©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder
On this day in 1935, my great-grandfather, Louis (Luigi) Licciardi, had his photo in The Cleveland Plain Dealer! He was the president of the Italian War Veterans (Cleveland Branch), and the newspaper article recounted a large event in honor of several commemorations important to the city's Italian-American community. (Click for larger view.) This article reminds us that Mussolini and his actions were looked upon favorably by Italians in America, at least for a time before the onset of the Second World War.
©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder
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This coming Friday, November 7, marks the 25th anniversary of the death of my husband's maternal grandmother, Rita Brunswick Tumbush. This obituary, which was published on the same day as her death, is from the Celina Daily Standard (Mercer County, Ohio). Rita was born 14 Sep 1921 to Lawrence and Justina (Braun) Brunswick, the second of the couple's eleven children. She grew up on a farm in Sharpsburg, Gibson Township, Mercer County, Ohio. As a teenager, she left her family farm and went to work in the home of a church minister in nearby Ft. Recovery, Ohio. She married Frank Tumbush on 21 Nov 1942 at St. Paul's Church in Sharpsburg and they had seven children.
More about Rita's ancestry can be located at the following links: Brunswick Line (her paternal grandfather) Braun Line (her paternal grandfather) Kahlig Line (her maternal grandmother) Rolfes Line (her paternal grandmother) ©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder A couple of weeks ago, FamilySearch posted on their site the images within their Ohio, County Death Records, 1840-2001 record set. Previously, I had to check to see if an ancestor's death record had been indexed, and, if so, I had to order a copy of the image from their photoduplication service. This release of images was a big deal for me, because just about all of my and my husband's ancestors lived in and died in Ohio. I was somewhat disappointed, though, to see that death records for Darke County in western Ohio were NOT included in the record set. My husband's French Catholic ancestors settled in the northeastern part of that county, and I was looking forward to finding some of their death records. Not one to dwell upon disappointment when there were so many OTHER county records to comb through, I decided to search through Mercer County's images for ancestors from my mother-in-law's side who settled there in the 19th century. I was searching through the entire set page-by-page, and I found a lot of ancestors whose records had not previously been indexed and whose names were indexed or transcribed so poorly that there proper names didn't show up in the search engine results. Suddenly, I came across the name 'Crist Magato,' who was my husband's FRENCH 4th great-grandfather through his paternal grandmother's line. Christopher never lived in Mercer County, and, according to this death record, he didn't die there either. (Click below for larger view.) The death record states that he passed away in Osgood, which is a small town located in Patterson Twp, Darke County, about a mile south of the Mercer-Darke county line. In the 1880 U.S. Census, Christopher is living in Wayne Twp, Darke County, which is directly south of Patterson Twp. He is also buried in Frenchtown, Wayne Twp, so I assume he remained there until his 1892 death. I am glad that I stumbled upon a death record for him, but now, I have more questions. Why did his death occur in Osgood, and not closer to where I assumed he was living. Maybe he was staying with a family member in his old age? I have not yet located his obituary, but that might provide some additional clues.
