The Hyphen Family Lineage

Note: Researching Ralph Ducray Vincent and family

I have not managed to find many more records for Ralph than I have for his older brother Albert, but the few I have found contribute to some understanding of the continuation of his line. (It should be noted that there was a man born and living in Crawford Cty, Pennsylvania at about the same time and of a similar age, named Ralph Leroy Vincent; I do not currently know of the relationship between the two men, if any, but their simultaneous presence in the same county does complicate the search for records and information.)

The earliest record I can find for Ralph is his inclusion in his parents' household listing in the 1900 US Census, where he was reported as their one-year-old son with three of his siblings. Just a few years later in 1905, his mother, Adelaide (Ducray) Vincent, died, and his remarried. A few of the children from the first marriage did not remain in their father's household, and Ralph was one of them - in the 1910 US Census, he was counted living with his paternal grandmother, Margaret (Cayot) Vincent, in Wayne Twp, Crawford Cty.

The next few potential census listing matches are less certain in my mind:

- In the 1920 US Census, there is a Ralph Vincent, aged twenty, listed as a brother-in-law in the household of "Gus and Mable Mallard" in Meadville, Crawford Cty. If this is the same Ralph as our subject, then I am uncertain as to his exact relationship to the other members of the household. Further complicating the possible match is the inclusion of a nineteen-year-old Gladys Vincent as a sister-in-law in the household, as I am not currently aware of a sister of Ralph's by that name. On that form, Ralph's occupation was given as a "trainman" for the railroad.

- In the 1930 US Census, there is a Ralph Vincent, aged thirty-two, as a roomer in the household of "Minne J Swartz" in Meadville. This record seems likely to apply to our Ralph Vincent, as the other man (Ralph Leroy Vincent) was married and living in Cambridge Springs, Crawford Cty that same year. On the form, he reported his occupation again as a "trainman" in the employ of the Erie Railroad.

Ralph's WWI draft registration card placed him Meadville in September 1918, and named his father as his closest living relative; this record undoubtedly applies to our Ralph, and indicated that he worked for a boiler manufacturer. Likewise, in 1934, there is a birth record for a Jergen Ernest Vincent in Chicago, Cook Cty, Illinois, born to a "Ralph Edward Vincent," himself born in "Meadville, Pennsylvania" and aged thirty-four, with the mother named Anna Christina Holm, aged twenty-nine and born in Norway. I have not found a marriage record for Ralph and Anna, but a few years later, the 1940 US Census includes a listing for the household in Chicago of Ralph D. Vincent, aged thirty-nine and born in Pennsylvania. His household includes his thirty-five-year-old Norwegian wife Anna, five-year-old son Jurgen V., and a brother, Albert E. Vincent, aged forty-one. (This latter would be Albert Edward Vincent, born two years before Ralph and who had come to Chicago many years earlier and who worked as a butcher for their uncle, Louis Edward Vincent.)

The last record I have found for Ralph is his death record from Chicago in early 1977; that record specifically names his parents and gives his wife name again as Anna Holm. It also gives his burial location ("Rosehill"), but I must note that I have not confirmed where he is buried as of yet.

As for his wife, Anna, I have not found much in the way of confirmed records for her. There is an immigration record for Anna Kristine Holm from Norway, b. 1906, into New York in 1931; there is also a naturalization record in Chicago in 1975 for an Anna Vincent, b. 1 May 1905. Matching that immigration record is a US Social Security Death Index record for Anna Vincent, b. 1 May 1905, d. 7 Dec 2002. It is unknown which of these records (if any) apply to the Anna that married our Ralph.

After the census listing in 1940, Ralph's son, Jurgen, went on to marry Rita M. Vondrachek (a native of eastern Wisconsin) in 1954. Their first child was an infant death Chicago in early 1955, but the couple would go on to have five more children and would live for many years in Eastern Wisconsin until Jurgen's death in 1996.

Ralph and Anna had another child after that federal census - Ralph Jr., b. 9 Aug 1941. Ralph Jr. also married and had at least two children. His obituary mentions only one sibling - Jurgen - suggesting that Ralph Sr. and his wife Anna had only those two sons.