From the Historian: Stanley James Van Tassell

 

Dear Trinity Church and friends,
 
You never know where a journey will take you. This journey began by researching a particular Black parishioner and discovering a newspaper clipping suggesting he had a sibling with a different last name. I thought nothing more of this other person until I chanced upon his name in church records. One could not help but wonder, who was he?
 
Stanley James Van Tassell was born in Newport, Rhode Island on March 3, 1899, to Henry Van Tassell and Emma Elmyra De Wolfe Braithwaite. The family would primarily reside in Boston, where Emma had roots stemming back to the end of the Civil War. Emma's mother, Lydia De Wolfe, who was formerly enslaved, brought her and her two sisters north from North Carolina. Lydia found employment with Miss Louisa Gardner, with whom she became friends. Emma helped raise her siblings until she met William Smith Braithwaite of British Guiana. They married in 1875 when she was sixteen and he was twenty-three years old. They had several children together, including Eva, William Stanley, Rosie, and Arthur Augustus. William Smith Braithwaite died in 1886. In the pursuit of work to provide for her family, Emma met French Canadian Henry Van Tassell, a Newport coach washer. Stanley appears to have been their only child.
 
Stanley was confirmed at Trinity Church Boston on March 16, 1913. In 1918 he completed his WWI draft card at 19 years old. He was employed as a mechanical draftsman for the B. F. Sturtevant Co., a Boston-based manufacturer of fans, then located on Damon Street in Hyde Park. For the “name and address of the person who will always know your address,” he listed his mother Emma at 18 Claremont Park in Boston. As for his personal description, he selected black hair, brown eyes, tall, of slender build and “negro” as his race. 
 
One year later, Stanley’s name appears in the 1919 Trinity Church Year Book. He is listed “Van Tassell, Stanley J. 18 Claremont Park, Boston.” Founded in 1885, the Trinity Club held meetings throughout the program year to “Spread the Spirit of Brotherhood.” And in that year of 1919, Stanley, along with Black parishioners George L. Ruffin, Jr. and Dr. Samuel E. Courtney, was listed as one of the club’s 162 active members. 
 
By the late 1920s, Stanley spent more of his time in New York; perhaps to be part of the energy and excitement of what would become known as the Harlem Renaissance. In 1925, a marriage license was issued to him and stage performer Marie Bennette Smith. No record of the marriage taking place has yet been found. An August 1928 column in The Afro American newspaper describes a “Van Tassell Party,” sadly noting that 

"Young Mr. Stanley Van Tassell who hails from Boston and who is a photo engraver but lives like a banker has decided to give up his rooftop apartment at 409 Edgecombe Ave. For the last three months his place has been the scene of many of the good old fashioned parties … Those old cronies of his are all in tears.”

In that same year, his mother Emma passed away in Boston.

Eventually Stanley settled in New York, as would his half-brother William Stanley Braithwaite, who was an acclaimed poet and literary critic. William, during his time in Boston, attended Trinity Church where several of his children were baptized and later confirmed in the 1920s. 
 
By 1940, according to the U.S. Census, Stanley was living in Harlem with his wife, Norma. He worked as a photo engineer. She was active in their church, St. Luke. By the time Stanley completed his World War II draft card in 1942, he noted that he was unemployed but one must imagine that he found employment in due time. A 1957 Boston Globe obituary acknowledges he and William as the surviving siblings of Arthur Braithwaite. 
 
After a long and venerable literary career, brother William died in his home in Harlem in 1962. Stanley died fourteen years later in February 1976 at the age of 77.
 
Until next month,
Cynthia
 

 
Sources and Further Reading
 
Braithwaite, William Stanley. The William Stanley Braithwaite Reader, Ann Arbor University of Michigan Press, 1972.
 
Harlem Renaissance - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlem_Renaissance
 
“Marriages.” The Afro American March 7, 1925, p. 6.
 
“Obituaries.” The Boston Globe September 25, 1957, p.34.
 
The Year Book of Trinity Church in the City of Boston, 1919, p.75.
 
Trinity Church Record Books of Baptisms and Confirmations
 
U.S. World War I Draft Registration Card, 1917-1918
 
U. S. World War II Draft Registration Card, 1942
 
“Van Tassell Party.” The Afro American August 4, 1928, p.5.
 
William Stanley Braithwaite - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/William_Stanley_Braithwaite