The Disconnected Photo

The Disconnected Photo – Zillah Carstensen

By

Esther Lebeck Loveridge

September 9, 2011

For years, I have been going through my father’s files; some items were probably saved from his mother’s treasures. One such treasure was what I would call a light oil 8 x 10 portrait of a woman whose identity was noted on its back in her own handwriting. She wrote “I am Zillah Carstensen, wife of Nick” and that their son was Billy Bruce. She went on to add they were married in 1917, and included the date of Nick’s birth and death, the name of the cemetery where he was buried in Clinton, Iowa and that she had been a teacher and their son worked for Du Pont where they made cellophane. That was a lot of information to be written on the back of a photo, but the problem was I was not familiar with any Carstensens.

Over the years, I have come across this beautiful photo and always put it aside, knowing there must be a family connection somewhere. It was too lovely to discard.

My father had written “Carstensen” in pencil at the top of Zilllah’s handwritten note so I presume he knew something about the family. I can’t recall the exact order of my investigation, but since she noted where her husband was buried, I started exploring the cemetery in Clinton, Iowa on the Internet. It was interesting to me to find that not only were the names of people buried in the cemetery posted but also the photos of their headstones! Bingo – I found the photo of Nick and Zillah’s headstone confirming the date of his birth and death but only the date of Zillah's birth. Could she still be alive?

One can often find the address of people on the Internet and so my search for Billy Bruce took that route. Sure enough, there was a W. Bruce Carstensen in Clinton, Iowa on the same street as my father’s cousins. Even a phone number was listed!

At some point, I called Shirley, the widow of Ray, my father’s cousin in Clinton, Iowa and she said she knew Bruce – said he lived across the street and down a few houses! We were on that street when we visited Ray and Shirley and his siblings few years ago.

Should I call a stranger? Would he think I was a nut from California? Didn’t matter – if this photo was of his mother, he should have it.

A nice phone connection was made and I was able to confirm that Zillah was his mother and that he’d love to have the photo to show his children and grandchildren. We were not able to determine if there was a connection to our families, but at least I had found a safe place for the photograph of Zillah and mailed it to Bruce this week.

But, the story doesn't end there. For some reason, yesterday (are there no coincidences in life?) I re-read the diary my Great Grandfather Ketelsen wrote in 1929-1930 when he and my Great Grandmother made a 10 month visit to America from Germany to visit their six children who had immigrated. Their journey took them from New York, to Chicago, to Clinton, Iowa and finally to California to see two of their children - my Grandmother Frieda Lebeck and Great Uncle Chris Ketelsen. But, while visiting their son Karl Ketelsen in Clinton, Iowa, he wrote the following in his diary – “Went to see my nephew Nick Carstensen in Clinton who owns a fairly big car dealership and repair shop”. How excited I was to read that. Of course I had read it before, but didn’t realize then the implications that had for identifying the photo of Zillah.

Now I could go to my genealogy program and check out the siblings of my great grandfather to see who might be the mother of Nick. Of course, with Nick having a different last name, he would have to be the son of one of Ketel’s sisters. Ketel had 3 sisters – Louise Amelia died when she was 10 days old, Louise Magdalene married the man we all knew as “Uncle” (Boysen) since he lived on my grandmother’s property in a little trailer after his wife’s early death and then that left Ketel’s youngest sister, Catharina Dorothea Ketelsen, born November 11, 1869 as Nick’s mother. Twenty-three years later, Nick was born. (Zillah, his wife, did live to be 86 years old and died in 1980).

Nick was my Grandmother Frieda Lebeck's first cousin and Bruce is my father’s second cousin. Now, as Paul Harvey would say, “You know the rest of the story”. The "disconnected photo" has been the connecting link between our two families.