The History of Our House (1938-1944)

Okay, rather than update the bottom of that post below I'm going to dedicate an entire post to what happened in the days after I used the 1940 census to find out who was living in our house.

You might want to remove your socks now, otherwise they might be blown off.
Ed. note: thanks Jennifer for pointing out that at this point in the summer almost no one (save for people in Australia - Hell-o-o, Australian reader(s)!) would be wearing socks. Too.hot.for.socks y'all.

So, after I completed filling in the census form I figured one Google search couldn't hurt (probably wouldn't help either but, whatever). I searched for Daniel Muck and came up with a rootsweb page littered with his name. I poured over it quickly and saw that his middle name was Webster. I added that to the search and this time clicked Images. The first picture I saw was the one I posted earlier of Dan and Eva on their wedding day (which was December 25, 1890 - long before they lived here but still pretty amazing).

Dan and Eva Muck on their wedding day.

I went to the page where the picture came from, findagrave.com and there they were along with lots of interesting information about them and their daughter Maude including the fact that their final resting places were just a few minutes away here in Wichita.

Most of the Muck family. Dan, Eva, Charles and Maude.

A later photo of the Muck family. Maude wears a watch that was her grandmother's and now belongs to Wilene.

That evening we hopped in the car and went to find the family that had called our house home for at least a few years. We found their grave markers, took a couple of pictures and went on our way. The next day, on a whim I decided to email the woman, Wilene, who had compiled all of that information about Dan and Eva. I also included this picture of our house for her records and a little information about who else was living with them at the time.

She emailed me back and can you believe it? She was their only granddaughter! After a couple of emails back and forth, she called me yesterday afternoon and we spoke for over an hour about her grandparents, fond memories, name pronounciation (it's Eh-va with a soft e - pretty, huh?) and what she recalled from visiting her grandparents in the house. Turns out Dan and Eva slept in the dining room and Maude, their daughter slept in the attic. Wilene could remember looking out the attic window and down the street as a very young girl and she could remember her grandfather, Dan eating his favorite cereal at the kitchen table. The Muck family lived here from about 1938 until around 1944.

Dan Muck and his granddaughter, Wilene.

I still can't really believe this. It must have been meant to be otherwise there's no way it would have been this easy. If you live in an old house, I URGE you to look into the 1940 census. It will take less than an hour and worst case scenario, you know a little more about your house's history. Best case scenario? Well, you just read about it, folks.

Wilene is searching for a photo of the whole family on our front staircase and when I have access to it I will add it and all of this information to the "About Our House" Section in the sidebar. Wilene, a whiz at research, also tipped me off to the county records department so hopefully someday soon I will be able to find out who preceded the Muck family.