And why was his death recorded in Mercer County? As I mentioned above, I searched the entire Mercer County set for our family tree surnames, and this is the only Darke County relative I have found in Mercer County records. This experiences has taught me, though, to check record sets for adjacent counties, just in case an assessor or recorder decided to jot down a death that may have happened near, but not technically within, county lines. ©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder Mary Frances Wimmers Tumbush, who went by Frances her entire life, was my husband's great-grandmother through his maternal line. She was born 9 Mar 1872 in Granville Township, Mercer County, Ohio, the only daughter of German Catholic immigrants John Wimmers and Mary A. Hummler. In January 1893*, she married Henry Tumbusch (surname spelling later changed to Tumbush). Between 1895 and 1919, they had eleven children, nine of whom survived into adulthood. Her youngest son, Frank (1914-1997), was my husband's maternal grandfather. She was widowed in 1942. She passed away 14 November 1955 in Rockford, Ohio and is buried 17 November 1955 in St. Henry Cemetery in Mercer County. *Date of marriage based on obituary of husband, Henry Tumbush, published 4 September 1942 in The Minster Post I have located two separate obituaries for Frances. This first one was published in The Lima News on 16 November 1955: The second obituary was published 18 November 1955 in The Coldwater Chronicle: "Funeral services for Mrs. Frances Tumbush, 83, were held yesterday (Thursday) at St. Henry Catholic Church. Rev. Valentine Fleckenstein officiated and burial followed in the church cemetery. Death occurred Monday at the Colonial Rest Home in Rockford, following an illness of one year. She had been confined to her bed for the last eight weeks. Born in St. Henry March 9, 1872, a daughter of the late Mr. and Mrs. Henry* Wimmers, she was married to Henry Tumbush, who preceded her in death 12 years ago. Two sons are also deceased. She was a member of the St. Henry Catholic Church and the Christian Mothers sodality. Surviving are the following sons and daughters: valentine of Valley City; Edward of St. Marys; Leo of Celina; Albert , Anthony and Frank, all of St. Henry; Julius of Coldwater; Mrs. Isadore Steinke of Montezuma and Sister M. Iedephonse of Dayton. There are also 26 grandchildren and 15 great grandchildren, and a brother, Bernard Wimmers, of St. Henry." I placed an asterisk after her father's first name, because it is incorrect - it should be John. John Wimmers passed away due to an accident in 1882, when Frances was only ten years old, so it is understandable that younger family members who wrote this obituary may not have known his first name. Just this past week, I was able to obtain the Frances's death certificate from the Ohio History Connection (formerly the Ohio Historical Society). They recently acquired 1954-1963 death certificates from the Ohio Department of Health, and charge the public a small fraction of what the Office of Vital Statistics was previously charging for them. ©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder
Johann Heinrich (Henry) Rolfes was my husband's 4th great-grandfather through my mother-in-law's Brunswick line. He immigrated to America from Germany in the early 1830s. After arriving at the Port of Baltimore, he made the journey to western Ohio, and settled in the newly-formed German-immigrant town of Minster. Henry married Maria Catharina Huessmann in 1836 and, in 1852-53, he purchased a fair amount of land in Auglaize County's Jackson Township, a couple of miles southwest of the Minster town limits. Until this past week, I had had trouble locating Henry and his family in the 1850 and 1860 U.S. Censuses. I decided to take a fresh look at the information I did have and try to search again. I made the assumption that he stayed in the general vicinity of Minster between 1836 and 1852. (And yes, I made the conscious decision to come back and search the 1840 U.S. Census; that census only lists the male heads of household, and, at the time, I didn't feel like looking through tick marks and trying to decide if I had the correct family). First, I manually read through the entire 1850 U.S. Census enumeration for the town of Minster itself. I did not find a family resembling the Rolfes family. There was no enumeration district known as Jackson, so I decided to check German Township's enumeration; German Township was known as such because so many German immigrants settled there. Plus, it is directly adjacent to Jackson Township, where I know they did end up. I am fairly sure I did find Henry and Catherine Rolfes, with their only two children living at the time, Joseph and Catherine, in German Township. The surname isn't spelled correctly, but their ages match other evidence I have found. Two teenage girls with the same surname also live in the household, but I haven't been able to identify the correct relationships yet. (Click for larger view.) Finding the family in the 1860 Census was a little more challenging. By now, I knew that the family was established in Jackson Township, and I knew that I had combed through that enumeration section before. But, I went back and looked more carefully. There were not any families with an 'R' surname whose first names and ages even resembled the Rolfes family. But, I did find a family by the name of 'Wolfast' whose names, ages, and birthplaces fit. I went to Google Translate, selected German, and typed 'Rolfes' into the box. Then, I clicked on the little sound button in the lower right corner to listen to how Rolfes would be pronounced in German. And, let me tell you, with a thicker German accent, a census enumerator not familiar with German could very well interpret it as Wolfast. Take a listen here. I should mention that I'm not exactly sure who the ten-year-old 'Catherine M.' is in the family - it could possibly be a daughter or a niece I haven't yet researched. Then, I went and manually searched the 1860 Agriculture Census forms for Jackson Township. I should have looked here first, because there is no 'Henry Wolfast' listed, but instead his name is spelled 'Henry Rolfast.' It turns out that he was one of the top landowners in Jackson Township, with a total of 290 acres and a farm value of $5,000. (Click for larger view.) Henry Rolfes did not appear in any future census. He passed away in 1866. His wife, Catherine, went to live with her married daughter, Catherine Rolfes Prenger, whose husband was also a farmer in Jackson Township. The widow Catherine Rolfes passed away 11 Oct 1877.
