James Renn, our great-grandfather, immigrated to Chicago from Ireland in the late 1860s or early 1870s. Our Family Record states that his siblings are “none known.”  At the time he left Ireland, he was married to Mary Ellen Reynolds and had six children: Patrick, Ellen and Bridget (the latter two became nuns), Maria Agnes, James Jerome, and John Francis. A fourth son, Thomas Hubert, was born in Chicago in 1871.

The earliest records that I found for our great-grandfather James Renn in Chicago are listings in the Chicago City Directory for the year 1875 and also the Lakeside Annual Directory of 1876. I’m pretty confident that the James Renn in the directory is our great-grandfather because the address matches an address handwritten on a typed record from Calvary Cemetery.

Our great-grandfather’s occupation is listed in the 1875 City Directory as “lamplighter.” Chicago first obtained gas lighting in the 1850s, furnished by the Chicago Gas Light and Coke Company, which supplied gas lighting to 2,000 central Chicago customers in 1860 by way of 50 miles of underground pipes.

In the evenings, lamplighters would walk the streets “starting open burners.”[1] James Renn, therefore, was likely employed by the utility company or perhaps the Department of Public Works, in contrast to many other recent immigrants who scrambled day to day to earn money.

In our Family Record, James Renn is described as dying in 1879 about age 45, cause of death noted as “killed.” My cousin Les had told me that he died falling down stairs. After long searching, it felt like a victory to find, on microfiche in the Chicago Public Library, a death notice that is most certainly for my great-grandfather, despite a different spelling of his surname. He died early on Sunday, March 16, 1979.

Patrick Renn, the eldest of the Renn siblings, would have been about 23 years old at the time his father died, my grandfather, James Jerome, would have been about 15 years old, and the youngest child, Thomas, would have been about seven years old.

The 1882 City Directory finds the Renn family living a few doors east of where they lived at the time of James Renn’s death:  377 Division Street. There are two listings in the directory. The first is for Mary Renn, widow, living in “house, rear, 377 Division,” and the second is for Patrick Renn, plumber “boards rear” 377 Division. We can assume that Mary Ellen and her seven children also lived there.

By 1885, the Renn family had purchased a building at 227 Townsend Street that would remain a family home through at least 1910. By the time the residence was purchased, it is likely that the two eldest sons of the widow Mary were working as plumbers. (The 1887 City Directory lists James and Patrick as plumbers). From the City Directory we know that in 1887, the youngest son, Thomas Renn, was a student at H. B. Bryant’s Business College located at  77 79 and 81 State Street.

In 1889, Patrick, James J. and John Renn, all described as plumbers in the City Directory, were living at 227 Townsend with Mary Renn, widow of James. By the early 1890s, Thomas Renn was a medical doctor.

There was a sad episode in the Renn family in the 1890s, as publicized in local and national newspapers. Dr. Thomas H. Renn was shot four times by his estranged wife, the former Sara McCarthy, who claimed to have been abandoned by Tom.  Newspaper articles reported that Sara and her mother believed that Sara had been cheated of alimony due her based on Tom’s inheritance of a small fortune from his father. Sara’s mother said that Thomas was one of four heirs to his father’s estate which was valued at $30,000 (about $800,000 today). This story will take more than one blog post to tell so look for more in the future.

The timeline so far is that our great-grandfather James Renn was killed 1879, after immigrating to Chicago about 1871 and working as a lamplighter. Supposedly, he left his heirs $30,000, more than $800,000 in today’s dollars. That’s hard to believe and likely was an exaggeration on the part of Tom Renn’s mother-in-law. However, in the decade after their father’s death, Patrick, James, and John became plumbers. James and Patrick started Renn Brothers plumbing business, the Thomas went to the business school and then medical college. In addition, the family bought properties at 227 and 248 Townsend Street.

In this same period, Mary Renn bought a Calvary Cemetery lot for six graves, purchased on Nov. 10, 1884. Calvary Cemetery records state that on the same day, the bodies of James Renn and Catherine Wrenn were removed and James Wren & child, “previously interred 3/18/79 and 8/15/72” were buried in the newly bought lots. It seems like a lot of money appeared after the death of James Renn.

Our great-grandmother, Mary Ellen Renn née Reynolds, died on June 15, 1892. There is a Cook County probate court document recording three administrators of her estate: her daughter, Maria Agnes Renn, Andrew Reynolds (which was probably Mary’s brother Andrew W. Reynolds), and Owen Coyne (I don’t know who that was).

According to our cousin Patricia, by the early 1900s, the Renn brothers had made a little money. When their mother died in 1892, they were able to pay for a funeral procession to Calvary Cemetery in Evanston, as confirmed by the below newspaper notice. Patricia remembers her mother, my Aunt Catherine, describing it as something special.

[1] http://www.encyclopedia.chicagohistory.org/pages/504.html

[2] City of the Century: The epic of Chicago and the making of America by Donal L.Miller, 1996, p. 177.