One of the most engrossingly fun things about doing family history is trying to resolve the many the puzzles posed by all the bits and pieces of raw data.  Sometimes, if you're lucky, pursuing those puzzles can lead to one of those rare moments of discovery -- one of those wonderful "aha!" moments, when pieces of the puzzle suddenly fit together and unexpected connections leap right into your face. 

     In late August 2006, Mike received an email from Jeane Morneau DeCoursey of Brooklyn Park MN.  A few months before, Mike had revised some of the data for Bailey T. Baldwin on Ancestry.com's World Family Tree.  Jeane, great-granddaughter of William C. Baldwin, was writing to ask if Mike knew anything more about her great-great grandfather, Bailey T. Baldwin.

     Boy did he.  Their correspondence soon blossomed, with Jeane's inside knowledge about William C. Baldwin and his children deepening Mike & Tom's understanding of Bailey's life, his family, and his descendents.  Many fruits of their exchanges appear on the bailey t. baldwin probate file page.

     A few days into their correspondence, Jeane sent Mike two mysterious photographs taken around the turn of the century.  The first features two lovely young women, seemingly sisters.  The second is a close-up of the woman who's seated in the first photo.  Jeane, who's had these photos in her personal collection for many years, has no idea who these women were. 

     Cropped portions of these photos appear below (click on images to view complete photographs):

Photos courtesy of Jeane Morneau DeCoursey.

     As can be seen in the uncropped photos, both had been taken at Thibodeau Studio at 28 Central Ave. in Minneapolis:

     For Mike, the name "Thibodeau" rang a bell.  He'd come across that name before, while trying to discover the whereabouts of Nellie Kinsman Lang Blowe's third and youngest daughter, Louise Blowe -- the child she'd had with Louis Bleau before he mysteriously disappeared (this was long before we discovered that Louis Bleau was murdered).

     Louise Blowe, age 5, appears in the 1880 census, living with Bailey & Margaret's daughter Lucy McClure and her husband Theodore, who lived a block away from Bailey & Margaret.  Living with Bailey & Margaret was Louise's half-sister Nellie Lang.  Essentially what we have here is one extended family living in two nearby houses on the northeast outskirts of the settled parts of Minneapolis (click here to view original image):

     Moving forward in time to the 1885 Minnesota State Census, Mike had found Louise Blow living with two adults he'd never heard of:  Edward and Adalaid Le Perdo.  Here's the excerpt, from KinSource.com, a census data service based in Minneapolis: 

     Mike looked elsewhere for the surname "Le Perdo" but couldn't find it.   Suspecting it was probably a corruption of some other surname, he fished around until he found that Edward & Adelaide Le Perdo were actually Edward & Adelaide Thibodeau, as seen in the 1900 census (this was about six months before he started corresponding with Jeane):

Excerpt from the 1900 census, listing Edward Thibodeau, age 47, b. French Canada; Adelaide Thibodeau, age 47, b. Michigan;  and Lily Thibodeau, age 14, b. Minnesota; all residing at 2324 Cline (?) Ave. N., probably near Hillside Cemetery, Minneapolis, MN.  Click on image to view full census page.

     So when Jeane sent Mike the two photos of the two unidentified young women, he became curious about the "Thibodeau" name and logo, the latter consisting of a large "T" with a smaller "E".  Could this have been Edward Thibodeau's photo studio?

     So Mike went back to the 1900 census to look for Edward Thibodeau's occupation.  He was listed as a "canvasser," which is a sort of street vendor or street peddler.  So Mike dug around some more.  What he found confirmed his hunch:  Edward "Le Perdo," the man who, with his wife Adelaide, helped to care for and raise little Louise Blowe in the mid-1880s, was the same Edward Thibodeau who owned Thibodeau Photo Studio at 28 Central Ave. and who took Jeane's photos of the two unidentified young women!

     Two bits of data clinched the connection.  First was the Minneapolis city directories for 1890 and 1891, which listed Edward Thibodeau as a photographer, with a studio at 28 Central Avenue, and who resided at 311 5th Street NE in Minneapolis, as seen in the following information taken from Ancestry.com's city directory database:

     The second was the 1910 census, which shows Edward Thibodeau, photographer, living with wife A. and daughter Lillian, in downtown Anoka, north of Minneapolis but still in Hennepin County (item on the right is a bit difficult to make out, but it in fact says "photographer.") 

Excerpts from 1910 census, showing Edward and A. Thibodeau, with daughter Lillian, in Anoka MN; Both Edward and Lillian are listed as photographers, and Edward the owner of a photo gallery.  Click on image at left to view full census page.

      In 1910, Edward, Adelaid, and Lillian Thibodeau were residing in downtown Anoka, within a block of St. Ann's Convent on Main Street -- probably in the apartment above their photo studio.  A final corroborating bit of evidence is a message on the RootsWeb message board for Hennepin County that mentions several photographs taken at the Thibodeau studio in Anoka around the turn of the century.  (RootsWeb.com > Hennepin Board > search Thibodeau)

     There's more!  After Mike had written up all the foregoing, Jeane sent him two additional photographs from the Edward Thibodeau Studio -- apparently older than the photos posted above, before he'd developed his fancy 'ET' logo, and from when his studio was located at No. 28 on Nicollet Island.  Yet another mystery!  Jeane has no idea who these women were, though they appear to be mother and daughter:

Photos of two unidentified women, apparently mother & daughter, taken at E. Thibodeau Studio, No. 28 Nicollet Island, Minneapolis, date unknown, ca. 1885, courtesy of Jeane Morneau DeCoursey.  Click on images for larger view.

