Immigration – Page 2 – A Deck of Ancestors

52W Mark IV – Week 31: Card B5 Ella Elizabeth Thomas

My Gx2 Grandmother, Ella Elizabeth Thomas, is a rarity amongst my direct female ancestors, as she was one of the few with an occupation outside of the home. Ella was a midwife and nurse for about 40 years, serving the town of Cardston, Alberta and the surrounding community.

Ella was born in Lehi, Utah on October 9, 1859. Her father, Preston Thomas, was originally from North Carolina. Her mother, Maria Hadlond, was from England and emigrated to the States with her family when she was a teen.

When Ella was about 18 months old, her family moved nearly 200 kilometers north to Franklin, Idaho, which is located right on the Utah border. It was the first non-Indigenous settlement in Idaho. In fact, when the town was founded, the original settlers thought they were within the boundary of Utah. Another fun fact about Franklin is that its county, also named Franklin, is the only county by that name in the United States that is not named after Benjamin Franklin. Rather, it was named after Franklin Richards, a Mormon leader.

Somehow, by 1879, when she was 19, Ella was living in Salt Lake City. It is not clear what events in her life led her to be there. Salt Lake City is a fair distance south of Franklin. Her father died in 1877, so it may have been that her mother relocated to the city after becoming a widow. That’s a matter for further research.

^{Ella and John. One source I’ve seen says this is their wedding photo, but I have a hard time seeing a 19-year-old and a 24-year-old. Of course, the stern expressions, style of dress, and fact it’s black and white all serve to age them.}

In Salt Lake City, Ella married John Alexander Nelson on January 9, 1879. After marrying, the couple relocated to Smithfield, Utah, which is relatively close to Franklin. They remained there for about ten years, where Ella gave birth to the first six of their twelve children. In September 1890, the family moved to Canada. They were part of the earliest wave of Mormons to settle Cardston, Alberta after it was founded in 1887.

While John was kept busy by a multitude of endeavors, Ella was soon called to a profession of her own after the family settled in Canada. As a new community, Cardston did not have any physicians or other kind of healthcare providers. The closest doctor would have been in Lethbridge, 80 kilometers away. Today that’s under an hour’s drive; in 1890, it was a long and difficult journey by horse or wagon.

The accounts of Ella’s training as a midwife differ. They all agree that Ella was called to study nursing and obstetrics in her early 30s and was sent to Salt Lake City for training. Several sources say that Cardston’s founder and stake president, Charles Ora Card, issued the direction himself. However, the various sources are inconsistent as to when Ella received her training.

An article about Ella in the Lethbridge Herald following her death said that she left her five eldest children at home, taking with her “a six months old baby”. Given there were five older children left at home, that baby would have been Seth Henry Nelson, who was born October 1891. Another article in an annual family newsletter, Nelson Talk, stated that the baby Ella brought with her was her son Cleveland, who was born in March 1893. Chief Mountain Country: A History of Cardston suggests that Ella “left behind seven small children for John to care for and run the home, only to find she was expecting another child.”

^{Ella with her four eldest children, Ella, Rachel, Lileth, and Maria. This photo would have been taken in Utah shortly before the family moved to Canada.}

Together, these accounts are most consistent with Ella having attended her studies in Utah in 1892. Seth would have been about six months old at the time, and the child Ella learned she was expecting was most likely Cleveland. Of course, Nelson Talk most likely nailed it when it said that John and Ella’s eldest child, Maria, who was about 12 at the time, primarily took care of the other children in the family during their mother’s absence.

In Salt Lake City, Ella trained under a Dr. Shipp for about six months. When Ella returned, she was the only medical help that Cardston and area had for many years. The Herald article says that Ella “answered every call from 1892 to the time when the district was supplied with medical men, and after that time when there was more work than one doctor could do”.

Chief Mountain Country indicated that Ella often received no payment for her services, or would sometimes be paid in goods, such as produce. In a short biography of his mother’s life, Seth wrote that Ella’s regular fee for the delivery was $5 and $1 per day for nursing services after the delivery. However, she would often not receive anything for nursing.

