Henry Darger’s birth date is a puzzle.
When Henry’s parents met, his mother’s name was Mrs. Rosa Ronalds. She’d been married before—twice. First to a man named Fullman, later to one called Ronalds. Henry’s father’s name was also Henry Darger, and like his wife, he too had been married before—to Elizabeth, an immigrant from England, who died on September 14, 1883. Henry was an immigrant from Germany, and Rosa was native born, from Wisconsin. Rosa and Henry were married on August 18, 1890, and according to their marriage license, he was forty-nine when he was joined in holy matrimony with twenty-nine-year-old Rosa. It was a no-frills affair. John Murphy, a Chicago justice of the peace, married them, and his clerk, Henry Wulff, served as their witness.
Several years later, their son was born, but when? The date that Henry believed to be his birth doesn’t jibe with either of the two birth certificates on file for him. And, complicating matters, the birth certificates contradict one another!
Henry opens his unpublished autobiography, The History of My Life, by writing, “In the month of April, on the 12 in the year of 1892, of what week day I never knew, as I was never told, nor did I seek the information.” Written when he was sixty-eight and in ill health, he forgot to mention what the date refers to: his birthday. It’s this date that is typically used as his birth date.
But his birth certificates offer alternatives.
In the earlier of the two, Henry is not “Henry” at all, but “Arthar.” He was born on May 23, 1893—a year and twelve days later than Henry reports in his autobiography. He was born at home, at 2707 Portland Avenue on Chicago’s Near South Side. His father, Henry Darger, was fifty-two years old, a tailor, and a German immigrant, and his mother, Rosa Darger (née Burkeman) was thirty-two. “Arthar” was his mother’s third child. The form is dated June 2, 1893.
In the other one, dated a year and eight days later, Henry is “Henry” again. He’s still his mother’s third child, and she is called Rosie—not Rosa, though close enough—but his place of birth has changed to the Cook County Infirmary, where the most destitute of Chicago’s poor sought medical help. His father’s name remains “Henry,” but he’s not a German immigrant anymore, having now been born in the “UStates.” His occupation is “unknown.” Henry’s birth date—his third—is listed as May 28, 1894.
Which should we believe? And why are there two birth certificates, which contradict one another?
For the answers to these and other mysteries surrounding the life of outsider artist Henry Darger, be on the lookout forThrow-Away Boy: A Life of Henry Darger…
