Talk:Jerome Bonaparte Squier

Jerome Bonaparte Squier was not an immigrant from England

The statement that the Boston violin maker Jerome Bonaparte Squier was an immigrant from England is demonstrably wrong. As best I can see, this notion was invented in recent decades by the Fender musical instrument company, possibly to add a dash of romance to the story of the Squier music company that Fender acquired in 1965. With one exception, every contemporary record that I can find indicates the Boston luthier, and father of Victor Carroll Squier, was born in Ohio in 1838 or 1839, a son of Andrew J. Squier. The only exception is a census record for 1880 that states that he was born in Michigan. Nothing from the lifetime of Jerome Bonaparte Squier even remotely suggests that he was an immigrant.

I don't have the proficiency in Wikipedia markup language that I would need in order to revise the Wikipedia articles about Jerome Bonaparte Squire and the V. C. Squire Company and correctly cite my sources. So I'll leave this information here in raw form in case someone else would like to fix those two articles.

According to his Boston death certificate, Jerome B Squier, violin maker who died there on 1 June 1912, was born on 19 Nov 1838 in Akron, Ohio, a son of Andrew J. Squier.

The web site of the Johnson String Instrument shop of Newton Upper Falls, Massachusetts, a seller of vintage stringed instruments, says (at https://www.johnsonstring.com/american-collection/squier.htm) that Jerome Bonaparte Squier was born in Cleveland, Ohio.

The 1850 US census records Jerome Squires, age 11, born in Ohio, a son of A J and Joanna Squires, living in Chesterfield, Fulton County, Ohio.

The 1860 US census records Jerome Squires, age 21, born in Ohio, a son of A J and Joanna Squires, living in Buchanan, Page County, Iowa.

An 1863 US draft registration record of the Michigan counties of Eaton, Ingham, Calhoun, Jackson, and Washtenaw lists Jerome B Squier of Battle Creek, age 24, born in Ohio, a shoemaker, married.

The 1870 US census records J B Squire, age 32, born in Ohio, married to Olive Squire, living in Battle Creek, Calhoun County, Michigan with four children including Victor C Squire, age 3.

The 1880 US census records Jerome B Squire, age 40, born in Michigan, divorced, living in Worcester, Massachusetts, a shoe pattern maker.

Most records of the 1890 US census were destroyed in a fire in 1921, including all records for Massachusetts.

The 1900 US census records Jerome B Squier, born April 1839 in Ohio, married for 20 years but living singly as a lodger in Boston, Massachusetts, a violin maker.

The 1910 US census records Jerome B Squier, age 72, born in Ohio, father born in New York, mother born in Ohio, married for 29 years to Jeannette E. Squier, living in Boston, Massachusetts, a violin maker.

It's notable that the collection of Page County, Iowa obituaries cited in the Wikipedia article about Jerome Bonaparte Squier itself strongly suggests that Squier was born in Ohio, not England. The transcribed obituary for Jerome Bonaparte Squier, attributed to the Clarinda Herald of Clarinda, Iowa, on July 25, 1912, states that he was a brother of Eugene W. Squier, and the transcribed obituary for Eugene W. Squier, attributed to the Page County Democrat of Clarinda, Iowa, also on Jul 25, 1912, states that Eugene was born in Cleveland, Ohio in 1841, a son of Andrew Jackson and Joanna Squier.

Finally, an image at https://www.gegoux.com/UDVBM-Henley-page1092-Squier.jpg, showing pages 1092 and 1093 of the Universal Dictionary of Violin and Bow Makers (presumably the 1268-page 1973 edition), gives a brief biography of Jerome Bonaparte Squier that says that he was born in Ohio in 1838.

As a sidebar, an unsourced account posted to Ancestry.com states that a tradition among the descendants of Andrew Jackson Squier (or Squiers, or Squires), father of Jerome (and Eugene), has it that he was born with the surname Coleman, and that after his father died (or left), his mother remarried a John Squire or Squires or Squier, and Andrew took his stepfather's surname, or at any rate an approximation thereof. This may or not be the case. But contemporary records do seem to clearly indicate that Jerome Bonaparte Squier was certainly not an immigrant from England or anywhere else.

Jerome B. Squier's Boston death record, his draft record, and all of the abovementioned US census records can be easily found on ancestry.com. As is usual with ancestry.com, many of these records are badly mistranscribed; I have ignored the transcriptions and looked only at the images of the original records themselves. pnh (talk) 13:42, 14 February 2021 (UTC)