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WHO IS ALICE LEGGETT?!?!?
You may well recall this posting from last year all about my research on this mysterious character in the ancestry play of Who is Alice Leggett!? I have deleted parts of this blog because.............
I now know exactly who Alice Leggett and how she fits into the puzzle.
For the past few years, she had been quite the mystery for me as Alice continued to pop up on either obituaries or census listings. Was she a relative or a daughter?
Well, last week, the mystery was solved!
Periodically, I check other family trees on ancestry.com just to see if mine are updated and/or if there are additional hints that I missed.
Originally I had thought the family of Thomas and Hanora Filben only consisted of eight children starting with Mary Ann Fiben and ending with Nellie Ellen Filben.
My cousin Becky, had on her Filben family tree- two additional children both born in New York. A daughter named Margaret born in 1850 and a son by the name of John Henry born 1852 but died in 1860. How I missed these additional family members is beyond me, but read on- because what my new research showed was even more exciting!
The Updated Filben Family Tree Of Ten Children Now Looks Like This
The first born daughter Margaret was married to a man named Henry J Leggett (Born July 5th, 1878 in England) Thus disapproving my theory that Winifred (her younger sister) was the Filben sibling who married a Mr. Leggett?!
Margaret and John had three children. Their first born child was a daughter they named of Alice. Sadly she died of convulsions in/around the age of 4-5.
then a second daughter was born, and guess who that was! They named her Alice AND THIS IS THE MYSTERIOUS ALICE LEGGETT WHO KEEPS POPPING UP IN EITHER OBITS OR THE CENSUS OF THE FILBEN TAKEN OVER THE YEARS
Indeed all the information matched up to our Alice Legget!,
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Remaining Alice Leggett Story
Below is a census taken in 1880 of the Filben family when they lived in Almaden, Santa Clara. Seven names down you will see a name you might not be familiar with, Alice Leggett.
If you are wondering who Alice was, I too was curious! She seemed to continually pop up in either a census listing or in newspaper obit such as shown below with her married name of Corey.
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George was 25 when he married Alice (who was only 16) in 1887. An 1890 voter registration, describes George at age 28 with the occupation of a teamster.
Most of us have heard of the term teamster, but wanting to explore more, I logged onto the https://teamster.org/ website and found the following information on the history of how the teamster organization came to be:
“From colonial times to the turn of the last century, the men who drove horse-drawn wagons formed the backbone of North America’s wealth and prosperity.
Despite their essential role as guardians of trade—the lifeblood of the economy—they remained unorganized and exploited.
“In a teamster’s life, work was scarce, jobs were insecure and poverty was commonplace. In 1900, the typical teamster worked 12-18 hours a day, seven days a week for an average wage of $2 per day. A teamster was expected not only to haul his load, but to also assume liability for bad accounts and for lost or damaged merchandise. The work left teamsters assuming all of the risks with little chance for reward.
“In 1901, frustrated and angry drivers banded together to form the Team Drivers International Union (TDIU), with an initial membership of 1,700. The following year, some members broke away, forming a rival group, the Teamsters National Union.”
Alice and George had five children as shown below.
Recently, I was contacted by the niece of the youngest daughter Gladys. Her neighbor Sara is currently working on her ancestry tree and hopefully more information and possible pictures to come at some point in the future!
The following year, George moved to Oakland and was listed in the phone book as an Mfrs Agent. Looking up that acronym on GOOGLE pulled up no less than 18 different meanings:
But in 1911 the term stood for A Manufacturers' Representative, (also known as independent sales representatives or sales agent) is an individual, sales agency or company that sells a manufacturer's products to wholesale and retail customers.
It is unknown as to when James died.
Alice lived in San Francisco all her life until the ripe old age of 91 dying on September 27, 1962.
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