©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder. Today, September 27, is Ancestor Appreciation Day. As the name suggests, it is a day dedicated to celebrating the lives and accomplishments of those people in our families who came before us. Obviously, if you know me or regularly visit my blogs, I consider every day to be Ancestor Appreciation Day. However, this particular post is not directed towards my genealogy-inclined friends; it is directed towards ALL of my friends. I want to let my friends know that if you ever want to learn more about YOUR ancestors, figure out where they came from, where they lived, what they did, and so on, I am more than willing to spend some time researching those people for you. I am not a professional genealogist, but I have accumulated enough knowledge and experience to know what sorts of documents and resources are out there and how to go about finding them. Why would I spend my time helping others learn about their family history? It's been very rewarding for me to learn about my ancestors and it has helped me grow as a person. It's given me a greater appreciation for the study of history in general. I've come to realize that every person's story is important, including my own. And, simply put, I just enjoy the act of researching people and families, and I learn a little bit more about history and research methods with every person, document, and geographic area that I research. So, if you think you'd like to take me up on my offer, send me an email or contact me through Facebook or Twitter. I'd be happy to help! ©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder. All rights reserved. Saturday Night Genealogy Fun is a series created by Randy Seaver and hosted at his blog, Genea-Musings. This week, his challenge is to create fun genealogy-related images using the templates over at ImageChef. Here are my contributions. The first is a tribute to what might be my favorite genealogical document, because they can contain a lot of family-related information. I also think they are my favorite because I am a science nerd and I love all the medical jargon: And this is what happens to me when I start searching through Italian records in an attempt to find my grandmother and great-grandparents' records: My third image is something I need to stick on my laptop as a gentle warning to my children (as soon as they are both able to read!) And for the times when you just don't know how to celebrate your ancestors' birthdays: I even ventured into ImageChef's animation template section. This is how I feel when I know a document is "out there" but certain lawmakers inhibit my ability to access it. Give ImageChef a try - it was a lot of fun! Thanks for suggesting it, Randy!
Mary Watercutter Knob (1878-1965) was the maternal grandmother of my husband's paternal grandfather, Walter Schroeder. Mary was the granddaughter of Ferdinand Waterkotte, born 26 December 1809 is Ostbevern, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Germany. He arrived in America on 27 Oct 1834, and made his way from the Port of New York to McLean Twp, Shelby County in Western Ohio, where he raised a family and farmed the land until his death in 1876. I have been fortunate in researching the German roots of Watercutter family members, because they are listed in an online collection of family/local history records known as 'ortsfamilienbuches' (OFB). When I visited the Family History Library in Salt Lake City this past spring, I used the information from the online source to dig up microfilms of the original church baptism, marriage, death records for many of the family members, going as far back as the early 1700s. On the images below, click to see the baptism records for Ferdinand Waterkotte (1809), his father, Bernard Heinrich Waterkotte (1775), and his grandfather, Bernard Herman Waterkotte (1734). (On the bottom two records, the parents' names are listed in the first column, the godparents (sponsors) are in the second column, and the child's name is in the third column.) Going back through the paternal line, you can see that the spelling of the surname is consistent, until you see Bernard Herman's record at the bottom. His father is listed as Herman Sanders, which wasn't a huge surprise to me, because I had seen it on the online OFB. My question was WHY? (Notice that the male sponsor is Bernard Waterkotte, so there must be some connection to a Waterkotte family here.) I asked my question in the German Genealogy Facebook group to see if anyone more experienced than me had any insight into why the family name may have changed. I posted a photo of Bernard Herman's younger brother's baptism record, where the father is listed as Herman Sanders g. Waterkotte. One knowledgeable gentleman in the group told me that the 'g' stood for gennant, which means 'called.' He also explained that some people had two surnames; one acquired from the father in the traditional sense and another Hausname. The Hausname may have been acquired if a family had inherited from, bought or lived on some land of another family by that name OR perhaps if his mother married another man after his father died. INDEED, using the online OFB records, I found that Bernard Herman's mother, Margaretha Lange, did remarry in 1741. However, the man she married was named Jobst Heinrich Dalhoff. Margaretha