Heiress Times Two

Losing her mother—and in such a devastating way—must have been difficult for Rose Kober. Though we can hope life turned out better for Rose in the years following Anna Kraus’ 1921 death, such wishes don’t always come true.

Looking through the New York City area newspapers of the era, the Kober name surfaced a number of times in that same decade. Though I often comment that mine was not a family likely to have their name show up in The New York Times, in this one case, I have to take that statement back, for Rose’s mother-in-law became the next subject in my search.

Appearing on page forty six of the August 10, 1927, edition was the following brief entry, under “Wills for Probate—Queens”:

KOBER, PAULINE D. (July 31). Estate $3,000 real and $3,000 personal. To brother, John J. Hutton of 717 Ninety-sixth Street, Woodhaven; grandchildren, Pauline M. Thomas of 93-17 Eighty-fifth Avenue, Woodhaven; Florence H. Thomas and Clara B. Thomas of 80-00 Ninety-sixth Street, Woodhaven; daughter, Pauline J. Thomas of 80-00 Ninety-sixth Street, Woodhaven; son, George W. Kober, and his wife, Rose, of 80-20 Ninety-sixth Street, Woodhaven; nurse, Kate Heil of 717 Ninety-sixth Street, Woodhaven. Daughter, Pauline, executrix.

Though George Kober lost his mother on July 31, 1927, she herself was following in the footsteps of her own husband, for George William Kober had passed away only a few years earlier, on June 12, 1925.

For Rose, that meant the sudden and unexpected loss of her mother in 1921, followed by her father-in-law in 1925, and then her mother-in-law in 1927. That she was named in her mother-in-law’s will was likely small consolation in the face of so many losses. And considering how many family members were named along with her, the inheritance seems just as tiny—at least in today’s mindset—as the awards on Monopoly game cards.

That was not the last of such consolations for Rose, however. Five years later, a brief entry on April 27, 1932, alerts us to yet another loss Rose suffered. Incongruously—or, perhaps not so much unlike it—wedged under a soap-opera-styled story sprawled across the front page of the second section of the Long Island Daily Press, the insertion read,

LEAVES ALL TO WIDOW

Rose Kober of 89-29 96^th street, Ozone Park, is given the “more than $2,000” estate of her husband, George W. by a will on file in the surrogate’s court.