Quote:
Originally Posted by ethereal_reality
Great memories Earl. Thanks for sharing-
__
This is a bit of a mystery. There appears to be a run on feed!
Downey CA
ebay
ebay
ebay
So what's going on? Could it be a polling place?
|
So, I searched the forum for anything with Downey in it, and found this post from 2013. I didn't see anyone post a location, so I hope if they did, they will point me to it because I went on a goose chase all day.
I did not find where Tetzlaff's feed store was, but I did find out a few things about a man named Tetzlaff.
First things first: I found a Martin B. Tetzlaff Middle School in Cerritos. Is that our Tetzlaff? Who was he and why is a school named after him?
Well, all of the school district websites didn't answer that question. So I don't know what he did to get a school named after him. My google-fu has failed me on this part, but I'm not done.
I did find him, his wife, and his daughter in the 1940 census. He was born in 1906 and came here from Russia. His wife is from Los Angeles, so he must have met and married her here at least 4 years before the census. Their daughter is 4 in the census.
(12th line from the top)
Public census record 1940
Here's the thing, though: He lived in unincorporated Artesia, part of Downey Township. Is that where the Downey designation comes from on these photos? Maybe....
Public Census Record 1940
Public census record sourced from stevemorse.org
http://stevemorse.org/census/eddef12...93&image=00110
Whomever put their information for the Tetzlaff's into Ancestry.com also recorded them living in Downey, which is not right. The census page says unincorporated Artesia, in Downey Township. (ED 19-125, for those following at home)
I checked the census pages for Downey proper, and the ED designation is very different (ED-19-132 to 137), so there's really no question that Tetzlaff and his family did not live in Downey proper. Downey is shown to be Unincorporated Downey in Downey Township on the census.
Public census record 1940, sourced from Downey Historical Society
http://www.downeyhistoricalsociety.o...ES/383pg32.jpg
According to the census, he drove a truck for Dr. Ross Dog & Cat food co, and had been at that job for 62 weeks. Could he have made the jump from that to running a feed store in a few short years? Seems likely to me. He would have met people running the grocery and mom & pop stores, and would probably know what things were needed in local communities. The area was all agricultural and mostly dairies at the time, so maybe he saw a hole that needed to be filled. Maybe that's how he got his name on a school? By keeping all the farm communities in feed and supplies during the war?
Unfortunately, that's where I am going to leave this. I am at a dead-end for now. But it was fun finding out a bunch of land was in Downey township. I'm guessing everything from the old Rancho Santa Gertrudes property was marked that way in legal records before the cities in it were incorporated.