Nevertheless, it seems that Ella did not forego payment easily. Seth said that her sons were often sent to collect on outstanding accounts, which sometimes required repeated trips. An account from another of Ella’s sons was that one woman deducted fifty cents on her own volition because she was paying in cash. Ella promptly sent her son back to get the full $5, who told the woman, “mother is not a storekeeper and does not give discounts!”

All the while, Ella had five more children after becoming a midwife. I have no idea who, if anyone, attended to her for those births. However, Seth wrote that at the time Ella began her service there were “a partially trained midwife or two” in Cardston.

Ella assisted in the delivery of hundreds of babies in her 40 years of service. According to Seth, his mother lost track after 400. Seth proudly said that Ella never lost a mother and rarely lost a baby.

When physicians first set up shop in Cardston, Ella would sometimes act as their nurse. Ella also helped those suffering from diphtheria, typhoid, and childhood diseases. Seth wrote that Ella continued to provide midwife services after physicians had established themselves in Cardston. However, Seth stated that after the Alberta “Medical Professional Act” came into effect, Ella was not permitted to charge a fee for her services.

This was most likely a reference to the Alberta Health Insurance Act enacted in 1935, when Ella was 76. She had already largely retired from working as a midwife and healthcare provider a few years earlier, when she was 73. By that time, Ella was not only a grandmother, but a great grandmother.

Ella passed away on October 30, 1941, almost a month after her 82^nd birthday. The funeral service was held at the Latter Day Saints tabernacle in Cardston and Ella was interred at the Cardston Cemetery. Ella’s pallbearers were all grandsons: Leo Burgess (my grandfather), Grant Lamb, Rulon Lamb, Grover James, and Wilbur Nelson. Her granddaughters Ella Burgess, Julia Burgess, Fontella Burgess, Jean Nelson, Dorothy Nelson, Kathleen Nelson, and Jane Nelson all served as flower girls.

Ella is one of those ancestors for whom I have a lot of respect. When people query which of your ancestors you’d like to meet, Ella certainly comes to mind. It is somewhat strange and special to think of my personal connection with my grandfather, born over 100 years ago, who had a personal connection with someone born in the middle of the 19^th Century. While musing over this, I also remembered that just as my grandfather was a pallbearer for his grandmother, I was one of his.

52W Mark III – Week 9: Changing Names

I originally wrote this for Week 1: Family Lore. Shortly after posting, I went through some draft posts I had written weeks ago and realized that the story about my great x3 grandparents, Robert Nelson and Elizabeth Joseph, was a much better fit for that prompt. So I deleted the original Week 1 post, replaced it with Robert and Elizabeth’s story, and repurposed this story for Week 9: Changing Names.

Schulor Barry McGene
(formerly John Warkentin)

When I was a kid, sometimes I’d hear talk about one of my mother’s first cousins, John Warkentin (1942-2003). The family referred to him as “Hollywood Jack”. The family lore was that he had always dreamed of moving to Hollywood and becoming a star. My mother said that when Jack was still a teenager, he left home for California and changed his name.

When I was a kid, the stories left me with the impression that Hollywood Jack was never heard from again. When I was older, I learned that John had remained in contact with his family, they knew his whereabouts, and knew his new name.

John’s Petition for Naturalization filed with the U.S. District Court in Central California shows that he landed in the United States on July 13, 1961, shortly after he turned 19. The Petition showed that John was living in Los Angeles, half a block from Santa Monica Boulevard. That area is now part of West Hollywood, which separated from Los Angeles and incorporated as a city in 1984. John was granted U.S. citizenship on November 21, 1969. He married for the first time one month later.

