StoryTeller Tuesday Challenge: An Ordinary Day in the Plunkett Household

@Genealogy Matters Storyteller Tuesday Challenge

This post is the second for Robin Stewart’s Genealogy Matters Your Sixteens – Storyteller Tuesday Challenge.

An Ordinary Day: Peter Plunkett and Julia Smith
My Father’s Mother’s Mother’s Father and Mother

January–June 1875

An ordinary day for the Plunkett household at 418 Van Brunt Street in Brooklyn’s Red Hook waterfront neighborhood began with the sounds of dock work. Peter headed to his paper business, operating as a middleman in the rag trade. He bought bulk materials from street pickers and sold them to paper mills. Meanwhile, Julia managed the daily routines of eight children at home. They ranged from twenty-four-year-old twins Bernard and James down to five-year-old Mary. (For more about Peter Plunkett’s business, see “From Scraps to Success: Peter Plunkett’s Paper Business“).

The family of ten lived in tight quarters near the business. The waterfront hummed with commerce. Ships, warehouses, and the massive Erie Basin drove the local economy. Cobblestone streets rang with Irish and German accents. Cart wheels clattered over Belgian block, and the harbor’s salt air mixed with the acrid smell of industrial work.

Every family member likely played a role in the household economy. For instance, the adult children and teenagers may have sorted rags by quality, managed inventory, and handled the heavy, dirty work that came with the trade. The youngest children probably attended school. However, their help would have been expected at home. The amount of disease was staggering. Smallpox, tuberculosis and other communicable diseases were all over this stuff.²

Julia’s Daily Routine

An ordinary day for Julia would have centered on keeping the household running. Morning probably meant preparing breakfast for ten people. Then, she would get the younger children ready for school and coordinate everyone’s schedules. With eight children generating clothing and linens—plus work garments soiled by the rag business—laundry alone would have consumed entire days. Additionally, meal preparation, cleaning, mending, shopping, and managing the household budget would have filled her waking hours. Seventeen-year-old Bridget and twelve-year-old Julia may have helped with household tasks. Nevertheless, the weight of managing this large family rested on their mother’s shoulders.

The Church of the Visitation of the Blessed Virgin Mary stood a few blocks away on Van Brunt at Verona Street, within easy walking distance. It served as the center of Irish Catholic life in Red Hook. Founded in 1854 for Irish and German dock and factory workers, the parish was experiencing tremendous growth. In fact, construction began in 1876 on a magnificent new granite church to replace the small wooden one.³ Sunday Mass, feast days, baptisms, and First Communions most likely filled their calendar and provided their social network. Business connections were made after Mass. Marriages were arranged, and community bonds strengthened.

After Julia’s Death

Then May 15, 1875 arrived. Julia died at age fifty, leaving Peter with eight children still at home.

When census enumerators knocked on June 1—just seventeen days after Julia’s death—they found the household still together. Peter, now a widower at forty-six, kept everyone under one roof. The older sons were pursuing their own paths. Bernard (24) and Peter (19) were preparing for priesthood. James (24) worked in the family business, and John (23) would marry within the year.

Consequently, the household duties likely fell to Bridget (17) and young Julia (12). They would have managed cooking, laundry, and caring for Mary until Peter remarried in 1877. An ordinary day had become anything but ordinary. Two teenage girls running a household of ten—an extraordinary response to loss in 1875 Brooklyn.

1. George Bradford Brainerd (photographer), “Erie Basin, Brooklyn,” ca. 1872–1887; collodion silver glass wet plate negative, Brooklyn Museum/Brooklyn Public Library, Brooklyn Collection, Brooklyn Museum (Brooklyn, New York), item 1996.164.2-1798; digital image, Brooklyn Museum (https://www.brooklynmuseum.org/objects/192825 : accessed 12 January 2026). ↩︎
2. “Walkabout: Brooklyn, Through Rag and Bone,” Brownstoner (https://www.brownstoner.com/history/walkabout-brooklyn-through-rag-and-bone/ : accessed 12 January 2026). ↩︎
3. “Red Hook’s Visitation Church – 165 Years of Neighborhood Service,” Brownstoner (https://www.brownstoner.com/sponsored/red-hook-visitation-church-brooklyn-catholic-98-richards-street-koinonia-john-the-baptist/ : accessed 12 January 2026). ↩︎
4. Sanborn Map Company, “Brooklyn, V. 1, Double Page Plate No. 7 [Map bounded by Richards St., Partition St., Conover St., Imlay St., Verona St.],” in Insurance Maps of the Borough of Brooklyn City of New York (New York: Sanborn Map Co., 1886), vol. 1, plate 7; Lionel Pincus and Princess Firyal Map Division, New York Public Library (New York); digital image, New York Public Library Digital Collections (https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/edfe8810-c5fc-012f-4a9b-58d385a7bc34 : accessed 12 January 2026). ↩︎