I will introduce a new name to this blog today. That name is Klugherz. According to Google Translate, this name means “wise heart”. A Klugherz man marries today’s birthday girl. I will begin with her story.

Ida Elizabeth Scholl was born on September 11, 1881, thus making today her 145th birthday. Ida was the daughter of Conrad and Maria (Koessl) Scholl. She was the 7th of 9 children born to her parents, several of which died early. Ida was baptized at Immanuel Lutheran Church in New Wells. Let’s take a look at her baptism record below. I like to find a baptism record at the top of a records page so you can definitely identify the year of the baptism, and you can see the names given to the columns.

Ida is one of those people who, being born so soon after the 1880 census, and because we cannot view the 1890 census, she would be almost 20 years old before we can look at her in the 1900 census. It also means that it would be the only census in which we find Ida before she got married. Ida was 18 years old in this entry, and her father was a blacksmith in the Shawnee Township.

Now, we will turn our attention to the man who carried the name Klugherz. William August Klugherz was born on February 7, 1874. William was the son of Rudolph and Catherine (Borchelt) Klugherz. He was born in or near Cape Girardeau and baptized at Trinity Lutheran Church in that town. I am unable to display an actual image of his baptism record, but I can show you this transcription.

I found the Klugherz name as far back as 1862 in the Trinity, Cape Girardeau records, so this congregation had Klugherz’s sitting in its pews for quite a few years before William was born. William is found in the 1880 census at the age of 5. His father was a farmer in the Cape Girardeau Township. Also included in the household was a 20 year-old young lady named Emilia Borchelt, who was called an orphan. She likely was related to William’s mother somehow.

In the 1900 census, William was the only child living with his parents in Cape Girardeau. He was 26 years old and working as a saloon keeper. His father was called a day laborer.

William Klugherz married Ida Scholl on October 5, 1902 at Immanuel Lutheran Church in New Wells. We can take a look at the church marriage record for this couple here. All the marriage records that I will show will indicate that William was from Cape Girardeau, and Ida was from Shawneetown, just down the road from New Wells.

We are also able to view 2 different civil marriage records for this occasion.

William and Ida had just one child, a son named Rudolph, who was born in 1902 and baptized at Trinity Lutheran Church in Cape Girardeau. Rudolph’s baptism record is seen here.

Sadly, Rudolph died in February of 1903, so William and Ida would spend the rest of their lives with no children. In the 1910 census, the Klugherz’s were living in Cape Girardeau where William was a proprietor of a saloon.

William had his World War I draft registration completed in 1918 despite already being 45 years old. He is given a Cape Girardeau address and called a delivery wagon driver. His employer was the Bauer Brothers.

When the 1920 census was taken, William was working for the shoe factory in Cape Girardeau. Despite the household just consisting of William and Ida, William is found as the last entry on a census page, and Ida is found at the top of the next page.

Next, we find the Klugherz’s in the 1930 census. William was still working at the shoe factory.

The Klugherz couple is next found in the 1940 census with William having the same occupation.

The last census the public can view is the one taken in 1950, which also turned out to be the year that William died. When that entry was completed, William no longer had an occupation.

The above census was dated as being submitted on April 5th. William Klugherz died 5 days later on April 10th at the age of 76. His death certificate is displayed below.

Ida Klugherz died in 1970 at the age of 88. Her death certificate says that she died at the Wilson Nursing Home in Cape Girardeau.

William and Ida Klugherz are buried together in the New Lorimer Cemetery in Cape Girardeau. Their gravestone gives evidence that this couple changed their surname’s spelling to Klughartz, which does not get translated in any way on Google Translate. I like it better when it gets translated as “wise heart”.

Sadly, today’s highlighted couple would have no descendants because their only child died as an infant. That means this branch of the Klugherz family tree comes to an end. It looks as if other branches of this tree had descendants who carried on the Klugherz name. However, I will tell you that I asked some old-timers at my breakfast table this morning if they were familiar with this surname, and I got nothing but negative replies. I am thinking that it is likely that this will be the only Klugherz post to appear on this blog.