Columbus, GA rests on the banks of the Chattahoochee River, straddling the the Alabama / Georgia state line, on the snowline in the middle of the state. Snow to the northern half of the state, rarely here or to the south of its humid subtropical climate. Founded by 1830 with 1000 residents, Columbus expanded swiftly up to the Civil War and during the Gilded Age just before the turn of the century, with 17,500 residents entering the 20th C. Railroads bring cotton to the river for shipping. Textile mills spring up around the river. Industry is king.
In 1900, Joseph Jackson Smith is a machinist at Hamburger Cotton Mills, living at 2215 Thomas Ave, in Columbus, Georgia. We don’t know much about his early life. He was born in June of 1863, in Tennessee, to Napoleon Bonaparte & Elizabeth Smith. Maybe. We think. Both of his parents were from Tennessee and are believed to have died before he, at the ripe old age of 30(!), married 20-year-old Warner “Warnie” Pittman, in 1893, in Columbus, Georgia. A year (9 months?) later, they produce Royce Calvin, then pause briefly before bringing Joseph Jasper and Harry William into the world. In between Joe & Harry, they move from Alabama to Georgia? Maybe.
At any rate, by 1900, they and their 3 children, an 8-year-old, a toddler and a baby, are living in their own home at 2215 Thomas Ave., where Warnie will continue to live for the next 40 years, until she sells the homestead and moves in with her youngest son. The street name changes to 6th Ave. in 1929. Warnie moves out a decade later, in 1939.
Warnie’s 3 sons will live with her and marry and continue to live near her for the rest of her life. Joseph Jackson has just under 2 decades left. He dies in 1918, at the young age of 54, still living at that 2215 Thomas Ave. address he bought for his family. He works steadily at the Hamburger Cotton Mills from 1900 on, rising from machinist through master mechanic to overseer in 1912.
His middle son, Joseph Jasper, starts work early, bringing home a paycheck to contribute to the family pot starting in 1910, at the tender age of 12, working as a clerk. Warnie herself begins working outside the home just a few years later, clerking at the Bee Hive in 1912. Something may have happened to Joseph Jackson, possibly an industrial accident? as he is not listed as working at the mill from that 1912 listing through his death 6 years later.
Warnie continues to work in ladies dress sales until her death (confirm??) in 1949, starting in 1912 at the Bee Hive for 5 years, at Lee Millinery and Lowenherz Bros for a few years each, and then in the mid-20s at Kayser-Lilienthal for the next 2 decades, or the rest of her working life.
Unlike the stability Warnie enjoys, her son Joseph Jasper Smith’s domestic life is far more turbulent, with frequent moves and multiple marriages. After his early work experience, he embarks on getting himself kicked out of “every military academy in the state” as he will later proudly recount to his children. The constant in his life is the Central of Georgia Railroad, where he is employed life-long, since at least 1918, from his return home from his academic escapades to live with his mother, until his death in 1964.
1918 (possibly earlier) – thomas ave.
marries Harriotte in 1927 at 1138 Front Ave, lives there in 1928
1930 – 813 21st
1934 – 1935 8th Av
1937 thru ’42 – 2308 16th Av Harriotte is gone by 1942
marries Loretta when? they live 1952 & ’56 – Sylacauga 206 W Walnut