Yesterday, I dropped in at the Indiana Historical Society to see the library on the second floor of their building. After signing in and locking my belongings in a locker, I asked at the desk for some pointers on researching my Bavarian ancestor, George Buchter. He lived in Indianapolis from the 1860s until 1879. I am still working on determining his year of immigration to the United States, but I thought I'd try to learn a little more about his life in Indiana and Indianapolis.
The information that I've already found about him on Ancestry.com indicates several changes of occupation. In the 1860 Census, he was a weaver. When he was registered for the U.S. Civil War draft in 1863 he was still a weaver. In the 1865 IRS Tax Assessments, he was a retail dealer in liquor. By 1870, the last Census he was alive for, he was a retail grocer.
The Smith Memorial Library at IHS has a reference collection that patrons may access without calling in the materials from the 3rd floor. I was directed to check a printed Guide to Ethnic History Collections which describes their manuscripts and books about Germans. Their entire catalog can be searched online, and it includes more recent items than are listed in their printed guides. While I didn't find a listing that was immediately relevant, I was intrigued that the manuscript collection contains the minutes of the Bavarian Society of Indianapolis from 1888-1950. That is something that I might look at another time.
The library staff suggested that I try looking for Indianapolis residents in the book entitled A Consolidated Index to Thirty-Two Histories of Indianapolis and Indiana (1939). I checked under Buchter, and only found one reference which was to George's son Theodore. I had previously found this same information online through Mocavo.com because the book, History of Indianapolis and Marion County by Sulgrove (1884) has been digitized and OCR'd. Other subject terms I checked on were Groceries, Liquor dealers, and Weavers. I decided to hold off on pursuing all the references to Groceries due to the sheer number and the fact that there were many, many grocery stores in the 1800's.
The other mystery I've been wanting to solve is the location of a parcel of land that was mentioned in George Buchter's son Theodore's will. It was called George Buchter's Heirs Subdivision...of Indianapolis. The will didn't give the street address. I thought that I would have to visit the Marion County Recorder's office, but much to my relief, the IHS Library has the old Marion County Plat Books (1849-1940) on microfilm. The index listed George Buchter's Heirs subdivision of an earlier subdivision called Ellis & Mays. It was located on the southwest corner of Maryland Street and California Street. This land is currently part of Victory Field where the Indianapolis Indians play baseball. The puzzle pieces fell together because I knew from the Indianapolis city directories that Backus & Butcher's grocery store was at that same corner of Maryland and California.
I was pleased with my first visit to the Smith Memorial Library, and I'm certain that I will be visiting again. All of those German manuscripts and printed volumes have captured my interest.
