The main industry in East Perry County is lumber. Logs are constantly being transported down Main Streetm most on their way to the East Perry Lumber Company in Frohna or the Altenburg Hardwood Company in Altenburg. Quite a few local men could be described as lumberjacks in the business of felling trees. Trees are important around here. Most of the trees found growing in East Perry County would be classified as hardwoods. However, today I will be telling the story of one tree that has been located in Altenburg for over 100 years, and it would biologically be called a hardwood tree, but it is known for being used in carving and scroll-sawing projects because of its “softness”. That tree fell this past week, but it was not felled by a lumberjack. A large portion of it just fell. It may have just fallen because of old age, weakened by some pretty strong winds in the days prior to its falling. That tree had an interesting story, and it became quite a landmark for Altenburgers over the years, especially for children that grew up here and attended Trinity Lutheran School. I am going to attempt to tell that story today.

The story begins with two characters, one an adult and one a child. I am going to begin with the child. Arthur Martin Lohmann was born on October 14, 1883, the son of Peter and Wilhelmine (Mueller) Lohmann. Wilhelmine was Peter’s 4th wife, and Arthur was that couple’s first child. The story of Peter Lohmann was told in the post, Lohmann – The Altenburg Cobbler. Arthur was baptized at Trinity Lutheran Church in Altenburg, and we can view his baptism record below.

Since Arthur’s story has already been told on this blog in the post, Panhandle Pete of Perryville, I will not go into much of the detail about his life now. What matters that is connected to the tree story is that a new Lutheran teacher arrived on the scene in Altenburg when Arthur was just one year old. His name was Werner Asche. Teacher Asche was the teacher of the younger students at Trinity, Altenburg from 1883-1895. On Ancestry.com, family trees for Werner say that he was born in 1846, but none of them give an exact birthday. I will be showing evidence that Teacher Asche was born on October 14th, so he and Arthur Lohmann would celebrate their birthdays on the same day. When Teacher Asche arrived on the scene, he was teaching in a log cabin building. Below, we see Teacher Ashe with his class taken in front of that building. I do not have a date for this photo, so I suppose it is possible that Arthur might be one of the younger ones in this picture. I count 54 pupils in this photo.

If I took some extra time, I could find the year when Trinity constructed a new brick building to be used by the younger students. It was called the Kleine Schule (Little School). A later photo showing Teacher Asche in front of the new Kleine Schule can be seen here. Once again, I would say that Arthur may be in this picture. I count 47 students.

I figure that Arthur began as a first grader (there were no Kindergartens then) in 1889. Two years after that, you get to the year that I wrote about yesterday. That post was about the confirmation classes in 1891, and Teacher Asche’s daughter, Marie Asche, was one of the members of the Trinity, Altenburg confirmation class that year.

Now, we have made our way to the year that the tree discussed in this post was planted. That took place on October 14, 1892. We have a Lohmann binder in our research library, and within that binder, we can find some stories that were written down by Arthur Lohmann. Arthur became a Lutheran pastor, and his story was written in the post, Panhandle Pete of Perryville. One story written by Pastor Lohmann was this one about the tree. His tale mentions that he shared his birthday with his teacher, and that they planted a tree on the day they were each celebrating their birthdays. For Arthur, it would have been his 9th birthday. Teacher Asche would have turned 46 on that day. The teacher was born in ’46, and turned 46 when he was planting the tree.

Arthur was about to leave the Kleine Schule after four years as a student in Teacher Asche’s class and move to the Grosse Schule, which was located on the other side of the Trinity church sanctuary. The teacher of the older students at that time was George Beyer. The Grosse Schule (Big School) was located in the building that was once used as the first permanent church that had been built in 1845. That building is now a gallery in our museum.

