The birthday boy for today is Erich Herman Mueller.  He was born on June 23, 1900, so he would have been 118 years old today.  Erich was the son of Adolph and Martha (Koenig) Mueller, and he was baptized at Salem Lutheran Church in Farrar, Missouri.  Some of Adolph’s older siblings had been baptized at Grace Lutheran Church in Uniontown, where Adolph was raised.  Here is a photograph of Erich’s parents.

When Erich was 18 years old, he filled out his World War I draft registration.  His form indicates that he was living in the Menfro, Missouri area and working for his father on his farm.

I will not show it, but the 1920 census indicates Erich was still living in Perry County.

I am going to move on to Kansas in order to set the scene for Erich’s wedding.  A child was born in Herkimer, Kansas on January 14, 1903.  Her name was Sophie Gaede.  She was the daughter of Christian and Louise (Pralle) Gaede.  Here is a photo of the Gaede family.

Sophie is standing in the back on the left.  In this 1920 census, we see that the Gaede family was still living in Herkimer with her father working as a farmer.

However sometime during the 1920’s, this family moved to Hoxie, Kansas.  Also around the same time, it is likely that Erich Mueller came to work in Kansas.  I am not sure whether Erich met Sophie in Herkimer or in Hoxie, but it is said that Erich and Sophie were married on June 27, 1924.  Their first child was reportedly born in 1925 in Hoxie.  Here is the wedding photo of Erich and Sophie Mueller.

In the 1930 census, we find both the Mueller family and Sophie’s parents listed right next to each other.

There was already a Lutheran church established in Hoxie, Kansas in 1888.  It was Immanuel Lutheran Church.  It was located in the rural area northwest of the town of Hoxie.  A new church was built there in 1948.  Here is a photo of that church.

That congregation moved into the town of Hoxie later on.  I cannot resist posting some photos I found of the town of Hoxie that were taken in the early part of the 1900’s.  The thumbnails are clickable.

 

The 1940 census records that the Mueller family was still living in Hoxie with five children.

It was not long after this census that Erich and Sophie moved their family back to Perry County.  Their sons, Reinhold and Marvin, were confirmed at Salem Lutheran Church in Farrar in 1941 and 1942.

Probably at about the time when Immanuel Lutheran Church was built in Hoxie in 1948, Sophie’s parents were celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary.  We have this photo of that event, and it looks like it was taken outside that new church.

Sophie died in 1989; Erich died in 1991.  They are buried together in the Immanuel Lutheran Cemetery in Perryville, Missouri.  Here is their gravestone.

Someone in Sophie’s Gaede family has compiled all the Gaede siblings’ gravestones in a collage.  It covers two pages.

 

Sophie is the only sibling buried outside the state of Kansas.  We also have this photo of Erich Mueller taken later in his life.

Some folks around here to this day get a little offended when people say they are going “back to Farrar”.  This has been a story where a Farrar native leaves the state of Missouri only to come “back to Farrar”.