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October 31, 2001

When county records might equal family history

I'd known most of the actual facts. I knew the date (in Sept. 1898) and the general location (northern San Mateo County) of my grandparent's wedding. I knew their names, of course. I even have their wedding photo, a rare artifact given the time, the place, and the relative cost of photography in 1898. What hadn't occurred to me was how difficult and time consuming it might be in 1898 to get from one end to the other of San Mateo County. I'm a Sonoma County native. So was my father. He was born in 1907 on a ranch near Healdsburg. My grandfather had been in this country about 14 or 15 years by the time he bought that ranch in Sonoma County. His wife, my grandmother, was 11 years younger than he. Like thousands of his fellow Azorean immigrants, he was an extremely hardworking, frugal man. Owning his own land was important to him.

I knew he'd worked in Marin County for a time. Before that he'd worked for a northern San Mateo County dairy. I presume he was a milker for the Sneaths, before the days of milking machines. The dairy business was very labor intensive in those days. There were three Sneath ranches, totaling about 3000 acres, including part of what became Pacifica. The Sneaths were very progressive for their times, and made a lot of improvements in milk production and distribution. One recent day I had a chance to take a look at the handwritten index of marriages recorded in the late 19th century for San Mateo County. Though the entire county population was only ten or twelve thousand, several Jose (the approximate Portuguese pronunciation is Shoh-zay) Azevedos had gotten married, but my grandparents weren't listed. That's when I realized the obvious. In 1898 transportation was slow at best. A trip from San Bruno to Redwood City for a marriage license was difficult and time-consuming. On horseback or even by a combination of horse and rail it might take several hours. In all likelihood it was easier to get to San Francisco City Hall. But those are the records that didn't survive the earthquake and fire.

My grandparents' marriage lasted more than 50 years. My grandmother lived for another two decades. But the official papers recording her marriage apparently lasted less than eight years. Roughly one quarter to one third of the population of California lived in San Francisco in 1906. The earthquake preceded microfilm, computers, duplication of records. But even today it's important to put some thought into possible disasters. Fire, floods, earthquake, air crashes, all make it important to put our eggs in several separate baskets.

In the concern of our county officials to take care of current needs, it's easy for them to overlook the need to protect and duplicate records inherited from the past. Even though my grandparent's marriage license is not on file here, hundreds of others are. I hope something is being done to put those records on microfiche, stored separately, so future generations will be able to look at the vital records that bring the past so much to life. The particular Jose Silveira de Azevedo I'm interested in did not leave his name behind on a marriage license in this county. Several other Jose Azevedos, as well as Machados, Soares, Silvas and Souzas did so, however. And those were just a few of the Portuguese immigrants. This county had its full quota of Italians, Irish, Australians, Germans, Mexicans, Midwesterners, and Easterners. They plowed the ground (with a sidehill plow invented in Half Moon Bay). They milked and drove cattle, pulled teeth, tended bars, sold dry goods, managed banks, and clipped hedges on country estates. Each was an individual. Each deserves to be remembered.

E mail Paul Azevedo at Paul@thereactor.net. Check his website at http://www.thereactor.net.

 
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