I will be telling the story of a woman who would be celebrating her 200th birthday today. However, it is somewhat debatable what her maiden name was. Our German Family Tree says she was Margaretha Reimann. And her marriage record from Germany says her maiden name was Peymann, which I figure was pronounced as “Pie Man”. Her information on Family Search says her name was Margarethe Riemann Peymann. I am going to use Peymann.

Margarethe Peymann was born on November 11 1825, so today would be her bicentennial birthday. I am only able to give you her father’s name. He was Johann Diedrich Peymann. I cannot provide any documentation for Margarethe until her marriage which took place in 1850. So, now I will turn our attention to the man who would become her husband.

Johann Heinrich Blanken was born on November 3, 1817 in Grasberg, Germany. John was the son of Herman and Adelheid (Luhrmann) Blanken. I am able to display John’s baptism record from the books of the Grasberg parish.

John Blanken married Margarethe Peymann on September 22, 1850. This couple was married at the Lamstedt parish in Germany. The church marriage record for this couple is displayed here. This form definitely gives Margarethe’s surname as Peymann.

I was not able to locate any immigration information about this Blanken pair, but they must have made the trip to America in the early 1850’s. Their first child was born and baptized in Frohna in 1854. The Blanken’s had 5 children, all who were baptized at Concordia Lutheran Church in Frohna. When the 1860 census was taken, the Blanken household listed 4 children. John was a farmer in the Brazeau Township.

One more child was born in 1864. It appears that the youngest child in the 1860 census, Martha, and the child born in 1864, Anna, had each died prior to the 1870 census. We find just 3 children in the census entry below. Their daughter, Margaret, should be listed as being 14 years old, not 4.

After the Civil War, Perry County carved out a new township called the Union Township. That is where we find the Blanken family in the 1880 census. This entry was a combination of the John Blanken family and the Herman Blanken family. Herman had married Lydia Gentsch in 1875. This entry makes it look like Margaret Blanken is Herman’s wife, but she was actually John and Margarethe’s daughter. Lidda (Lydia) is actually Herman’s wife.

John Blanken died in 1887 at the age of 69. He died during the time when Perry County was keeping death records. His is shown below in 2 images.

Another interesting fact about Margarethe Blanken is the fact that she died on November 11th, her birthday. She died in 1889 at the exact age of 64. On her Perry County death record below, you will see that she was listed as being 64 years old, but had no extra months or days given. This document also states that Margarethe had eplilepsy since childhood.

The above death records state that both John and Margarethe were buried in the Frohna Cemetery. In the Concordia Lutheran Cemetery in Frohna, both John and Margaretha have grave markers which were probably added at a later date to give evidence that people are buried there who had no gravestones to mark their grave site.

I have a theory about how Margarethe’s surname was changed from Peymann to Reimann. I think in America, the spelling of her surname was changed from beginning with a “P” to beginning with an “R”. Peymann would be pronounced as “pie man”. So, if you wanted to have the name that rhymed with Peymann while changing the name to having an “R” in front, a German might spell the name as Reimann. That would be pronounced like “rye man”. An American spelling for a name rhyming with “pie man” would be Riemann, but a good German would pronounce that as “ree man”. I have no idea why such a change would have been made, but each of their children’s baptism records give Margarethe’s maiden name as Reimann.