The tale today has little documentation to be found in the German Lutheran records from area churches. Those few documents are the starting point for this story that takes us off into some interesting directions, but I think it’s a few photographs that I located on Ancestry that convinced me to compose this article. Benjamin … More Benjamin’s Spanish-American War Band
This past week, our museum’s printed copy of the German Family Tree was updated as a result of constant work being done by Lynn Degenhardt to make improvements to it. This document is now over 4000 pages long. I have not yet loaded the digital version of that document on my personal laptop, so I … More Engelbert and Eva Erlbacher
Much of today’s story will take place in Germany. It is the tale of a Stueve woman who married a Wichern man. In earlier posts, I have told of a Wichern woman who marries a Stueve man, but today you will read one that results in some more Wichern’s living in Perry County. I will … More Another Stueve-Wichern Story
I have written a few previous posts about an Engelhart family that lived in the area near Pocahontas. It was a very large family, one that apparently got together for several family reunions. The story today will be about the firstborn child in that family. She and two brothers were born in Austria before coming … More The Eldest of the Engelhart’s
I have known some details of the story I will write today, and I have wanted to tell it for a while. Today is a good occasion to tell it. I do not often write a story that starts with a date of death, but in this case, that is about the only date I … More Pastor Dies While Attending Convention in Altenburg
Oscar Christian Kassel was born on this day 125 years ago. It is his story that I will attempt to tell today. Oscar was the son of Christian and Sulamith (Hopfer) Kassel, born on October 13, 1897. That already puts him a rather large group. Our German Family Tree lists 15 children born to Christian … More Frohna Machine Shop – Perryville Parts Guy
I have decided to share this previous blog instead of writing a new one. I am doing so because today the funeral service for Thelma Steffens will take place at Immanuel Lutheran Church in Altenburg. I have been told that Thelma was the last to have helped operate the Steffens Orchard described in this post … More Rudy and Lydia and Their Fruit
You will be reading in this post about a wedding that took place 126 years ago. This year is the 125th anniversary year of Zion Lutheran Church in Longtown. The family of the bride was especially involved in the establishment of that congregation. However, the marriage is not recorded in that church’s books because it … More Longtown Hoehn’s
Johann Heinrich Ehlers was born on October 10, 1873, so today would have been his 149th birthday. Every census record in which we find John says that he was born in Illinois. However, his baptism record is found in the books of Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg, Missouri. That record is pictured below. There is … More John Ehlers – Broom Maker with Boehme Bride
I am not going to be writing my typical story today. Instead of discussing people, I’ll be writing about bricks. This tale began with a knock on my front door a few days ago. My neighbor, Greg Jung, who grazes his cows in my pasture regularly, was out making preparations for the cows to return … More Buenger Well Brick
