Joseph Waclawski
Joseph Waclawski was born on 11 May 1877 in Poland, by his own account on his draft card of 1942. Poland was then partitioned, and the censuses of his lifetime place his birth in the part ruled by the Russian Empire. He came to America in the late 1890s: he gave the year as 1896 in 1910, 1900 in 1920 and 1898 in 1930.
His first two sons were born in Connecticut: Joseph about 1900 and Alex about 1902. By 1904 he was in New Jersey, where Casimira was born. Their mother was Joseph's first wife, whose name is not known. In 1910 Joseph told the census taker he was in his second marriage, two years old, and his wife Helen Baclawska said she had borne two children. She had come to America about 1906. Joseph and Helen's own children began with Czeslaw, born about 1908, and Frank on 20 July 1909.
In April 1910 the family was living in the Seventeenth Ward of Cleveland, Ohio. Joseph, 32, drew wire in a wire mill. He could read and write and said he spoke English. With him were Helen, 26, his three elder children and her two babies, the youngest Frank, entered as Frances, aged eight months.
They were back in Jersey City soon afterward. A son Zygmunt was born there about 1913, Henry in 1915, John about 1917 and Helena in 1918. Henry died in October 1916.
On 1 January 1920 Joseph Wacloski, as the census taker wrote it, 46, was renting in the Second Ward of Jersey City with Helena and nine children. He was a laborer. He was still an alien, could read and write, and gave Polish as his mother tongue. His eldest son Joseph, 19, was a brakeman on the Erie Railroad; Alek, 18, drove for a private family; Kazimiera, 16, worked in a laundry. A Jersey City directory of 1922 lists Jos. Waclawski with his wife Helen.
Three more children were born in Jersey City in the 1920s: Stanley, Lucy and Anthony, the last in August 1926.
In April 1930 Joseph, 51, rented a flat at 472 Henderson Street, Jersey City, for 30 dollars a month. He worked as an ash man at a power house, clearing the ashes from the boilers. He was still an alien and he could not speak English. Eleven of the family were at home: Helen, Kathrine, Charles, Frank, Alice, Zygmont, John, Helen, Stanley, Lucy and Anthony. Charles was a brakeman on the railroad, Kathrine waited tables, Alice soldered cans and Frank sold from a street cart.
In 1942 the government registered every man born between April 1877 and February 1897, the so-called old man's draft. Joseph was inside it by thirteen days. On his card he gave his age as 65, his birth as 11 May 1877 in Poland, his address as 472 Henderson Street, and his employer as the Erie Railroad. He named his wife, Mrs. Helen Waclawski, as the person who would always know his address, and he signed the card himself.
In 1940 the census taker wrote the family as Laski, still in the Second Ward and in the same home as in 1935. Joseph was 64. In April 1950 he and Helen were still together in Jersey City, written Waczlawski, with their daughter Helen and their sons Stanley and Anthony at home. Joseph was 73, and he was still working at a power house for the railroad.
His sons grew up as Lasky and Laski. Frank, born in 1909, married Eva Kukolax in 1932 and raised seven children in Jersey City. A son Sigmund, the Zygmunt of 1920, died in August 1940 and was buried on 21 August.
His wife Helen died in 1950 and was buried on 2 October 1950 at Holy Cross Cemetery in North Arlington, where two of their children were later laid with her.
A Joseph Waclawski was buried on 23 February 1959 at Holy Name Cemetery, the Roman Catholic cemetery of Jersey City, in grave 3 of plot F 227. Two of the family had been buried in that grave before him: Henry Waclawski on 19 October 1916 and Sigmund Waclawski on 21 August 1940. Since Sigmund and very probably Henry were his sons, the Joseph laid with them is very probably this Joseph. A birth year of 1885 given for him on a cemetery memorial does not agree with the censuses or his draft card.
Children
Sources
If Joseph Waclawski is in your family, start your own tree.
Cite: Heirology, "Joseph Waclawski (1877-1959)", https://heirology.com/ancestors/joseph-waclawski-1876-1959-2e555e.