Roman Catholic Archdioses of Newark - Cemeteries (rcancem.org)

    On Saturday, George and I drove to the Secaucus Public Library to attend the monthly meeting of the Hudson County Genealogy Society.  As we were leaving (it was a very good meeting about naturalizations, by the way), George saw a local newspaper, The Hudson Reporter, in a rack in the lobby.  On the front page was a story about Laurel Hill a.k.a. Snake Hill.  The article was mostly about the asylum, but there were other institutions there: hospitals, prisons, etc… including the Fire Department.  This is where my Great Grand Uncle was the Deputy Fire Chief (remember when I found Thomas J Bergen’s death certificate?).  So when I got home I shot an e mail to the author of the article, asking for info about the Fire Department.  I later got a response telling me that all of that information is at the county, but there is a complete file of the Secaucus Home News past editions at the Library.  So next meeting you know where I am going.

    Well, all of this got me thinking about Thomas J Bergen and his wife Margaret.  I have the death certificate for each of them and I know (from Margaret’s obit) that they had no children.  I also know that both of them are buried at Holy Cross Cemetery in North Arlington, which brings me to the title of this post.  I know from the headstone at Holy Cross that Margaret Bergen, Thomas J Bergen, and Mary V Cannon are buried in this plot, but who else is here?  I went to rcancem.org to do some research.  I know I mentioned this website before and the fact that you can search by name (either first and last names or just last name).  I previously found that Thomas’ brother Patrick and his wife, Mary, are both buried here by searching the Bergen surname.  The website identifies the plot as Block 1, Section B, Grave 356, and gives a specific plot number within this area, as well as, burial dates.  So I have three people that I know are there from the headstone, and two more that I found before.  Here is what I have:

Name            Date of Burial            Grave

Thomas J Bergen    9 Apr 1931            1B
Margaret Bergen    7 Mar 1930            1A
Mary V Cannon    12 Aug 1969            3A
Patrick Bergen        19 Apr 1931            1C
Mary Bergen        29 Dec 1943            2B

So then I entered Bergen in the surname search and chose Holy Cross Cemetery and hit search.  Here is what it looks like:

Let me tell you, there are a lot of Bergens buried in this cemetery.  I scrolled through the burials paying attention to the Plot number and I found the following:

Yes, another Mary Bergen in grave # 2C, and a burial date of 13 Dec 1957.  (I was two years old)  You may notice that the name directly above the highlighted one is the first Mary Bergen (Patrick's wife).  Now this new Mary Bergen could be Patrick and Mary's daughter, but I thought that Mary V Cannon was Patrick and Mary's daughter and Cannon was her married name.  Now I am a little confused.  Now the good news - it gives a date of burial, that means that I can now check newspapers for an obit for each of them and maybe clear up the confusion.

Thanks to finding Thomas J Bergen's will at the NJ State Archives, I know that he had two sisters (which I already knew - but now I have their married names from Thomas' obit) They were Catherine Cavanaugh and Mary Kennedy (there are even more Kennedys buried here than Bergens).  I haven't found any Kennedys here, but I did find a Charles Cavanaugh.

 This is Catherine's son, with a burial date of 13 Oct 1937- he died young - I think he was born in the late 1890's.  I have not yet found Catherine's son Edward (the Jersey City Police Officer), her husband Bernard, or Catherine herself, but I just checked my Family Tree App and remembered that she had a daughter named - you guessed it - Mary.  Perhaps Mary V Cannon is Catherine's daughter under a married name.  That would make sense, but now I need to find obituaries for these folks to see who is who.

In case you haven't noticed, this is Post # 50 in my blog.  Not bad for a guy who was not so sure that there was enough family history to write about.  I will say this though, since I have been blogging, I have been more conscientious about researching so that I would have something to write about.  It's like a vicious cycle, I research to have something new to write about and then I write about the research, it could drive you crazy if you are not careful.  Some people say that I have not been very careful.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

Old Newspapers

Old newspaper articles are a great source of information on your family - if you can find them.  I have a subscription to Genealogybank.com, which has really helped me find some old articles.  I subscribed because one of the Newspapers that they have digitized is the Jersey Journal in Jersey City.  After searching through it for my father and his brothers, as well as, my mother's brothers all coming home after WWII.  I could not find anything.  Then I read the part where they tell you what newspapers are there and the dates that they cover.  It was then that I realized that they have only digitized up until 1922.  OOOPS, I should have read that before subscribing.  But as it turns out, that is where I found the small articles about George P Valleau in Omaha, NE.  There was one listing when he applied for a marriage license, and a second one about him leaving home and not returning.  I have located some recent obits also, one was for George's son:
Arthur Valleau.

But, I think I hit the mother lode with the Valleau-Metzger branch of the tree.  I recently found this article:

It was in the Trenton Sunday Times Advertiser, Sunday June 16, 1957 on the first page of section 2.  This is the son of Charles Metzger and Gertrude Valleau-Metzger, earning his degree from Gettysburg College in Pennsylvania.  It tells you his address (which I knew) and that his degree was in psychology, and that he was a member of the Sigma Alpha Epsilon social Fraternity - Party!, the government club, the Young Democrat Club, the Eta Sigma Phi honorary society, and the basketball team.  I never knew anything about him, but now I know a little more.

The best was the pictures I found:

Here is Charles E Metzger getting name President of the Alumni Association for the State Model School and Teacher's College (Trenton State College - now the College of New Jersey)

How about this one?

This is the wedding of Susan Valleau Metzger - Baldwin to Joseph R Baldwin.  Pretty picture of her don't you think?  These pictures were in the Trenton Times also.

Now here's an oldie but a goodie:

This is from the Jersey Journal and it is short but contains a lot of info - obviously no pictures.  This is the marriage of Mary Marguerite O'Dea (Susan's maternal grandmother) and Charles Arthur Valleau.  It tells her sister's name - Gertrude (which will also be the name of her daughter), as a bridesmaid  and the groom's brother, Percy, is the best man.  It goes on to say that only a few people knew of the marriage, and they will live in Bayonne.  The wedding took place on 16 Feb 1904 in St Paul's Church in Jersey City.  It doesn't say that in the article, but I just thought I'd throw that in to impress you with my knowledge of the family.

Last, but certainly not least, I can't write a post about newspaper articles without an obit:

He died suddenly in Philadelphia, he was struck by a train at the Belmont station while working on the railroad.  But this gives names of his mother, father, and brother and where his brother Leo lives, and the church that they attend.  Now all I have to do is find an article in a Philadelphia newspaper about the train accident - but I have to go to Philly for that.