Genealogy Story - Unraveling the VanDeCar Family Tree

Whenever a family has divorces and re-marriages, trying to sort out who is related to whom and how can be a bit confusing.  That certainly is the case in the family of Charles VanDeCar.  This paper will try to make some sense of it all.

Charles VanDeCar

Let’s start with Charles and his “siblings”.  Charles’ parents were Archibald VanDeCar and Gertrude [Duba] VanDeCar.  They married in 1920 and had two children – Louise VanDeCar and Charles VanDeCar.  So Louise is Charles’ sister.  Not too many years later Archibald and Gertrude divorced, leaving Charles and Louise to be raised by Gertrude’s father and his wife (more on that later).

Gertrude remarried a man by the name of J.D. Hicks (that was his legal name, just the initials, J.D.).  They had one daughter, Mary Salina Hicks.  Mary is thus the half-sister of Charles and Louise since they share a common mother.  I’ll pick up the story of Mary later on.

Archibald also remarried, to a woman by the name of Helen [Loomis].  She had three children by a former marriage – Nelda, Ray, and Del[bert].  That made Helen the step-mother of Charles and Louise and her children their step-sister and step-brothers.  Archibald and Helen had two children together, Jane and Arden – so they are also half-sister and half-brother to Charles and Louise.

Archibald and Helen later divorced, thus making Helen Charles’ and Louise’s ex-step-mother and the Loomis children ex-step-sister and ex-step-brothers.

So, in summary, Charles has one sister – Louise, three half-siblings – Mary, Jane, and Arden, and three ex-step-siblings – Nelda, Ray, and Del.

Archibald VanDeCar

It was a similar situation with Charles’ father, Archibald.  His parents were Dennis Birley VanDeCar and Alta [Larrow] VanDeCar.  They had two children, Archibald and his brother Frank.  Then they divorced.

Dennis remarried to a woman by the name of Mary Provney.  They had five children, Clarence, Lawrence, Pearl, Helen, and Clarabell – these would be the half-siblings of Archibald and the half-uncles and half-aunts of Charles.

Alta also remarried, first to a man named [unknown] Mitchell, then she divorced again and married a man by the name of George Trombley.  In the 1910 census she is shown as a servant in the home of George, his wife, and four children (Mary, Laura, Lawrence, and Margaret [known as Hattie]).  So when George divorced his wife and married his servant Alta, those four children became the half-step-siblings of Archibald and Frank and the half-step-uncles/aunts of Charles and Louise.  (Are you confused yet?)

In the 1920 census, Dennis and Alta’s son, Frank, is living with Alta and her new husband George, but Dennis and Alta’s son Archibald is living with Alta’s brother, Frank Larrow.

In summary, Archibald had one brother, five half-siblings, and four half-step-siblings.

Gertrude Duba

Of course, it would have to be just a confusing for Charles’ mother, Gertrude.  Her parents were William Duba and Rachel [Swaney] Duba.  They had three children, Gertrude, Beulah (who died young), and Allen.  So Allen is the uncle of Charles and Louise.  William and Rachel then divorced.

William remarried a woman by the name of Mary Ann Nestell – who just happened to be a servant in their house (much like George Trombley who married Alta).  They did not have any other children.  But that made Mary [Nestell] Duba the step-mother of Charles and Louise.  William and his second wife were the ones who raised Charles and Louise when Archibald and Gertrude divorced and remarried.

Rachel also remarried, first to a man named William Hoagland, then, when she divorced him, to a man by the name of Alfred Stafford.  They had one child, Leroy Stafford.  He would have been the step-brother to Gertrude and the step-uncle to Charles and Louise.

Other Divorce/Re-marriage Complications

Mary Salina Hicks first married Joseph Manning and had three children – [James] David, [Joseph] Ray, and [William] Bradley – just to be more confusing, they all went by their middle names.  Mary then divorced Joseph Manning and married Milton Andrews [known as Andy] and had four more children – Beverly, Theresa [Terry], Milton, and Tracy.  Since Mary was the half-sister of Charles, then her children are all half-cousins of Charles’ children, even though the two sets of her children are half-siblings to each other.

Louise VanDeCar first married Guy Holmes and had two children – Elgie and James.  She then divorced and married Frank Pop and had two more children – Terry and Larry.  Since Louise is a [full] sister to Charles, all four of these children are cousins to Charles’ children, but the two sets of her children are half-siblings to each other.

The above are only the divorces/remarriages of two generations.  With this kind of family history, it should come as no surprise that many of the next generation also had divorces/remarriages.  There are at least 13 other divorces among the various children in the next generation.

One of the difficulties with these types of situations is “what do you call someone?”  It’s hard enough with siblings, half-siblings, step-siblings, and ex-step-siblings.  But when you factor in the generational differences, how do you refer to half-uncles, step-uncles, ex-step-uncles, and half-grandparents, step-great-grandparents, etc., etc.?  The easy way is just to drop all the half-, step-, ex-, and great- prefixes and just call people aunt/uncle/grandparent, etc.  Since many of the above individuals had fairly long lives, the children of Charles grew up with six “grandmothers” just on his side of the family – even though they were actually a grandmother, a step-grandmother, two great-grandmothers, and two step-great-grandmothers.  And trying to sort out the uncle/aunt/cousin situation was even more confusing.

There is a Bible verse which reads [in part] “visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children to the third and fourth generation.”  At least in this situation, the consequences of divorce and remarriage have certainly caused difficulty for the children of the next generations.