The Rileys and the Weisses of Paterson, 1880 to 1996

Two families came to Paterson, New Jersey, the Silk City, by different roads: the Rileys from the iron mills of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, and the Weisses from Switzerland by way of New York. Their grandchildren married there. This is how the records tell it.

The Rileys, from Duncannon and Harrisburg

In June 1880 Mary E. Wagner was eight, living at Lower Duncannon in Perry County, Pennsylvania, with her widowed mother, Margaret D. Wagner, and five brothers and sisters. A few doors away lived a young laborer, Joseph E. Carmichael.

On the last day of October 1891, Mary, nineteen, and Joseph S. Riley, a twenty-six-year-old moulder whose father was Edward Riley, took out a marriage license at Harrisburg and were married the same day by Alderman A. Brackenridge.

By the census of 1900 Joseph was laboring in a Harrisburg iron mill. He and Mary had lost two of their first five children; Margaret, Joseph and a baby boy were living.

Sometime after 1900 the Rileys moved to Paterson. The 1910 census found them on Spring Street, where Mary, 37, had borne nine children and seven were alive: four born in Pennsylvania, three in New Jersey. Among the youngest was William, aged three. The state birth index enters him as William H. Riley, his mother's maiden name Wagner.

William and Iantha

Iantha M. Hoefer was born in Paterson in October 1909, the daughter of Philip and Lula Hoefer. In 1910 her father, then 27, managed a bottling works and the family lived on Bridge Street. He died in Paterson on December 30, 1914, when Iantha was five; the death notice in The Morning Call names him the "beloved husband of Lulu Hoefer (nee Van Winkle)." By January 1920 her mother had married again: the census lists Charles A. Seigel, his wife Lule M. and Iantha, entered under the Seigel name, on East 18th Street. By 1930 Charles Seigel was a widower, and Iantha was living with her grandmother, Iantha Van Winkle. After a short first marriage she married William Riley at the Market Street Methodist Church on October 25, 1931.

In 1940 the couple rented at 1244 Madison Avenue. William, 35, was a mechanic, and they had three children: Jantha, Charles and Lila. Seven years later, on December 19, 1947, William died suddenly at 42 and was buried at Laurel Grove.

Iantha raised the children on her own. For thirty years she worked at the Madison Sweet Shop on Main Street, retiring in 1965, and she kept her membership at the Madison Park Epworth United Methodist Church. She died in Paterson on April 22, 1996, at 86.

The Weisses, from Switzerland

Charles Weiss, born Karl in Switzerland on January 31, 1878, had been in America since about 1889. By about 1901 he had married Emma Piquet, who was born in Ohio, and they were living in New York, where their first two sons were born. The family moved to Paterson by 1910.

In 1915 they were at 177 Madison Avenue with four boys: Charles, George, Raymond and Edward. Charles was a weaver in Paterson's mills. A fifth son was born later.

About 1934 the couple left the city for North Haledon, settling at 61 Park Street. He retired about 1942 and died at home there on September 27, 1949, at 71. The Morning Call remembered him as a member of the Riverside Athletic and Singing Society and of the Workmen's Benefit and Benevolent Association.

Raymond and Edna

Raymond William Weiss, the third son, was born in Paterson on September 16, 1910. In 1940 he was a service-station attendant living at 1075 East 24th Street with his wife, Edna, who had been born in Ohio, and their two small children; that October he registered for the draft from the same address, working for Brustlin Brothers.

Raymond lived in Paterson for the rest of his life and died there on December 29, 1988, at 78. His son, Raymond W. Weiss Jr., died in 1990.

The two families meet

William and Iantha's son, Charles Riley, married Raymond and Edna's daughter in Paterson, and the Rileys and the Weisses became one family.

What we're still looking for

• Joseph S. and Mary E. Riley's deaths, and where the family lived between 1910 and 1930.
• Edward Riley, Joseph's father, in Harrisburg records.
• Charles Weiss's naturalization papers, which should name his birthplace in Switzerland and his ship.
• Emma (Piquet) Weiss's birth family in Ohio.

Sources

• 1880 U.S. census, Penn Township (Lower Duncannon), Perry County, Pennsylvania, ED 122, p. 29 (Ancestry).
• Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, marriage license no. 405, Joseph S. Riley and Mary D. Wagner, 31 Oct 1891 (Ancestry, Pennsylvania, U.S., Marriages, 1852-1968).
• 1900 U.S. census, Harrisburg, Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, ED 42, sheet 4B (Ancestry).
• 1910 U.S. census, Paterson Ward 4, Passaic County, New Jersey, ED 145, sheet 13A (Ancestry).
• New Jersey, U.S., Birth Index: William H. Riley, Paterson (Ancestry).
• 1910 U.S. census, Paterson Ward 4, ED 113, sheet 5B, household of Philip Hoefer (Ancestry). www.ancestry.com/search/collections/7884/records/172140931
• The Morning Call (Paterson), 31 Dec 1914, p. 12, death notice of Philip Hoefer (Newspapers.com). www.newspapers.com/image/552538890/
• 1920 U.S. census, Paterson Ward 3, ED 84, sheet 9A, household of Charles A. Seigel (Ancestry). www.ancestry.com/search/collections/6061/records/30626820
• 1930 U.S. census, Paterson, ED 29, sheet 15A, Charles A. Seigel, widowed (Ancestry). www.ancestry.com/search/collections/6224/records/19938276
• New Jersey, U.S., United Methodist Church Records: William Riley and Iantha Vanorden, 25 Oct 1931 (Ancestry). www.ancestry.com/search/collections/61176/records/337781
• 1940 U.S. census, Paterson, ED 26-106, sheet 4B (Ancestry). www.ancestry.com/search/collections/2442/records/136505533
• Death notice, Riley, William H., The Morning Call (Paterson), 22 Dec 1947, p. 21 (Newspapers.com). www.newspapers.com/image/553028424/
• "Iantha M. (Hoefer) Riley, 86", The Herald-News (Passaic), 26 Apr 1996, p. A12 (Newspapers.com). www.newspapers.com/image/528745490/
• U.S., World War I draft registration cards: Charles Weiss, Paterson (Ancestry). www.ancestry.com/search/collections/6482/records/32233578
• New Jersey State Census, 1915: Paterson, Ward 3, district 21, p. 22 (Ancestry). www.ancestry.com/search/collections/61558/records/532407
• 1920 U.S. census, Paterson Ward 3, ED 90, sheet 24A (Ancestry). www.ancestry.com/search/collections/6061/records/30637319
• "Charles Weiss, Sr., Retired Weaver, Dies", The Morning Call (Paterson), 28 Sep 1949, p. 12 (Newspapers.com). www.newspapers.com/image/553530592/
• 1940 U.S. census, Paterson, ED 26-125, sheets 4B-5A (Ancestry). www.ancestry.com/search/collections/2442/records/130959262
• U.S., World War II draft cards: Raymond William Weiss, 16 Oct 1940 (Ancestry). www.ancestry.com/search/collections/2238/records/301006158
• New Jersey, U.S., Death Index and Social Security Death Index: Raymond W. Weiss, 29 Dec 1988 (Ancestry). www.ancestry.com/search/collections/61260/records/2457996