If doctors told you that outdoor life could help your children who are having health issues, would you take that to mean walking from Schenectady to San Francisco? That is what the Fenton Family of Schenectady set out to do. Physicians told Mr. and Mrs. Reuben Fenton that their son Gilbert, 18, and two of their other children considered to be in failing health would benefit from spending time outside. The family decided that the warm air of the Pacific Coast would be the best place for their children and began to plan their trip.
The Fenton Family as they set off on their trip to San Francisco. Courtesy of the Wayne Tucker Postcard Collection at the Grems-Doolittle Library. |
The trip would be made in a typical Prairie Schooner or
“Watson Wagon” pulled by a single horse until reaching Buffalo. There, they
would supplant the horse with a team.
The schooner was six feet wide and ten feet long. Under the wagon was a suspended wooden box
containing the tools needed for the trip.
They carried two tents for sleeping, a cooking stove and provisions
enough to carry them from one city to the next.
The family dressed in the western ranch style of the day. The Fentons had postcards made of themselves
with their wagon and depended on the sale of the cards for their livelihood
along the way. One of these postcards can be found in the Wayne Tucker postcard
collection. On both sides of the wagon
were signs reading “The Fenton Family. Walking from Schenectady NY to San
Francisco California May 1st, 1913. We are dependent on the sale of post
cards and books for our living.”
The family consisted of Reuben and Lottie Fenton and their
children: Henry, 23; Edgar, 20; Gilbert, 18; Ruth, 15; Helen, 8; Sidney, 7 and
Marguerite, 5. They also had a dog that went along for the journey. According to the rules of the family, the
menfolk would walk all the way but Mrs. Fenton and the children could ride
“according to their pleasure”. At night,
Mr. and Mrs. Fenton and they four youngest children would sleep in the wagon
and the older boys would tent alongside.
Article/advertisement of Taniac, a cure-all. Gilbert Fenton Is quoted in the article saying "Off and on for eight years I have been bothered with rheumatism...Taniac gave me very good relief." Courtesy of Old Fulton NY Postcards. |
Did the family reach San Francisco? We don’t know for sure but assume not. There is a newspaper article from the Geneva
Daily Times dated June 5, 1913 reporting the family reached Waterloo NY and
were still traveling. No other
documentation can be found of them reaching another destination. However, an article from the May 24, 1917
Schenectady Gazette has a still ailing Gilbert working at
GE and promoting a product that helped his rheumatism and stomach. Another article has family members attending
Edgar’s 31st birthday party in Schenectady in 1924. Reuben, Lottie
and their children Sidney and Margaret were living in Albany at the time of the
1920 census and he was working as a machinist at General Electric, a job he
also held in 1910 according to that census.
Two members of the family did eventually move west. The 1930 census finds Edgar and his wife,
Irma, living in Detroit. Gilbert and his
wife, Tressa, lived with them as boarders and the two brothers both worked as
machinists in an auto parts factory.
Similar to the Fenton family were three young men who named themselves the Schaugh-naugh-ta-da Hiking Trio. They set out on a trip from Schenectady to Chicago on September 18, 1911. Much less is known about the trio than the Fenton family, but we do have a postcard of them taken before they set out on their journey.
Similar to the Fenton family were three young men who named themselves the Schaugh-naugh-ta-da Hiking Trio. They set out on a trip from Schenectady to Chicago on September 18, 1911. Much less is known about the trio than the Fenton family, but we do have a postcard of them taken before they set out on their journey.