Catherine Shick VanBilliard, U.S. Postmistress

Ancestry.com, "U.S., Appointments of U.S. Postmasters, 1832-1971", Ancestry.com Operations, Inc, 2010, Catherine VanBilliard, Freemansburg Postmistress

Today in The GeneaBloggers Daily there was an article from Familytree.com talking about how common it was for women to hold the position of "postmistress". I remembered that I had come across one in my VanBilliard line. She was Catherine Shick VanBilliard. She was married to Herman VanBilliard and widowed in 1889. It was mentioned in the article that it was more the case to hire single women to the post as with married women it was expected that she would be taken care of by her husband. So I guess since Catherine was a widow when she received the Appointment 8 Oct 1897 that qualified her for the position.

Ancestry.com, "U.S., Appointments of U.S. Postmasters, 1832-1971", Ancestry.com Operations, Inc, 2010, Catherine VanBilliard, Freemansburg Postmistress

Catherine showed on the census records as Postmistress in Freemansburg, Northampton, PA up to and including the 1910 census.

Images of America, Lower Saucon Township, Arcadia Publishing, 2005, pg 13

In this photo Catherine is the woman seated in the middle of the front row. The men in the photo are her sons, Howard, Harry and Reese are in the back and Russell is next to her. The other woman is her daughter in law Carrie, she is Howard's wife. Catherine died 19 Jan 1944.

Goodies on the Childs Family

A few weeks ago my son James said that he has a coworker whose maiden name is O'Donnell and her mother's maiden name was Childs. He asked me to see if there are connections in our families. He got me information on the O'Donnell's but there was nothing I could connect. I always say that O'Donnell is the Smith version of Irish, it is just such a common name.

So then we went to the Childs name. This was the maiden name of my ex mother in law, so my children's paternal grandmother. My son's coworker is my age so when he asked if I could find Leon Childs in our tree I looked at their great grandfather, George W. Childs and found that Leon was indeed George's oldest brother. So I told James that his coworker was indeed his cousin!!! They were both thrilled. So this past week she gave both James and I a copy of this family chart that starts with Leon and George's parents, John W. Childs and Clara Priscilla Aikin. She also loaned me this wonderful photo album to scan. It is filled with so many treasures, I had "photo envy" seeing all the photos she has.

Childs Family Reunion, 25 Aug 1956, photo privately held.

This photo was the last time the family had gotten together. When my son saw it he told me that he found his grandparents in the second row from the back on the right. He asked me is the man in front of my ex mother in law was her brother. I told him to look at the man on her left, I knew that was her brother. It seems the seated row behind the children would be the children of John and Clara. George Childs is the man holding the hat in that row with his wife Hazel next to him on the left.

This is such a great find to get all of us up to date. I think my ex mother in law would love this, she passed away last year and my ex died in 2000. But this is something for my kids and my grandchildren to see and learn. James loves this that he has been working with his cousin for the last 3 years and did not know it!