{"id":384,"date":"2011-09-21T09:08:37","date_gmt":"2011-09-21T15:08:37","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/iseeancestors.com\/comm\/?p=384"},"modified":"2011-09-24T12:03:01","modified_gmt":"2011-09-24T18:03:01","slug":"circuitous-yet-fortuitous","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/iSeeAncestors.com\/comm\/2011\/09\/21\/circuitous-yet-fortuitous\/","title":{"rendered":"Circuitous Yet Fortuitous"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Pohl<\/a>
Albert and Mary Pohl Homestead<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This is a case of genealogical serendipity.\u00a0 I set out to determine the precise location of the house where my maternal great-grandparents, Albert and Mary Pohl<\/a>, lived.\u00a0 In this picture taken about 1909, the Pohl family posed in front of their house. <\/span>1<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

From something unexpected, I uncovered a trail of bread crumbs that led me to their doorstep.<\/p>\n

My aunt Mary told me the Pohl family picture was taken in Linhart, Pennsylvania, which is a suburb of Pittsburgh and just north of Turtle Creek, Pennsylvania.\u00a0 The 1930 Federal census <\/span>2<\/sup><\/a><\/span> indicates the family lived on Harrison Road while in 1920 <\/span>3<\/sup><\/a><\/span> and 1910 <\/span>4<\/sup><\/a><\/span> they lived on #3 Hill.\u00a0 Were these two different addresses?\u00a0 I was told that #3 Hill is today known as Harrison Road.<\/p>\n

Of course the genealogically correct thing to do was to search property records for the chain of ownership.\u00a0 Wading through deed indices and property transfers is tedious and expensive in terms of renting microfilmed records.\u00a0 So I put the project on the back burner, hoping to return to it later.<\/p>\n

One day I searched the online news archives of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette for any articles that mention the Pohl family.\u00a0 I came across a relatively recent article published in July 2006. <\/span>5<\/sup><\/a><\/span>\u00a0 Apparently the Wilkins Township tax assessor was not paying property taxes on property owned by his late father’s estate.\u00a0 It reported his father bought the property from Irene Pohl, a cousin of mine, and granddaughter to Albert and Mary Pohl.\u00a0 Miss Pohl had then recently bought the property herself.\u00a0 That was interesting, although not entirely useful to me.\u00a0 But then the article went on to reveal something incredible.<\/p>\n

\n

The land previously figured in a tax matter.\u00a0 In 1947, when it was owned by the estate of Mary Pohl, executor Albert Pohl [her son] sold it for $2,300 to settle the estate’s debts.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Mary’s husband Albert died in 1931.\u00a0 Mary died in 1944, making it reasonable to assume her son Albert would settle her estate in 1947.\u00a0 This was the very property of my great-grandparents for which I was looking.\u00a0 Armed with the name of the property’s present owner, I visited the Allegheny County website to see if tax assessment records were online.\u00a0 I was able to find the parcel and display a satellite image of its boundaries. <\/span>6<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\"Property<\/a>
Property Tax Information<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Here it was, at the intersection of Harrison Road with Patterson Street.\u00a0 The house itself is no longer standing.\u00a0 A view from Google Maps (below, left) shows the property today. <\/span>7<\/sup><\/a><\/span>\u00a0 A deep ravine is a short distance from the road.\u00a0 The address is about 230 or 233 Harrison Road.\u00a0 Interestingly, a neighboring house two doors down (below, right) looks very much like the Pohl homestead from the 1910 photograph.\u00a0 Perhaps it is an original structure from that time period.<\/p>\n

\"Google<\/a>
Vacant Land, and a Neighboring House<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Armed with the location, I next wanted to find an early real-estate plat map that might show the property.\u00a0 At the Historic Pittsburgh website, I found three plat maps published by G. M. Hopkins & Company.\u00a0 The first, in 1915, shows Harrison Road and Patterson Street, with an outline of a home indicated on the property (highlighted). <\/span>8<\/sup><\/a><\/span>\u00a0 The main road at the bottom is Larimer Avenue Extension.<\/p>\n

\"1915<\/a>
Wilkins Township Plat Map, 1915<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The property boundaries in the plat map matched the tax assessment map perfectly.\u00a0 The second map, in 1903, shows the same area, except that Harrison Road was named Township Road at the time and what would be Patterson Street is unidentified. <\/span>9<\/sup><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

\"1903<\/a>
Wilkins Township Plat Map, 1903<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A third map, published in 1895, shows a similar view, although no roads are identified. <\/span>10<\/sup><\/a><\/span>\u00a0 It does indicate however the house was standing on the property as early as 1895, two years after the Pohl family immigrated to America in 1892\/1893.\u00a0 Precisely when the Pohl family occupied the house must still be determined by tracing the deed records.<\/p>\n

I continued to follow my trail of bread crumbs.\u00a0 In the 1903 map above, “Incline No. 5” caught my eye.\u00a0 It appears bottom, center.\u00a0 I read in the township history provided at the Wilkins Township website <\/span>11<\/sup><\/a><\/span> that an elevated railroad was to be built to transport coal.\u00a0 In August 1902, the Wilkins Township Board of Commissioners authorized the New York and Cleveland Gas Coal Company (NY&CGC) to build such an incline across the Millerstown to Turtle Creek Road on what was known as #3 Hill in the NY&CGC plan of lots. <\/span>12<\/sup><\/a><\/span>\u00a0 Linhart, Pennsylvania was formerly known as Millerstown, so that road would today be Larimer Avenue.\u00a0 That township ordinance implies that #3 Hill was an area<\/em> and not a specific street.<\/p>\n

In a round-about way I found the precise location of the Pohl family homestead.\u00a0 I started with an early picture of the house and family, a clue from a relative, and Federal census records.\u00a0 When I later happened upon an obscure newspaper article that mentioned the present owner, it led to a tax map, and a view from Google Maps, then to three real estate plat maps.\u00a0 One plat map showed an incline railroad.\u00a0 A 1902 Wilkins Township ordinance confirmed the area was #3 Hill.<\/p>\n

Harrison Road, formerly Township Road, was therefore part of #3 Hill, which was near Linhart, formerly Millerstown, in Wilkins Township, Allegheny County, Pennsylvania.\u00a0 A circuitous yet fortuitous find indeed.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This is a case of genealogical serendipity.\u00a0 I set out to determine the precise location of the house where my maternal great-grandparents, Albert and Mary Pohl, lived.\u00a0 In this picture taken about 1909, the Pohl family posed in front of their house. From something unexpected, I uncovered a trail of bread crumbs that led me … Continue reading “Circuitous Yet Fortuitous”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":309,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,54,7,9],"tags":[59,61,62,103,60,29],"class_list":["post-384","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-life-and-times","category-maternal-ancestors","category-research-methodology","category-surname-pohl","tag-linhart","tag-map","tag-nycgc","tag-pennsylvania","tag-plat","tag-pohl"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/iSeeAncestors.com\/comm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/iSeeAncestors.com\/comm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/iSeeAncestors.com\/comm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iSeeAncestors.com\/comm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/309"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iSeeAncestors.com\/comm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=384"}],"version-history":[{"count":23,"href":"https:\/\/iSeeAncestors.com\/comm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":411,"href":"https:\/\/iSeeAncestors.com\/comm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/384\/revisions\/411"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/iSeeAncestors.com\/comm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=384"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iSeeAncestors.com\/comm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=384"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/iSeeAncestors.com\/comm\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=384"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}