Hazard, Rachel
Rachel Hazard
Winchester, NH
Rachel Hazard lived with her mother Amanda for most of her life. She was born March 5, 1906, the second to last child of the eight Hazard children. At the time, the family resided in Chelsea, VT, where her father worked as a teamster and lumberman.
By the 1910s, the Hazard family was living in Woodstock, VT and may have been living through difficult times. In 1920, 13-year old Rachel was listed as an inmate in the Vermont Industrial School in Vergennes City, VT, along with her 11-year old little brother Frederick. Established in 1874, the Industrial School was a reform school for young offenders but also became a shelter for children of families facing extreme poverty.
It is unclear how long the Hazard children remained in the industrial school. As young adults, Rachel and Frederick moved into their older brother’s home in Winchester, New Hampshire, where their mother also resided. The 1930 census indicates that Rachel had found work locally as a domestic servant in a private home.
Within five years, Rachel had moved back to Woodstock, VT, with her mother Amanda. In the 1940 census, Amanda and Rachel Hazard were boarding within the white household of Adeline Barney and her two children. “Manda” identified as 64 years old, Negro, widowed, and unable to work. Rachel was listed as 34, Negro, and single. She worked as a dishwasher at a local tavern, working 52 hours a week for $312. Also boarding with the Barneys was Rachel’s relative John J. Dunbar, a 62-year old Negro male born in Tunbridge, VT.
Rachel Hazard died on March 4, 1977 at the age of 70. She remained single her entire life and lived at 38 Pine Street in Rutland, VT, in her later years.
GENEALOGICAL SUMMARY
RACHEL HAZARD was born in 1906 in Chelsea, VT, to WILLIAM F. HAZARD and AMANDA DUNBAR. She died in Rutland, VT, in 1977.
SOURCE MATERIALS
U.S. Federal Census, 1910, 1920, 1930, 1940
Vermont Vital Records, Births, 1906- Ancestry.com
Vermont Vital Records, Deaths, 1977- Ancestry.com