The Original Owners of Our Cards

[Jobu]

I recently acquired a new card for my New Orleans collection (thanks Mac!). It has writing on the back, which is usually a bad thing. However, in this case I actually like it because I biked past the house several times per week for a decade. I collect New Orleans cards because of how much I enjoyed my 10 years there, so to see an address that I knew written on the back was pretty fun.

Eva Reach wrote her name and address, 1036 Joseph Street, on the back.

Here is the house:

https://www.google.com/maps/place/10...!4d-90.1164077

I contacted the Historic New Orleans Collection to ask for leads on Ms. Reach and was blown away by how much Heather sent me: phone books, census records, and more. It turns out that Eva, who was 7 years old in 1910, moved to 1036 Joseph Street in 1910, where she lived until 1916. Those dates dovetail nicely with the 1911-1916 dates for T216.

Eva's father, Edward Reach, was the chief clerk for Schut & Kiehn, a lumber exporter in New Orleans and also a member of the Grand Lodge of the Knights of Pythias.

In 1931, Eva married Leonard E. Franseen in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and they went on to have two sons, Leonard and Richard. The family moved to New Orleans and then to Dallas, where Eva’s husband passed away in 1957. Eva died in New Orleans on July 12, 1962.

How about you? Do you know who owned one of your pre-war cards when it was brand new?