There are a few more funeral cards in my possession that belonged to my grandmother. Today’s card is for Anna Kowalsky, who died on 29 November 1936. She passed away only two days after my grandfather, George Sabo. Interestingly, her funeral was handled by the John J. Labash & Son funeral home at 40 Monroe Street in Passaic, New Jersey, while my grandfather’s was handled by the Andrew Labash funeral home at 102 Market Street, also in Passaic. The Labashes might have been cousins as there are a couple of different Labash families in Passaic and all are undertakers.

Anna Kowalsky Prayer Card

Anna Kowalsky, reverse side

I don’t recognize the Kowalsky name from my grandmother’s many friends, so she must not have kept in touch with the family in later years.

The Kowalskys are a bit confusing. I have found several different John and Anna Kowalsky family groups (Anna and husband John are buried together at St. Michael’s Cemetery in Garfield, Bergen, New Jersey) but none of their children are buried there.

Online family trees have the usual splattering of records attached for them in Cleveland, Ohio, Detroit, Michigan, Litchfield County, Connecticut and Passaic and Clifton, New Jersey. Children’s names don’t match up. Some records say born in Germany, some in west Prussia, some in Kiev, Russia.

However, John Kowalsky’s naturalization declaration record, dated 16 December 1918,  is recorded in Passaic County, New Jersey. He was born 18 October 1879 in Resolv, Poland. Anna, according to the same petition, was born in Nowa Grobla, Poland. It indicates that he arrived in New York from Hamburg, Germany on 29 May 1905.

It appears from the 1910 and 1940 censuses that John and Anna Kowalsky had at least two children, Mary, born about 1908 and Nicholas, born about 1912, both in New Jersey.

Links to Mary call her Elizabeth Marie and indicate that she married Harry Feld. Harry appears to have been born 13 October 1899 and died on 6 July 1993 in Paterson, Passaic County, New Jersey. Wife Betty was born 21 September 1907 and died 19 December 1992 in Passaic, New Jersey. Both are found in the SSDI.

Nicholas was born 5 December 1911 and died in January 1975, also found in the SSDI.

If you are related to John and Anna Kowalsky, please contact me. I would love to return Anna’s funeral prayer card to a family member.