What I was surprised to discover was that in the United States – at least at the time John moved there – you can apply for a legal change of name in your Petition for Naturalization. (However, they did not change your ancestor’s name at Ellis Island!!) In his Petition, John asked for his name to be changed to “Schuylor Barry McGene”. It seems he also went by “Skyler”, which is how he was named in his brother Frank’s obituary. I have no idea why John chose that name, but I would love to know the story behind it. (For ease of reference, I will continue to refer to him as John.)

For the life of me I still can’t figure out why WordPress won’t centre an image even when it is marked as centred.

Another fascinating aspect of John’s Petition are the affiants who were witnesses to John’s Petition. What caught my eye is that one affiant, Luthor Lindstrom, lived near John, on North Sweetzer Avenue in West Hollywood, while the other affiant was named Chase Sweetser. Chase lived about 25 kilometers away from John, in Redondo Beach. It should be no surprise that one affiant lived in John’s neighbourhood; it is a complete mystery to me how John knew Chase.

I spent a very brief amount of time trying to find out more about the affiants to see if this coincidence might be something other than happenstance. I also did do in hope of learning more about John. Always remember to research the FAN (“Friends, Associates, and Neighbours”) club! While I know John married twice and had children with both wives, I know nothing about what he did for work or how he otherwise spent his life.

I have not find anything on Luthor Lindstrom.

However, I found a newspaper article from 1988 about the address Chase Sweetser provided. The house at that address was built in the American Colonial Revival style by Chase Sweetser Sr. Since this person died in 1947, I assumed that he must be the father of the Chase Sweetser who swore the affidavit in support of John’s Petition. Further research confirmed that suspicion.

Chase Sr. apparently made his fortune as a “grocer”, provisioning ships in the nearby harbour. Chase Sr. also built his fortune through shares he owned in Coca-Cola as one of its early investors; he was also on its board of directors. The article said that his son Chase Jr. had been the president of the local Coca-Cola bottler.

The house went up for sale in the 1980s, after Chase Jr. died. It was newsworthy because it was listed on the National Register in 1985. The article noted that despite being on the National Register, there were no restrictions on tearing the house down and redeveloping the property. The house was listed for US$1.275 million (US$3.14 million in 2024 dollars).

Other articles I found show that the house was never torn down and still stands. Rather, the property sold a number of times (first in 1989 at well below the asking price) and currently serves as the offices of a wealth management firm. The firm’s website even provides a photo and brief history of the house.

My next thought was to research how Sweetzer Avenue in West Hollywood got its name. On top of that idea, my wife suggested that maybe Chase Sweetser was John’s landlord and Sweetzer Avenue was named as such because the Sweetsers owned property there. It turns out that Sweetzer Avenue is likely named after Edward Healey Sweetser. While my search was brief, I found no connection between Chase Sweetser and Edward Healey Sweetser. However, there still remains the possibility that Chase Sweetser was John’s landlord.

Another possibility is that John worked for Chase; however, I have not yet found any information as to what John might have done for a living in Los Angeles. Other than his marriages, the only other thing I know about John is that he died in July 2003 – in La Cañada Flintridge, California. Born in Canada, died in La Cañada!

I have a couple other theories about John (and his FANs) to research, but as of yet they’re speculative. While sites like Ancestry and FamilySearch do not include living persons, some of the records available there do identify living people, which provide some clues for research. As well, bits and pieces I’ve gathered through Google and other search engines have given me a few bits of additional details about John. However, given that they involve living persons, I will simply leave it at that.

Needless to say, in trying to answer a few questions about the family lore, I am left with many more than I started with!

Addendum

For the brief period of time this was live someone posted a comment asking about John’s choice of new name. In the time since I posted this and took it down, I asked my mother what she knew. Bear in mind John’s mother – my mom’s aunt – passed away when my mother was two months old and she never had much contact with her Warkentin relations.

Most of what my mother knows came from a mutual aunt of John and my mother’s. My mother said that when John first left home, he went to live with this aunt. Their aunt had a son who is also named John, so that’s when they started using “Jack”. Since Jack spoke so often of going to Hollywood, they started calling him Hollywood Jack.

