Lina Pauline Scholl would be celebrating her special 150th birthday today if she was still alive. Lina was born on November 29, 1873, the daughter of Tobias and Wilhelmina (Ruehling) Scholl. She was baptized at Immanuel Lutheran Church in New Wells. An image of her baptism record from that congregation’s books is pictured here.

Lina is found in the 1880 census at the age of 6. Her father was a farmer in the Shawnee Township.

As it turns out, the above census entry was the only one in which Lina was a single person. So, we will now take a look at the man who would become Lina’s husband. His name was Franz Theodore Saupe, who was born on December 11, 1857. That means he was about 16 years older than Lina. Theodore was the son of Julius and Justine (Dietze) Saupe. It is certainly not common to find more than one baptism record for a child, but that is the case for Theodore. First, we find a baptism record for him in the books of Grace Lutheran Church in Uniontown. This one says he was baptized on December 23rd.

A second baptism record is found in the books of Salem Lutheran Church in Farrar. This one says his baptism took place on Christmas Day. Each baptism record has the same list of sponsors.

I do not know if this is a factor, but in 1857, the pastor at Grace, Uniontown was Rev. Carl Gruber, and at Salem, Farrar was his son, Rev. Theodore Gruber.

I was unable to locate the Saupe family in the 1860 census. I figure that they were still living in Perry County because Theodore’s father had a Civil War draft registration which included him in a long list of men from Perry County. However, when the 1870 census was taken, we find the Saupe’s living in the Apple Creek Township in northern Cape Girardeau County. Theodore was 13 years old, and his father was a farmer.

Theodore was confirmed at Immanuel Lutheran Church in New Wells in 1872. His confirmation class is displayed in the image below.

When the 1880 census was taken, we find Theodore at the age of 22 and still living with his parents. He was working on his father’s farm, which this time was located in the Shawnee Township.

Theodore Saupe married Lina Scholl on November 8, 1894 at Immanuel Lutheran Church in New Wells. The church record for this wedding is pictured here.

The Missouri marriage license for this pair is shown below.

The German Family Tree lists 4 children born to this couple, all of which were baptized at Immanuel, New Wells. Two of these children are found in the Saupe household in the 1900 census. Theodore was a farmer.

Sadly, that was the last census in which we find Lina Saupe. Two more children were born in the next decade, but then in February of 1909, Lina died at the age of 35. Her death record found in the books of Immanuel, New Wells says she died of pneumonia. Lina is buried in the Immanuel Lutheran Cemetery in New Wells, but Findagrave.com has no gravestone photo.

Later in 1909, a new Lutheran church was established in Shawneetown, just down the road from New Wells. In the books of that congregation, among the list of their first members, we find the members of the Theodore Saupe family, minus that of his wife, Lina.

We also find Theodore and his oldest son taking communion at the new congregation in 1909.

The 1910 census shows Theodore as a widower with his 4 children, ages 5 to 14. His oldest son, Rudolph, was helping his father on his farm.

Theodore never remarried. The next census we can view in 1920 lists just 3 children living with Theodore. His oldest son had moved to South Dakota where he eventually was married and spent the rest of his life.

The last census in which we find Theodore is the one taken in 1930. He was 72 years old and living with his son, Isadore, who had gotten married by that time.

Theodore Saupe died in 1936 at the age of 78. His death certificate below states that he died of cancer of the liver and stomach.

Theodore Saupe is buried in the Trinity Lutheran Cemetery in Shawneetown. For some unknown reason, his birth year is given as 1858 on his gravestone, not 1857, as is seen on his baptism records and his death certificate.

One strange thing in this story is that Theodore has two baptism records in two different sets of church books. I would say that it is also not ordinary that a groom that was 16 years older than his bride would end up outliving his wife by 27 years.