Mary Skrobat

1898-1988 · Moszczenica, Poland
Also recorded as Mary Rozela

Born 1898, Moszczenica, Poland

Died 1988

Children include Donald

Mary Skrobat was born on 9 February 1898 at Moszczenica in Poland, the daughter of Stanley Skrobat and Anna Wszolek. The village lay in Galicia, the part of Poland then ruled by Austria, and when she married, the Grand Rapids clerk wrote her birthplace simply as Austria.

She left Moszczenica at twelve. She sailed from Bremen in Germany on the Main, a steamer of the North German Lloyd line, and landed at Baltimore, Maryland, on 7 September 1910, entered under her Polish given name, Marya. By her teens she was living in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Her younger brother Joseph was born there in Kent County the following March, in 1911, with the surname Bobola, and her sisters Rose and Vee carried the same family name before they married.

On 8 February 1916, the day before her eighteenth birthday, she married John Rozela in Grand Rapids. He was 23 and from Lublin, in the Russian part of Poland. The record gave her age as seventeen. Their daughter Helen was born on 12 January 1918 and their son Donald on 23 May 1922, both in Grand Rapids.

In 1930 Mary was 32 and kept the house in Grand Rapids for John, the two children, and her younger brother Joseph Bobola, 19, who lived with them.

On 21 August 1939 she went to the federal court in Grand Rapids and declared her intention to become a citizen of the United States. She was 41, a housewife living at 205 Marion Avenue N.W. The clerk wrote her down as five feet six inches tall and 152 pounds, with a fair complexion, hazel eyes and brown hair, and pinned her photograph to the paper. She was naturalized on 2 July 1942, more than a year before her husband.

By 1950 Mary and John had moved to Walker, northwest of the city. John died in 1963. Mary lived twenty-five more years as a widow.

She died on 5 February 1988 at St. Mary's Hospital in Grand Rapids, four days before her ninetieth birthday. Her funeral was held at the Shawmut Hills Chapel on Lake Michigan Drive, and she was buried beside John at Washington Park Memorial Gardens.

Children

Donald Rozela 1922-2008

Sources

1950 United States census, Michigan, Kent County, Walker Township, enumeration district 41-94, lines 29 and 30; National Archives and Records Administration, image 43290879-Michigan-109353-0002

United States Census, 1940, Michigan, Kent County, Grand Rapids, Ward 1, enumeration district 86-20, sheet 8B, line 52; FamilySearch, ark:/61903/1:1:KH3S-91Z (John), 1:1:KH3S-918 (Mary), 1:1:KH3S-91D (Donald)

United States Census, 1930, Michigan, Kent County, Grand Rapids, sheet 20A, line 21; FamilySearch, ark:/61903/1:1:XQBF-X7W (John), 1:1:XQBF-X74 (Mary), 1:1:XQBF-X7H (Helen), 1:1:XQBF-X7C (Donald)

Find a Grave, memorials 75641076 and 75641077, Washington Park Memorial Gardens, Grand Rapids, Kent County, Michigan, Section D, plot 377; marker photograph taken 17 April 2016

Obituary of Mary Rozela, Grand Rapids newspaper, February 1988; clipping photographed on Find a Grave memorial 75641077, added by KathyCook, 28 September 2019.

Washington Park Memorial Gardens, Grand Rapids, Kent County, Michigan, Section D, plot 377; photograph by Bill Grinstead, 17 April 2016, Find a Grave memorials 75641076 and 75641077.

United States census of 1930, Michigan, Kent County, Grand Rapids, sheet 20A, line 21; NARA T626; FamilySearch 1:1:XQBF-X7W.

United States census of 1940, Michigan, Kent County, Grand Rapids City Ward 1, enumeration district 86-20, sheet 8B, line 52; NARA T627; FamilySearch 1:1:KH3S-91Z.

Michigan marriage registers, Kent County, vol. 3, p. 166, record no. 2049; Michigan, Marriages, 1868-1925, FamilySearch 1:1:N3PT-F6G, image 3:1:S3HT-68NS-S8D.

Petitions for Naturalization, U.S. District Court, Western District of Michigan, Southern Division, Grand Rapids; Michigan, Naturalization Records, 1837-1997, FamilySearch 1:1:8432-QMT2.

Photograph affixed to declaration of intention no. 2492, U.S. District Court, Western District of Michigan, Southern Division, Grand Rapids, 21 August 1939 (NARA RG 21); FamilySearch image 3:1:3Q9M-CS5K-HSMR-S.

Declaration of intention no. 2492, U.S. District Court, Western District of Michigan, Southern Division, Grand Rapids, 21 August 1939, filed with Petitions for Naturalization, 1942 (NARA RG 21); FamilySearch, Michigan, Naturalization Records, 1837-1997, image 3:1:3Q9M-CS5K-HSMR-S.

Declaration of intention no. 3013, U.S. District Court, Western District of Michigan, Southern Division, Grand Rapids, 14 December 1940, filed with Petitions for Naturalization, 1943 (NARA RG 21); FamilySearch, Michigan, Naturalization Records, 1837-1997, image 3:1:3Q9M-CS5K-HSZW-S.

Petition for naturalization no. 6172, U.S. District Court, Western District of Michigan, Southern Division, Grand Rapids, 1943 (NARA RG 21); FamilySearch, Michigan, Naturalization Records, 1837-1997, image 3:1:3Q9M-CS5K-HSZW-C.

Michigan marriage record, Kent County, 8 February 1916 (FamilySearch, Michigan Marriages 1868-1925); 1920, 1930 (FamilySearch 1:1:XQBF-X74) and 1940 (FamilySearch 1:1:KH3S-918) censuses; Michigan naturalization records, 1939 (FamilySearch 1:1:8432-QMT2); Social Security Death Index (FamilySearch 1:1:JK8Z-NT1); obituary, Grand Rapids, February 1988, clipping on Find a Grave memorial 75641077 added by KathyCook; Social Security file of Helen Rozela (FamilySearch 1:1:6NMP-RGWH); Find a Grave memorials 75641077, 173306172 (Joseph Bernard Bobola), 179473335 (Rose Marie Kroner); declaration of intention of Mary Rozela, no. 2492, 21 August 1939, U.S. District Court, Western District of Michigan, Southern Division, Grand Rapids (FamilySearch image 3:1:3Q9M-CS5K-HSMR-S); petition for naturalization of John Rozela, no. 6172, 1943 (FamilySearch image 3:1:3Q9M-CS5K-HSZW-C)

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Cite: Heirology, "Mary Skrobat (1898-1988)", https://heirology.com/ancestors/mary-skrobat-1898-1988-dd3fa7.