A few years later, on January 12, 1920, the family is still living at 381 First Street. All three families are renting so they must have an absent landlord. Youngest children George and Helen at age 13 and 10 are in school. Conrad is a polisher at a brass factory, Christina is an auditor at an Insurance company, Laura is a telephone operator, Philip is a salesman at a Print house, and Henry is a truck driver. Thirty six year old George Eberhardt is a blacksmith helper. The census says that Conrad’s, Anna’s and George’s parents came from Germany and that their mother tongue was German. Everyone speaks English in the home and all can read and write. There are numbers in the margin of the form on every line of a person who works, but I am not sure what they mean. I thought maybe they were salaries but I can’t see Conrad making $170 when Christina is making $986. Perhaps they are occupation codes as people with same job have same number.
Soon after, on June 2, 1920 Laura married George Frey. Her sister-in-law Barbara made her dress out of parachute silk given to her by her Uncle John Knatz. Laura and George divorced sometime around August 10, 1935 as per a Missouri newspaper listing of the Franklin County Circuit Court Docket August Term. No one knows why they were in Missouri. As per information given to me by Helen’s son-in-law, Laura then married Dann Malloy on July 19, 1934. She had given me the date in 1933. But it looks like she wasn’t divorced yet. We still wonder if they legally married or not.
On November 5, 1922, Henry married Helen Walters.
By June 1, 1925, the family has moved into a one family home. They were now living at 181 Crystal Street in Brooklyn. Conrad at 55 is still a brass polisher. Christine is a typist, Philip a salesman, George a printer and Anna is doing housework along with daughters Laura who moved back to the family home keeping her maiden name, and 16 year old Helen. There are other teenagers in this census who are listed as in school, so it looks like Helen has left school, but has not yet found work. According to the website Zillow, the house had been built in 1930. This is incorrect as the home is the same one my mother remembered from her childhood. Either way, the house was new when they moved in. They were part of the wave of Lower East Siders who moved out of tenement and crowded apartment houses to one to 3 family homes in Brooklyn after the Williamsburg Bridge was built in 1903.
On April 3, 1927, Christina married her boss at Crum and Forster, Robert Heron in New Jersey.
On April 8, 1930 the census taker found the family still at 181 Crystal Street. Conrad and Anna own their home which is valued at $5000. They also own a radio. The census also notes the age at which they married – Conrad was 18 and Anna was 17. Only 3 children are still at home, Philip is now an auto salesman, George is still a printer and Helen is a typist in a bank. They all worked the day before the census was taken and Philip is a Veteran of the WW – the World War, now known as World War One. Philip and brother Charles fought in Europe during WWI, Henry was in the army but did not go overseas and a record for a George H Knatz, from Brooklyn, aged 20 in 1917 ( I believe this is our George) also served, in the National Guard. According to another Military Abstract, he served overseas and was severely wounded. Their first cousin, Frederick G Knatz, son of Conrad’s brother Jacob and his wife Kate, was killed in the Battle of the Marne in 1918.
In May of 1932 Philip married Margaret Anna Rich, known as Maude. She was the daughter of Joseph and Alaide Rich.
On March 18, 1933, Anna Marie Eberhardt Knatz died at her home on Crystal Street in Brooklyn. She was buried on March 21st in the Knatz family plot at Lutheran Cemetery. Her obituary states that she was a member of “Crandall Chapter, No. 103, O.E.S., and Wyona Court of the Emmegrants No.1” and is survived by her husband, seven children, two sisters and two brothers.