My first noteable discovery on the Wright side

When I first began researching the Wright family tree, I had a basic tree that my mother had received from Grandma Madeleine. It listed Marie Antoinette Finck (conflicting DOB either 1878 or 1874 depending which census & unknown death date) married to Frederick Harriman Wright (1863-1933). I found Marie, the youngest of seven, listed in the 1880 census and it listed her siblings names. They resided at 170 Eldridge Street between Delancy St. & Rivington St. in Manhattan's Lower East Side.

The NY Times has a good digital archive and I started popping names into the search engine. One of the first to get a result was my great-great-uncle Frederick Finck (1858-1889). The article I found tells of a sickly man who suffered from "consumption" (tuberculosis) and dyspepsia (impaired digestion). He was a trader on the produce exchange and was also employed by George Fowley & Co., which was a large provisions house based in Kansas City.

In mid-August, 1889, Frederick booked himself on the steamship Norman of the Windsor Line and was last seen August 19 while the ship was off the coast of Atlantic City. It appears that the 31 year-old jumped to his death.

The article was not only important to me because it shed some light on my great-great uncle's life, but it also listed his father, Frederick Finck Sr. (1830-1899) and identified him as a NYC Alderman. I will get to that notable story in another post.