The tree that was planted by the teacher and his student was a Linden tree. Such trees have a special place in the German culture. They are often planted near buildings that house the local government in German towns. Traditionally, important decisions were made under a Linden tree. I suppose it is possible that someone in the original 1839 immigration may have brought some Linden seeds with them and planted them in Perry County. I guess that I like to think this happened, and a population of German linden trees may have grown up in Perry County. However, I understand that there is also an American linden tree that is native to this country. I do not know what version of a linden tree was planted by Arthur and his teacher. Linden trees are also called basswoods, especially in this country. Basswood is a favorite of woodcarvers and woodworkers.

Before I move on to tell the story of this tree’s demise, I want to tell you what else I discovered about that tree-planting day. I did a search on our German Family Tree and found a result that said a man named Theodore Buszin died on that day in Altenburg. I have actually written the story of that death on this blog. It was titled, Pastor Dies While Attending Convention in Altenburg. Theodore was not from Altenburg. He was a Lutheran pastor who at the time of his death in Altenburg was serving Immanuel Lutheran Church in Cole Camp, Missouri. He was in town because, as had been the case in several previous years, the Western District of the Missouri Synod was having its convention hosted by Trinity, Altenburg. Rev. Buszin is buried in the Trinity Lutheran Cemetery.

I cannot help but let my mind imagine a scene in which pastors from all over the Western District (now called the Missouri District) were wandering around Altenburg, especially around Trinity’s church. I picture in my mind a few pastors seeing a teacher and his pupil planting a tree between the Kleine Schule and Trinity’s 1867 church building. I can just see them wander over to ask the pair what they were doing, and I figure either the teacher or his eager pupil would have been glad to tell them the story.

That tree would go on to live next to Trinity’s church for about 133 1/2 years. I looked through my phone and found this photo, which I think is the last one that I took including the Asche/Lohmann linden tree. You can see how large it had become.

The linden tree’s life came to an end recently on Friday, March 13th…yes, on a Friday the Thirteenth. We had some severe weather go through here, including a tornado warning, a few days before March 13th, and maybe part of the tree had been weakened as a result. There was not much happening weather-wise on the evening that a large limb of the tree came down and perched itself on the side of our church. Here are a few photos that I took on the morning of March 14th. They can be clicked to enlarge them.

A rather quick decision was made that this old tree should be taken down. That decision also included the idea of getting it taken care of before Sunday’s worship service. Trinity, Altenburg is blessed with many men who are skilled at tree removal and have the necessary tools and equipment to make it happen. I just so happened to be volunteering as a docent at the museum that day, so I was able to monitor and record what was happening when we did not have guests. Quite a few people either helped with the tree removal or wanted to watch it. Here are a few photos I took. The work was amazingly completed before noon that day.

All of the remnants of this tree were taken and added to a pile located behind our museum. I have been told that at least one local woodworker has taken some of the wood for his future projects. Our new pastor has also said that he has plans to have some sort of crosses made out of the wood for our members.

I do have just a few more comments before I close.

• When the tree was being cut down, a very, very angry raccoon vacated his home that was inside that tree. It managed to escape and quite possibly could be the only homeless resident of Altenburg now. The photo below shows how he might have found a home in this tree.

• The people that mow our church property are likely to be thankful now that this tree has been removed because there were often limbs on the ground that had to be picked up prior to mowing.
• I have heard that countless numbers of children played or sat under this tree when they attended the school at Trinity.
• I am hoping that some people in the Lohmann family may have some more facts to add to this story.
• I do not often state opinions on this blog, but I think it is time for Trinity to plant some new trees on their property soon. So many have been taken down or fallen down during recent years. I think it is time to adopt the attitude of the teacher and his student and plant some trees as a memory of good things that have taken place at this congregation. I also think it is important for people to preserve stories like this one so future generations know about them.

Just a few days ago, we had a beautiful sunrise, and I stopped on my way to breakfast to take this picture. I guess one good thing is that we can now view sunrises like this without the Asche/Lohmann tree blocking it.

I encourage people to comment on their memories of this historic tree.