A Slingerland Box Mystery

 The Slingerland Box at B.H.A.

 

Over the summer, the beautiful wooden box pictured here was donated to the Bethlehem Historical Association.  The outside is smooth wood with an inscribed plaque.  The inside is lined with silky looking fabric. There is a shallow space under the lid and a deep drawer. According to family lore, George Slingerland was a surveyor and this was his box for his surveying equipment.  However, the box itself refutes this.  It is simply too nice inside for a workman’s case.  I think it held a set of silverware. Follow along for how I got to this conclusion.

First, I started with the plaque on the case. It is inscribed:

Presented to
Mr. and Mrs. George W. Slingerland
by employees of the
National Express Company
New York City Division
September 1899

 

Mr. and Mrs. George W. Slingerland are George Wayne Slingerland (1847-1923) and Rosalie Mattice (1850-1929) who married in 1870.  George was born in Bethlehem’s hamlet of Slingerlands to William and Elizabeth Slingerland.

Tracing the couple through the census, we find them in Bethlehem in the 1870 and 1880 U.S. Census and the 1875 New York Census.  He is listed as a farmer (at age 23 still at home with the parents), then a surveyor (in his own household with Rosalie and their young children) and then as a civil engineer.  Then there is a gap in the Census trail until the 1905 New Jersey State Census where he is living in Hackensack with Rosalie and is listed as a manager with the Express Company. The 1915 New Jersey and the 1920 Federal censuses have him in Hackensack as a superintendent with the Express Company. 

So far so good. I hope you connected the references to the Express Company and the inscription on the plaque.

George turns up often in the newspapers. One of my favorites is from the February 13, 1886 edition of the Albany Argus.   Under the headline “Express Officials Fraternize” it goes on to describe a party where employees of the Boston office of the National Express Company entertained their superintendent, Mr. Merritt Seely, at a “sumptuous” banquet at the Quincy house. Among the 30 gentlemen present were George W. Slingerland, assistant to the general superintendent at Albany. 

Apparently, George made a speech.  As the article reads:

He soberly drew a voluminous manuscript from his pocket, and read a humorous poem, which coved all the great events in American History down to the time of the formation of the National Express company. When this point had been reached, his poem “cracked” every official of the company.  This production convulsed his hearers, who “laughed till they cried.”

 I wish we had a copy of that poem!

Sometime around 1890, he and his family moved first to Brooklyn then to Hackensack likely for George’s work with the National Express Company.  Then along comes this article from the September 29, 1899 edition of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle.  Let me just quote it:

George W. Slingerland, superintendent of the New York and Long Island divisions of the National Express Company, recently resigned his position to engage in other business.  He was agreeably surprised last night when arriving at his residence in the Brevoort, he found there his former assistant superintendents, route agents and principal agents, who on behalf of themselves and other employees, presented a magnificent silver service of eighty pieces as a testimonial of their appreciation and regard for Mr. and Mrs. Slingerland.

The article goes on to describe George’s work:

At the time of his resignation Mr. Slingerland had been with the company over twenty years, during the last thirteen of which he has been in immediate charge of its metropolitan service.  He originated and organized the first trolley express car system ever in existence, which operating over the Rapid Transit lines here has proven of inestimable advantage to the citizens and business interests of Brooklyn and Queens.

Did you notice the silver service mentioned in the article? And that the date of said article is September 29, 1899, the same date as inscribed on the box?  I am wholly sure that our box was the container for this set of silver.

These images of the King George pattern from the 1909 Goreham Hand Book of Stirling Silver give an idea of what the silver service might have been like.is. 

And what is an Express Company you ask? Basically they were in the business of moving packages and freight and maybe people. For example, here’s a snippet from The March 5, 1902 issue of the Standard Union:

Mrs. Eugene A. Philbin, has sued…George W. Slingerland as head of the Century Express Compony for $200 said to represent the vault of a package the plaintiff shipped by express on August 16 last to Seabright, and $50 for the failure of the package to reach its destination.

And a final, funny note if you do much historical research.  I was trying to find George’s obituary.  Did you know there were two George W. Slingerlands who died in 1923? Thankfully Rosalie is a unique name.  I often searched on her name while looking for George.

 

This photo of George Wayne Slingerland is from a public Ancestry.com family tree.