Ima’s Berlin Secrets: Still Secret!

This is 22 Mommsenstrasse, Charlottenburg, a suburb of Berlin, as it looks today. Ima Hogg lived here in 1907-08.

This is a page from the Berlin City Directory of 1908, listing the owners/residents of 22 Mommenstreasse. 

         Eight owner/residents are listed in this multi-unit building.  One of them was the German novelist/playwright, Felix Hollander.

         None of them is named Grandberry or Cranberry, the family with whom, according to Ima’s 1908 diary, she was living.

         This must mean that the Grandberry/Cranberry family were renting or leasing their apartment.

        

         But who the Grandberrys were, and why they (or Mrs. Grandberry, or Cranberry, as Ima calls her) were living here is a research work in progress. Ima’s diary says that she knew Mrs. Grandberry from Houston.

         The likeliest candidate is Mary Belle Grandberry, the wife of a Houston oilman, Prentiss Grandberry, who lived at 241 Heights Boulevard (a house no longer there). In 1908 this Mrs. Grandberry was 35 years old. But this Mrs. Grandberry of Houston was born October 26, 1872. The Mrs. Cranberry in Charlottenburg in Ima’s diary celebrates her birthday January 27.

Hmm.

It’s summertime! See the next blog on August 6.

Ima's Summer Travels: a Berlin Mystery

1910

From Galveston to Bremen

via “Hanover” N.G.L.

       Sailed June 30^th arrived July 18, 1910.

A most pleasant voyage with a very jolly, and interesting number of passengers.

       This time I am attempting to “conduct” a party--of two--Mike and myself. So far we have not gotten on the wrong train, our tickets have been good, and nothing outside the experiences Mike and I create for ourselves has occurred

       Our tickets, second class, from Berlin to London were $18.00 apiece.

A short account of our trip would be as follows:

       Left Berlin Sunday [July 31] 10:55 A.M.

A “short account, indeed! This brief notation s all we get about the ten days she and Mike spent in Berlin.

Ima Hogg had lived there for nearly a year, from November 1907 until October 1908.

WHY DOES SHE NOT RECORD THEIR BERLIN VISIT IN THIS DIARY?

 

Ima sails again for Europe, 1910

Tugboat Ima Hogg

This item appeared in the Galveston Daily News, July 1, 1910.

Friends of Miss Ima Hogg of Houston, who gathered at the North German Lloyd pier Thursday to bid Miss Hogg and her brother, Mr. Mike Hogg, bon voyage on their departure for Europe, noted with pleasure the pretty courtesy paid by the tug Ima Hogg. When the ocean liner was leaving the pier the tug named for this daughter of the late Governor Hogg drew alongside the Hanover and gave a salute of three whistles while passing around the vessel upon the deck of which stood the fair lady whose namesake the tug is. Miss Hogg was pleased with the pretty compliment, and smilingly waved a good-by to those whose thought prompted the salute.

Was she secretly gritting her teeth behind that smile?  Her name followed her everywhere!

Note to blog readers: can you diagram this sentence?

When the ocean liner was leaving the pier the tug named for this daughter of the late Governor Hogg drew alongside the Hanover and gave a salute of three whistles while passing around the vessel upon the deck of which stood the fair lady whose namesake the tug is.