Simon & Dora Ghertner’s questions answered and mysteries surface

Question answered: Census records from 1920 indicate Simon emigrated from Romania in 1902. That same census indicates Dora emigrated from Russia in 1885, where she was allegedly born in 1885

Minor mystery: Simon Ghertner listed his birth date as August 25, 1882 on his World War I Draft registration card. .Yet on the 1920 US Census, when he s living in Nashville, Tennssee his age was recorded as 35 which would have meant he was born about 1885 (not 1882); on the 1930 Census, Simon’s age was 45, which is consistent with the alleged 1885 birth date. I trust he’d have known his birth date but how did his age get recorded incorrectly twice a decade apart?

Family records of Dora Ella (Cooper) Ghertner’s birth date show it as October 17, 1880; yet her age listed on the 1920 US Census was 35, an error of 5 years. In 1930, her age on the Census roll was 40, so she only aged five years in the 1920s!

Simon Ghertner, later in life

Dora Ella Cooper, one of only two known pictures