had children with Mr. Dalhoff and those children's surnames were STILL Waterkotte. This makes me conjecture that the Waterkotte surname came from the land or house they were living on/in. So, the descendants of both Herman Sanders and Jobst Heinrich Dalhoff took the surname of Waterkotte and carried it forward in subsequent generations. In fact, by clicking on some of the other names on this list, you'll see that quite a few people with the surname Waterkotte did not have a father with that name. (A Kötter, by the way, is a 'cottager' who probably had a small amount of land for gardening/farming and maybe a few livestock.) Today, Waterkotte is not a common name in Germany, and its occurrence is still concentrated in Nordrhein-Westfalen, shown in the dark blue: When Ferdinand immigrated to the U.S, he, whether intentionally or unintentionally, changed his name almost right away, at least on non-church documents. His 1837 county marriage record lists his surname as 'Waterkater.' He is listed as Watercutter on his 1834 ship manifest and his 1844 Declaration of Intention also says Watercutter. And since Ferdinand settled in and raised a family in Ohio, it is not surprising that the U.S. occurrence of the surname Watercutter is still highest here, and particularly in the same county in which Ferdinand started farming his land 180 years ago. For fun, click this link, and then click on the small megaphone in the bottom left corner of the German box to hear how Waterkotte is pronounced in German. Then, I think you will understand how it became Watercutter. Just for fun, I typed in 'Waterkotte' and looked at that name's U.S. distribution. I found a relatively high concentration in Adams County in Western Illinois. And just by using Google, I have found a Waterkotte Harley-Davidson dealership in Mt. Vernon, IL, a St. Louis attorney by the name of Waterkotte, and a University of North Carolina professor named Waterkotte who got his Bachelor's degree at Illinois State University. It's likely that these people are somehow related to each other. With the surname being so unique even in Germany, it really makes me want to trace the ancestors of these Waterkotte individuals to see if I could find an Old Country connection between them and my husband's Waterkotte ancestors. (And that connection may not be blood - it could be due to land ownership and/or tenancy, as I discussed above.) Baptism Record of Ferdinand Waterkotte: FHL microfilm 801427, Kirchenbuch: Katholische Kirche Ostbevern, Taufen 1803-1840
Baptism Record of Bernard Heinrich Waterkotte: FHL microfilm 801427, Kirchenbuch: Katholische Kirche Ostbevern, Taufen 1753-1805 Baptism Record of Bernard Herman Waterkotte: FHL microfilm 801427, Kirchenbuch: Katholische Kirche Ostbevern, Taufen 1718-1752 ©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder You are the family's historian. You've spent years or perhaps even decades of your life researching family ancestors and digging up documents, photos, articles and stories about the people that came before you. You write about these people, and maybe even publish a book or a blog related to your family's history. Although you find all of these ancestors and their stories so interesting, it seemingly appears that few other people share your interest and perhaps don't even care to know anything about the past. And even among other genealogists and historians, maybe you have an idea for a project or website or class or field trip and you pitch it to your local historical or genealogical society. But, in the end, the group decides to put its resources towards other endeavors, and your request goes unfulfilled. Experiences like these can make us question our work, question why we spend so much time and money researching people who are dead. (Because as alive as they may seem to us, the reality is that they are gone.) Personally, I am in a 'genealogical funk' right now, wondering why I spend so much time on my and my husband's ancestors when I could be reading more books or keeping a cleaner house or learning how to cook better. I have lost some enthusiasm for 'digging up the dirt' and writing about it on my blog. It's almost as if I don't know in which direction to move, and I'm sort of frozen in my indecision. And this feeling of 'All this doesn't matter' keeps permeating my thoughts and further adds to my apathy. Have you ever been discouraged or disheartened during your genealogical journey? What has helped you recharge your ambitions and regain your enthusiasm for genealogical research? ©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder I couldn't let the day end without publishing something on my blog related to my maternal grandmother, Dina Licciardi Bellan. Today would have been her 100th birthday. She was born 4 September 1914 in Iselle, Italy, which is a small mountain town on the Italian-Swiss border. She immigrated to America with her parents and sister when she was about six years old. She served in the U.S. Coast Guard during WWII and married my grandfather, William Bellan, in 1947. They had two children. She was active in her church community and loved to cook and socialize. She passed away in 1997. Here is a photo of her with me as a baby, circa 1979. ©2014, copyright Emily Kowalski Schroeder
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