My mom says that John wanted to be an actor and thought Schuylor Barry McGene would be a great name for an actor. He also wanted to make a break from his father, with whom he did not get along. My mom says John remained in contact with their aunt for about a year after he moved to California. After a period of no contact, my mother’s aunt contacted the Red Cross to help track him. About a year or two later John called the aunt. Apparently she was quite shocked when she learned about the name change. My mom tells me that sometime well afterwards John came back to Canada to visit his aunt, at least once, but he otherwise remained in California.

Additional – November 5, 2025

In the last six months, a distant relative came across this post and contacted me. We entered into correspondence and exchanged a fair amount of info. All I will say about it is that Hollywood Jack made it into show business. While not his biggest foray into the industry, one thing he did was to appear on screen with Elvis and Anne Margaret!

52W Mark II – Week 32: Reunion

I’ve only been to one family reunion, when I was 13. It was a gathering of all the descendants of John Alexander Nelson and Ella Elizabeth Thomas, my great great grandparents.

Ella Elizabeth Thomas (1859 – 1941)
John Alexander Nelson (1854 – 1942)

They were amongst the earliest settlers of Cardston, which was founded in 1887 by members of the Latter Day Saints (Mormons). John and Ella were both born in Utah a few short years after it became a territory of the United States. John was born in 1854 to Irish immigrant parents. Ella was born in 1859. Her father was originally from North Carolina and her mother was from England. John had worked as a farm labourer in Utah before he married. John and Ella married in Salt Lake City in 1879. Shortly afterwards, John and Ella moved to Smithfield, Utah, where John continued to work in farming.

John and Ella came to Canada in September 1890. John and Ella had five children at the time. The family travelled to Canada by covered wagon. Their eldest daughter, Maria, said that she often drove the wagon team while her father managed the cattle. The family first settled in a sod dugout at “Lee’s Creek”, west of Cardston. They arrived with 13 horses, 7 cows, 7 “other horned cattle”, and a pig.

^{This was where John and Ella first settled in Canada, just west of Cardston, where the prairies meet the foothills of the Rockies.}

The book, Alberta Past and Present, states that upon moving to Canada, John homesteaded on 160 acres of raw land. The homestead was located on Lee Creek, which ran through the property and into the centre of Cardston. The farmhouse was about four kilometers southwest of the town centre and is located on what is now Alberta highway 501.

In addition to farming, John also worked in carpentry. As well, John and a partner, John Turner, constructed and operated the first lime kiln in this part of the country. In 1906, John and Ella moved to nearby Woolford, Alberta, where John continued farming. John and Ella briefly returned to Utah in the early 1920s, where John operated an orchard or fruit farm, but they returned to Woolford in 1924. John continued farming the rest of his working life.

Ella did not simply bide her time in the background as a farm wife and mother. According to a Lethbridge Herald article published after her death, in 1892 Charles Ora Card, Cardston’s founder and stake president, called to on Ella to study nursing and obstetrics. After six months’ training, Ella returned to Cardston and started her service. The Herald article says that Ella “answered every call from 1892 to the time when the district was supplied with medical men, and after that time when there was more work than one doctor could do”. Ella continued as a midwife until 1932, when she was 73.

John and Ella had twelve children, two of whom died in infancy. This included my great grandmother, Hazel Nelson, and her twin sister, Irene, who died at one month old. Ella died in October 1941. John died almost a year later, in September 1942.

The reunion was quite an interesting experience for me. The reunion was held in Bigfork, Montana, with attendees from the United States and Canada. At the time, I knew I had American ancestors, but did not realize how large an extended family I had that lived there. A memorable highlight for me was some of my mother’s American cousins hiring me to babysit for them one night – and paying me in American dollars.

Another interesting part of the experience was that our immediate family, and my maternal grandmother, were pretty much the only attendees who were not members of the The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormon) church. While my maternal grandfather Leo Burgess was Mormon, he was no longer an active participant in the church during my childhood, so at the time I knew little about their church, customs, and traditions. In my late teens my grandfather began participating more in the church, which is when I learned much more about them.

