When I began researching today’s main character, I discovered that all of the images I wanted to save to put in this post were already in our files. I eventually realized that I had begun writing this story on this date exactly a year ago. I must have made the decision to not finish the story, and instead wrote a post that announced that our museum had hired a new director, Kristen Lewis. So, I will finish this post today.

Hilda Caroline Maria Hoehn was born on January 25, 1891, so she is today’s birthday girl. Hilda would be celebrating her 133nd birthday today. She was the daughter of John and Elizabeth (Muench) Hoehn. Hilda was baptized at Immanuel Lutheran Church in Perryville. Below is a transcription of her baptism record from that congregation’s books.

Hilda is found in the 1900 census at the age of 9. Her father was a farmer in the Central Township.

Next, we find Hilda in the 1910 census when she was a teenager. 

Hilda would get married during the next decade, so we will turn our attention to the man she would marry. His name was Friedrich Ferdinand Yamnitz, who was born on March 22, 1887. He went by the name, Frederick or Fritz. He was the son of Ernst and Mary (Brickhaus) Yamnitz. In a story about Frederick’s parents titled, Yamnitz’s in Yount, it was said that his father had two wives and had sired 16 children between them. Thirteen of those children lived to adulthood. Frederick was a son of the second wife. He was baptized at Trinity Lutheran Church in Friedheim. An image of his baptism record is displayed below.

Frederick is found in the 1900 census at the age of 13. His father was a farmer in the Union Township of Bollinger County. In that previous Yamnitz post, a map of their farm indicated it was located very near the town of Yount.

Frederick was no longer living with his parents when the 1910 census was taken. He and one of his older sisters, Anna, were living in the Central Township where Frederick was farming.

Since Frederick was living in the Central Township, it is more likely that he attended Immanuel Lutheran Church in Perryville where Hilda and her family were members. On August 20, 1916, Frederick Yamnitz married Hilda Hoehn at Immanuel, Perryville. The Missouri marriage license for this couple is pictured below.

Frederick had his World War I draft registration completed in 1917. He is given a Perryville address on this form. There is no evidence that he was called into military service during that war.

Our German Family Tree lists 3 children born to this pair, all of which were baptized at Immanuel, Perryville. It appears that at some point in time, Frederick and Hilda bought a different farm located in the Saline Township of Perry County. That is where we find them in the 1920 census with 2 young children.

I think it might have been about this time in Frederick’s life that his parents gathered their 13 Yamnitz children together for the photo shown below. Frederick is the man standing over his father’s left shoulder in front of several brothers in the back row.

The 1930 census shows the Yamnitz’s with all 3 of their children.

When the 1940 census was enumerated, we find the Yamnitz household with just their 2 daughters. Their son, Vernard, had joined the military and was an airplane mechanic on a base in Michigan in 1940.

Frederick was required to complete a World War II draft card in 1942 even though he was already in his 50’s.

The last census we can view is the one taken in 1950. Just their youngest daughter, Eileen, remained with her parents, and it says she was doing chores on their farm.

Both Hilda and Frederick died in 1968. Hilda was 77 years old when she died. Hilda’s death certificate is shown here.

Hilda died in May, and Frederick died 2 months later in July at the age of 81. It appears that in the short time after his wife’s death, Frederick was moved into the Morris Boarding Home in Perryville because his death certificate says that was the place where he died.

Frederick and Hilda Yamnitz are buried together in the Immanuel Lutheran Cemetery in Perryville.

Since there were so many children in the Ernst Yamnitz family, it is likely that more Yamnitz stories will someday appear on this blog.

If you have never taken a look on our website for this, there is a counter that can be found which is called Blog Stats. That counter keeps track of how many “hits” our website has had since its inception in January of 2016. As of this morning, this counter was a bit above 980,000 hits. We are closing in on a million, which will likely happen this coming spring. I wish there was some way to tell which of our readers would be the one to hit a million.