Born: 16 Jun 1882 Henry Co. VA Married: 21 Mar 1914 Clifton, Greenlee Co., AZ Died: 03 Apr 1978 San Antonio, Bexar, TX FATHER Unknown MOTHER Unknown WIFE Anne Young  CHILDREN 1. Chase Jackson Brooke b. 11 Jan 1915 2. Richard Coorpender Brooke b. 1919

Chase Jackson Brooke

by Chase Brooke

Aug 2020

Chase Jackson Brooke told his children and grandchildren that he was born in Henry Co., VA and that his parents were Chase J Brooke and Anne Gwynne. (1)   He said that he was orphaned at the age of 14. He refered to having been living in Germany, France and England.  At the age of 9 the family visited Devon England and met a man named "Brooke' and then they sailed home.
Chase gave various dates of birth on various records.  The WWI Registration form recorded that he was born 16 Jun 1879.  (2) However, his passport application form says he was born 16 Jun 1882.  The age given in 1911 when he was returning from Cuba was age 29 (born about 1882).  And his death certificate reads that he was born 16 Jun 1880.
The first time Chase Jackson Brooke shows up in any record is in 1911 when he was returning from Cuba. (3)   According to his passport application forms, he went to Cuba in 1907. (4)   There are no records of any military involvement.  He was probably in Cuba as part of the Provisional Government Support issued by President Theodore Roosevelt in 1906.  In the Feb 23, 1911 passenger log as he was returning from Cuba, he stated that his last place of residence was Richmond, VA and his arrival destination was also Richmond.  However, he has not been found in Richmond. Instead he was a resident of Las Palomas, Chihuahua, Mexico by Oct 8, 1911 staying at the Zeiger Hotel in El Paso. (5)  His passport application says he was a resident of Mexico from March 1911 to June 1912. (6) By 1913 he was working for the El Paso Milling Co and can be found in the El Paso City Directory of 1913 listed as a timekeeper, residence at 608 N Stanton. (7)
The next year he was in Clifton, AZ employed as a bookkeeper for the Clifton Lumber and Imp. Co.  He met Ann Young there and married her on March 21, 1914. (8) By 1917 he was working for the Arizona Copper Mine and getting involved in labor issues.

"C. J. Brooke was a member of four people chosen to represent the union, the ILGWU, at a commission hearing in Phoenix in 1917.  President Wilson formed the commission to investigate unrest among the unions in the copper mining region of Arizona.  The two principal commissioners were _____Wilson, Secretary of Labor and Felix Frankfurter, Assistant to President Wilson and future Supreme Court Justice.  The fact that such important people were appointed to the commission shows how worried President Wilson was about labor unrest occurring during wartime. C. J. worked for the Arizona Copper Mine in the spare parts department which had recently unionized.  One of the major concerns of the union was that wages had not kept up with cost of living increases.  C.J.'s main job during the commission hearing was to review with the commission a set of figures which he had put together to demonstrate that cost of living increases had outstripped wage increases.  C.J. was the main speaker, and judging from the record he did pretty well under strong questions from both Secretary Wilson and Frankfurter."

After Clifton, Arizona he moved with his family to Nueva Rosita, Coahuila, Mexico sometime in the 1920's where he worked as an accountant for ASARCO, an American mining company, until he retired in the early 1950's. He started his own business in Mexico but soon after he moved to San Antonio, Texas where his wife went into a nursing home.  He was a very intelligent and energetic man who loved to talk and spin a yarn.  He worked as a tax preparer for H&R Block well into his seventies. At the time of his death on 3 Apr 1978 at the age of 95 he was living with his youngest son, Richard, surrounded by numerous grandchildren.

Sources

(1) Letter written to Susan White Brooke about 1970

About the family history: I have a lot of second hand information (my parents died in a typhoid epidemic when I was 14) so what I have is from other, and a lot is probably made up. The first Brooke was in Virginia in 1696.  He was the fourth son of a Devonshire family, which had neer had many male children before, so they named him Chase and when he grew up he have to move out, as the fourth son got nothing, So, apparently with a little family pull he came to Virginia as a Surveyor to the Crown.  About 1741 they got a small land grant in Henry County, which was then part of Pittsylvania County. The name Chase came down to my grandfather, who married Caroline Jackson from the Eastern shore of Maryland, -- so they named my father Chase Jackson. When I was 9 years old we were in England and they took me to see an old gentleman (Brooke) who told a long story, very hard for me to understand, as after 5 years in Germany, France and Switzerland my ear from English was not too good. Refers to coming home on the boat.

(2) WWI Registration Form
Chase Jackson Brooke born June 16, 1879

(3) Alien Passengers going to the US
onboard SS Chalmatte
from Havana, Cuba 21 Feb 1911  
C J Brooke, clerk, age 29 

(4) 1941 Passport application
names parents
Gives times spent in Mexico and Cuba

(5) El Paso Times
8 Oct 1911

(6) Passport Application

(7) US City Directories, El Paso, TX

(8) Marriage License  

(9) Death Certificate

C. J. Brooke was an accountant for ASARCO in Rosita, Mexico in the early 1920's. C J Brooke is in the center in a white shirt

The photo with the car is of Anne Young and Chase Brooke with their two sons taken around 1930.

Photo taken in 1933 with son Jack

Abt. 1935

Abt. 1942

Photo taken in 1970 in Mexico City. Back Row: C.J., Chuck, Jack - Front Row: Tim and John

..

1968 San Antonio, Texas.  Anne and C J Brooke

.