Amanuensis Monday: An Unknown Relative Sold His Car in Detroit in 1924

Amanuensis: A person employed to write what another dictates or to copy what has been written by another.

I continue my project to transcribe family letters, journals, newspaper articles, audiotapes, and other historical artifacts. Not only do the documents contain genealogical information, the words breathe life into kin - some I never met - others I see a time in their life before I knew them.

This week I look at a newspaper advertisement mentioning an unknown relative.

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To the left is the full advertisement.  If one were searching for surnames using the traditional method of browsing newspaper microfilm, most likely it would be missed. But with databases of digitized papers, one can find surnames in unlikely spots. (emphasis added)

In the lower left corner:



1923 Rickenbacker Coupe
Sale Price $1350 / List Price $2345
Equipped with 2 Bumpers, Stoplight, Motometer, good Tires. This car has the wonderful Duco Paint Job which cost $175.00, and will last for years. Driven 7,000 miles. Formerly owned by Mr. Cruvand, Peterboro Avenue.

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Notes:

1) The 'Cruvand' surname (with all of its variant spellings) is rare. While one hesitates to say that "all people with surname X are related" I have been able to connect all instances I have found. In one mysterious case, a 16-year old Cruvant popped up in an England database, and I was able to prove it was a misspelling. Could this be another? No known Cruvands, Cruvants, Kruvands or Kruvants lived in Michigan in the 1920s.

One possibility that comes to mind is Edward/Clifford Cruvant the son of my great grandmother's brother, Ben Cruvant, and his first wife Goldie White. Born in 1904, he would have been 20 in 1924. In 1910 the mother and children were in Chicago, Illinois. In 1914 Denver, Colorado.