Theodore Held. This was in the town of Bristol in Kenosha County, Wisconsin. Bonnie was not aware of any Kenosha area connections with her Held family line. (Two years later, another 1900 census record with Held misspelled as Hild was found making the lead to Kenosha completely accidental and indeed fortunate.)

At the Kenosha Counry courthouse the marriage record for Inga and Edward in Kenosha was located, dated 1915. Inga is shown as divorced from Foster Shumaker in 1914. We then found the marriage record for this first marriage also in Kenosha and the birth records for her first two children; Clifford (born 1911) and Cecil (born 1912) in Kenosha.

A check of various Kenosha city directories revealed the presence of Inga's family starting about 1906 and periodically until the deaths of her parents in 1949 and 1963, respectively. The 1912 Kenosha city directory shows Inga (Miss Inga Jacobsen) living with her parents Daniel and Cecelia (Olsen) Jacobson in 1912, about the same time as the birth of Inga's second child, a girl named Cecil Shumaker.

The death records for Daniel Jacobsen and his wife Cecelia Olsen Jacobsen were found in the Kenosha County courthouse. The Kenosha newspapers were then checked the for obituaries of both of Inga's parents and found at the local public library, including the 1949 obituary for Daniel Jacobson and a 1963 obituary for her mother Cecelia Olsen Jacobsen (sic). Inga is listed as "Mrs. John Georgas (Inga) Ft Worth Texas", as the obituary listed the married names of each of their daughters, Inga, Thora, Gertrude, and Dagney and where they were living at the time. This was especially important for it opened the door for searching the census records for Inga as Inga Georgas, her name from her third marriage.

A check of the 1930 US Census shows Inga was married to John Georges (sic) and living in Calumet City, Indiana where John and Inga worked in a dry cleaning business. With them was a daughter named June Georges (sic) age 5 and Inga's son from her first marriage, Clifford Heldt age 19 and a laborer. It is strange that Clifford's surname is shown as Held (actually Heldt) and not Shumaker, his birth surname. In checking the Social Security Death Index we found a record of Inga's death in December, 1976 and it also showed Inga Georgas was born on 3 April 1892, and that her SSN was issued in California. A check with the state of Wisconsin Vital Records located a divorce record issued to Inga Shumaker dated in 1914 and it cited the reason for the divorce as "cruel and inhumane treatment". Alimony was also granted as part of the divorce decree.

Two sources in Fort Worth Texas were checked to locate an newspaper obituary for Inga Jacobson Georgas. First we called an editor with Ft Worth Star-Telegraph newspaper regarding access to the newspaper archive obituaries. The editor returned my call promptly and promised to get the information I was seeking. He also suggested I check with the Fort Worth Public Library. Both the library and the newspaper found the obituary for Inga and for John Georgas. The obituary for Inga listed her daughter June and her married name, June Georgas Crowe. We found June's mailing address on the internet.

Bonnie wrote a letter to June Crowe sharing the information we have learned and asking for cooperation in sharing information about Inga, including photos, if any exist. June Crowe contacted us as soon as she received Bonnie's letter. She was delighted at the news we shared. On Sunday, July 24 Bonnie spoke directly with June, her newly found aunt, and they spoke for two hours, sharing news and information about each other. June is Bonnie's father's half sister, and the only sibling still alive. As June put it, "you are my only living close relativebesides my son." June Georgas Crowe, also recalled that she was born in Chicago and that later the family lived in Gary Indiana, where her parents ran a dry cleaning business. In subsequent conversations with June Georgas Crowe, June pointed out that Inga came to live with June in North Hollywood, California for about six months during World War II, hence her Social Security was issued there.

Thanks to June we contacted members of the Rubjerg family. The Rubjerg family is from Inga's younger sister Dagney Jacobsen and her husband Eiler Rubjerg. Several members in the Rubjerg family recalled having met Inga years ago and described Inga as a wonderful, fun-loving person. Also mentioned was the medical footnote that the Rubjerg family suffered from a tendency for aortic annuerisms; Eiler has lost a leg from a recent aortic annuerism, Dan has had corrective aortic surgery, and one sister has died early in her sixties.

And so the search for Bonnie's grandmother Inga has come to a successful conclusion. Forthcoming conversations with June have embelished and added to our impressions of Inga and a number of old family photos have been shared. However, the mystery of Inga's 1920 disappearance from her young husband and son remains. June never knew of this second marriage or of the birth of Inga's third child, despite living in close proximity to her mother for most of her life.

We have also learned from the obituary of Cecelia Olsson Jakobsen (Inga's mother) that the Jacobsen family came from Egersund in Norway's Rogaland county. A large digital database in Norway (Digitalarkivit) revealed the 1900 Norwegian census records for the Jacobsen family in Egersund, Norway.

Subsequently we have acquired information from the Vesterheim library in Madison Wisconsin, the Immigration Center in Stavanger, and Norwegian helpers on site in Egersund that the Jakobsen family lived on the Helvik farm near Egersund in Norway and that Cecelia came from Bokn, an island across the fjord to the north of Stavanger. Also from this research we have learned the family history of Cecelia's Alvestad family from Bokn, which identified a number of living cousins from both Daniel and Cecelia.

In May, 2006 we visited Norway and met many of these cousins in person. More than a dozen showed up at a fiord landing in Bokn to meet this newly found "cousin".

Note: The early records use the Jakobsen or Jacobsen spelling, but more recent references use the Jacobson spelling, something not uncommon with immigrants from Scandinavian countries.