     Here's a close-up of the stamp at the bottom of these photos and close-ups of these women's faces:

Close-ups of portions of the photos directly above.

     Finally, here's yet another piece of the puzzle:  the 1882-83 Minneapolis City Directory listing for Edward Thibodeau -- a laborer working at 732 North First Street:

Excerpt from the 1882-83 Minneapolis City Directory.

     Exactly what all this means is not entirely clear, though we can say with a high degree of certainty the following:

Edward Thibodeau was born on 15 Feb 1853 in Mitchell, New France (French Canada, later Quebec), the son of French-Canadian parents Joseph and Mary Thibodeau, and brother of Joseph, Samuel, Hondoedus, and one sister Thibodeau, first name unknown.  He married Adelaide Le Mere in Marquette, MI, in 1873, and soon after the two of them migrated to Minneapolis.  He worked as a locomotive engineer, then took up photography, an art and business he practiced for the rest of his life (this thanks to the death certificate and obituary information, below).

In 1882-83 he was working as a laborer at 732 N. 1st St., Minneapolis.

Around the mid-1880s he opened a photo studio on Nicollet Island, where he took the two photos of the two women, presumably mother & daughter, above.

In 1885, Edward Thibodeau and his wife Adelaide, both around 32 years old, lived in NE Minneapolis, not far from Bailey T. and Margaret Baldwin, sheltering and helping to raise Louise Blowe, the 10 year-old daughter of our great-great-great grandmother Nellie Kinsman Lang Blowe and her late husband Louis Bleau.

In 1890-91, Edward Thibodeau owned Thibodeau Photo Studio at 28 Central Avenue in Northeast Minneapolis.

Sometime around the turn of the century, Edward Thibodeau took the pictures of the unidentified (and we might add, hauntingly beautiful) young women with whom we launched these inquiries.

Sometime between 1886 and 1900, Edward and Adelaide adopted a girl named Lillian.

In 1900, Edward, Adelaide, and their adopted daughter Lillian, age 14 (b. Minnesota, parents b. Michigan) lived at 2324 Cline (?) Ave. N., Minneapolis (near 14th Ave N and Hillsdale Ave, probably near Hillside Cemetery), with Edward's occupation listed as "canvasser" or street vendor.

Around 1904, Edward, Adelaide, and Lillian moved to downtown Anoka, where he opened another photography studio and along with it, a photography supply company.

In 1910 all three lived above their photography studio and supply company on Main Street in downtown Anoka.   Lillian, age 24, was also working as a photographer.

On November 13, 1919 in Anoka, Edward Thibodeau died, according to the Minnesota Historical Society's death index.  His death certificate includes the following information:  b. 15 Feb 1853 in Canada, son of Joseph and Mary Thibodeau, b. Canada; husband of Adalaine E.; buried in Calvary Cemetery, Anoka MN; lived on 3rd St in Anoka; occupation photographer; died of cancer of the spine.  (Thanks to Jeane Morneau DeCoursey for the death certificate information.)

In 1920 and again in 1930, the widow Adelaide Thibodeau continued living in Anoka with daughter Lillian.  According to the MHS death index, Adelaide died on 16 Sept 1934, in Anoka.  Lillian lived another 34 years, until her death on 29 Nov 1968, at which time she still bore the same surname (in fact she's listed as "Adelaide Lillian Thibodeau," with a birthdate of 1 Nov 1884).  Thus it appears that Lillian never married or had children, and that Edward & Adelaide left no direct descendents.

     Finally, at the tail end of all this searching, Jeane Morneau DeCoursey found Edward's obituary at the Anoka County Library and Historical Center, originally published in the Anoka Union:

Obituary of Edward Thibodeau, Anoka Union, Nov 19, 1919.  Thanks to Jeane Morneau DeCoursey for unearthing, and the staff at the Anoka County Library and Historical Center for preserving this document.

 

     This clarifies Adelaide's origins:  born Adelaide Le Mere, probably in Marquette, Michigan, she married Edward Thibodeau in Marquette in 1871, and soon after the two of them came to Minneapolis.  We thus learn that there was no blood relation between Marguerite Baldwin's family and Adelaide LeMere Thibodeau.  (It also tends to confirm the 1885 census listing showing Edward & Adelaide Le Perdo living with 10 year-old Louise Blow in Minneapolis, only four doors down from her mother Nellie Blow -- especially the Michigan birth for Adelaide; everything matches perfectly:  there seems no doubt that the 1885 Le Perdo's were really the Thibodeau's.)

     Many mysteries remain, of course, as seems entirely fitting and proper.  If not blood, what kind of relationship linked the families of Edward & Adelaide Thibodeau and Bailey & Marguerite Baldwin?  (The French-Canadian connection is the most obvious one; what else?)  Why was Nellie Kinsman Lang Blow's daughter Louise living with Edward & Adelaide in 1885?  Whatever happened to Louise Blow?  (1885 is the last date for which we have any evidence for her; she was not the wife of any of the men listed in Edward's obituary).  Also, why Anoka?  Is there some connection here to Centerville, Anoka County, that we're overlooking?  (Bailey, Margaret, and many other characters in this saga lived in Centerville in Anoka County in 1860, and we now know that in December 1874, Louise Blow's father Louis Bleau was murdered in Centerville.)

     Finally, who are the two young women whose photographs set us off on this journey?  (Speaking of which, what inspired the woman on the right to grow her hair till it nearly touched the ground?  How'd she do that?)  And who are the women in the older photographs?  We still have no idea (though the women in the photo directly above certainly appear to be ethnically Métis). 

     If anyone out there recognizes the people in these photos, or knows anything more about the Thibodeau's of Minneapolis in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, please let us know!

    And for now at least, that's

THE END.

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