The only photo I have scanned of the Nelson family reunion. This is Cleveland Nelson (1893-1982) with four of my maternal grandfather’s aunts (Cleve’s nieces). From left to right: Fon, Cleve, Julia, Ella, Molly, and Irene. In the background on the right you can see my mother.

The star of the reunion was my great great uncle Cleveland Nelson. Cleve was John and Ella’s eighth-born and last surviving child. He was 87 years old at the time. Everyone wanted to talk to and get a photo with him!

52W Mark II – Week 31: Flew The Coop

This week’s theme for the week’s 52 Ancestors Challenge is “Flew The Coop”. I’m making a real stretch of the phrase to write about my recent visit to Pier 21, where my father and his family arrived in Canada after emigrating from the Netherlands. They arrived on board the Sibajak in early 1954. My father’s aunt and uncle had arrived at Pier 21 four months earlier, in January 1954 on the Groote Beer, while another aunt and uncle followed in late May 1954, on board the Castel Felice.

This was not my first visit to Pier 21 (analogous to Ellis Island in the United States), but it had been many years since my last visit. The displays are significantly different; moreover, the museum has strictly implemented privacy rules that means they don’t display ship passenger lists like they used to. I find their policy a little illogical, because the researchers on site will happily use other sources for the same information that aren’t subject to the same rules.

We began with watching in Canada/au Canada. It’s an excellent and moving short film weaving together the stories of many immigrants from countries all around the world and who have settled in all sorts of places, big and small, across Canada. We then participated in a guided tour. The tour was available in English and French. I felt bad for the fellow offering the tour in French – he had no takers at that time. I told him that my wife and kids would have gone with him if it weren’t for my lack of proficiency in French.

Our tour guide began by asking if anyone had family or friends who had come through Pier 21. Most of us on the tour raised our hands. One woman in our group had come through herself, at 18 months old, with her mother who was a war bride. The tour guide immediately welcomed her back and gave her a gold “Alumni” sticker to wear.

This hangs on the wall in front of the seating area where immigrants waited to be interviewed by immigration officials.

The tour began with at this model of Pier 21 as it was at the time it was in operation. The building on the left no longer exists. The guide showed the path of the immigrants as they disembarked from the ship and the steps they went through before being able to leave. We were told that if everything went without a hitch, people could be off the ship and on the train in four to six hours. However, most people were usually in and out within a day.

There were many displays recreating the immigrant experience. One was of the interior of typical tourist class accommodations and amenities. On the opposite wall were photos of many of the immigrant ships that landed at Pier 21.

The *SS Sibajak*, the ship that brought my father, his parents, and his siblings to Canada.

My son and I sitting on the benches in the waiting room where my father would have sat with his family upon arriving in Canada almost 70 years ago.

The museum has something for visitors of all ages, with lots of interactive and immersive displays. I think our youngest must have watched every video that accompanied the exhibits. There were also lots of crafting and other hands-on activities for the kids.

One of the activities was to decorate a baggage tag showing the name of your immigrant family member and stringing it from their point of origin to their destination. Our youngest made one honouring his grandfather.

A temporary exhibit we were lucky to see was “Destination: Canada”:

In 2022, the Consulate General of the Kingdom of the Netherlands published a graphic novel called “Destination: Canada”, telling the story of ten Dutch immigrants, illustrated by ten comic book artists. The Museum has adapted two of these stories for a special exhibit, presenting the story of George Zwaagstra, a Pier 21 immigrant and volunteer, and Tayebeh Farooqi-Wahedi, a refugee from Afghanistan and immigrant from the Netherlands.
From the Pier 21 page, Destination: Canada

One of the panels of *Destination: Canada* on display on the wall at Pier 21.

Needless to say, being the son of a Dutch immigrant I had to buy my own copy!

Share this:

Share this:

Share this:

Share this: