Sunday's Obituary - Katherine Boegel

Catherine (Melzer) and William Boegel

I posted previously on how information can be wrong in obituaries and Catherine and her husband, William, were the examples I used.  I figured that it was about time to transcribe Catherine's two obituaries.  One is short, sweet and to the point (and lacking in genealogical excitement) and the other is certainly longer and filled with more detailed information.  Sadly, you can see what the obituary looks like for this longer one.  The newspaper must have been bound and when they microfilmed it the left side of the obit was a casualty.  Catherine's obituary was on the front page of the paper and on the far left side.  She was apparently important enough to have her passing make front page news, but the image doesn't do it justice.

As luck would have it the majority of the information that isn't visible in the crease is relative easy to make out, especially when comparing some things between both obituaries.  I'm a bit bummed about the name of the city/region in Austria that she was born in was lost in the microfilming process.  I haven't done any searching to recover the lost information, but at least I've got a good bit of it.  It should help (unless, of course, the information is wrong!).

Catherine and William are my husband's 2nd great grandparents.

Fond du Lac Commonwealth Reporter,  24MAY1927

"Expires at St. Kilian

Mrs. William Boegel Dies Today at Home of Son, Raymond

Although confined to her bed by illness for 10 days Mrs. William Boegel died unexpectantly at 7:50 a.m. today at the home of her son, Raymond Boegel, at St. Kilian, passing away in her sleep.  Surviving the deceased are seven children.  William of Kewaskum, John and Ray of St Kilian, Peter of St. Bridget, Mrs Catherine Bonleder of St. Kilian, Theresa at home and Mrs. Gebhart Strobel of Milwaukee.  The funeral will be held at 9 a.m. Friday from the Catholic church at St. Kilian.  Burial will be in the church cemetery."

The Campbellsport News,
26MAY1927

"Mrs. Catherine Boegel

Mrs. Catherine Boegel, age 80, passed away at the home of her son Raymond in St. Killian at 7:50 o'clock Tuesday morning following a (unk) years' illness.

Mrs. Boegel was born in Bischof (unk), Austria, December 12, 1846, and immigrated to this country at the age of 22 years settling at St. Kilian where she has since resided.  She was united in marriage to William Boegel on October 13, 1874, at St. Kilian.  Her husband preceded her in death four years ago.

She leaves to mourn four sons and three daughters namely:  William of Kewaskum; Kate (Mrs. Joseph Bonlender), John and Raymond of St. Kilian; Peter of Kewaskum; Mary (Mrs. Gebhard Strobel) of Milwaukee; and Theresa at home.  Two sisters and three brothers also preceded her in death.  She is also survived by 20 grandchildren and seven great grandchildren.

The funeral will be held Friday morning at St. Kilian's Catholic Church with burial in the adjoining cemetery.  The pallbearers are: Or(unk) Strobel of Milwaukee, Adelbert and Roman Boegel, Reynold and Oth(unk) Bonlender or St. Kilian and Ar(unk) Boegel of Theresa.  Rosemarie (Boegel) and Elvira Bonlender are the (unk) girls."

Funeral Card Friday - A Mysterious Card

I visited my sister in Iowa last weekend and had a great time.  Before I left she passed on to me 4 Funeral/Memorial Cards that were in a Bible that had been given to her. Two were for my 2nd great aunts, Catherine and Mary Quirk; one was a memorial card for President Kennedy (different than the one I'd previously posted); and then there was a card for Joseph J. Skernolis.

I have no ideas who this young man was.  It's not a name I recognize from my family tree and as the card was from 1963 and my family still (to the best of my knowledge and research to date) hadn't begun marrying outside their Irish ethnicity yet, I doubt he is in my family tree.  He was 19 when he died, but that's all I know.  Was he a student they knew?  A friend of the family's?  More likely than not he fits into one of those 2 categories.

I can't find anything online about him (just on Find A Grave) and since I'm now farther away from Pennsylvania than I have been in awhile, there is no visit home in my immediate future.  There are some things that I could do from a distance to find him, but since I've narrowed it down to him not being a member of the family I don't think I'll be wasting resources looking.  I'll wait until next summer and if I get back home, I'll pull his obituary and visit his grave.  Perhaps I'll get lucky and come across someone that knew young Joseph before then and will be able to fill in the blanks and let me know his story.

UPDATE:  Amazing how that happens isn't it?  I Google-searched Joseph last night before posting this and Find A Grave was the only thing that popped up.  After posting, I decided to Google again and a post on an Ancestry message board came up (didn't come up when I searched Ancestry...hmmmm).  Joseph was not a member of my family's church, but the information posted on his death (not a full obituary) said that he was a pianist.  I wonder if my grandmother Mary Quirk may have known him.  She was a music teacher.  Come to think of it, my mother may have known him.  He was around her age.

Wordless Wednesday - God Bless the Cheese Makers!

Romand Kuehl 3rd from left (back row)

My husband's grandfather, Romand Kuehl.  He knew many trades, and cheese making was one of them!  Gosh I love cheese...

Tuesday's Tip - The Obituaries Aren't Always Right!

Fond du Lac Commonwealth Reporter, 24MAY1927

The Campbellsport News
26OCT1922

So I visited the Wisconsin Historical Society in June.  It was a long day and I was so absorbed in my research that I forgot to eat or drink the entire time I was there (fellow genealogists can understand this completely) and by 4:00pm my head and stomach were starting to hurt so it was time to start the 2-1/2 hour drive back to Green Bay (construction...yuck!).  By the time I got back, my head was a little better, but I couldn't bring myself to look at any of my finds until the next morning.

Now maybe I'm wrong to not be looking at my finds as I get them, but honestly I don't.  I get to the WHS once, maybe twice, a year if I'm lucky and by then I've got tons to look up.  In fact, I didn't get through everything I wanted to yesterday, but I did get through 3/4 of it.  Saturday morning as I sat down with my coffee and my printouts I showed my mother-in-law the obituaries for her great grandparents, William and Katherine Boegel nee Melzer.  I was bummed about the fact that Katherine's was scanned from a newspaper that was apparently bound and her obit was on the inside edge so part of it is unreadable, but we enjoyed looking at them, and then I noticed it....

The Campbellsport News
26MAY1927

In both Katherine and William's obituaries it states that they were preceded in death by their spouse.  Did I have the wrong Katherine or William?  I was confused and concerned.  I pulled both obituaries with dates that I had from their tombstone and they were on the same tombstone!  I found it hard to believe that there were two Katherine or William Boegels that died on the same day in the same town.  I then compared the rest of the obituary.  Same kids.  Same wedding date.  The newspaper had made a mistake.  I'm sure Katherine must have been delighted when reading her husband's obituary that she died years before.  She may have felt like it at the time, but I assure you she was quite alive.

I know those of us that have been researching our families (or other families) for more than a hot second, already know that obituaries, death certificates, etc can have mistakes in them, but the death of a spouse in the obituary is certainly something that many of us might have used to at least narrow down a date of death for the other if it was still unknown.

Taking a line from The X-Files, "The truth is out there," we just need to figure it out amidst the details that may be leading us astray.

Amanuensis Monday - Always Searching for Bessie

Saint Gabriel's Roman Catholic Cemetery, Hazleton, PA

I always come back to Bessie.  She's more than just a brick wall she's an obsession at times.  Bessie isn't a direct line ancestor.  She's my 2nd great aunt, but of all the children that her parents had, she and my great grandfather (Edward Quirk) were the only ones to marry and the only ones to have children.  It's like the Quirks were dying out...


Edward had 2 children.  The first was my grandmother and the second child died...along with his wife/my great grandmother Alice Quirk nee Blanchfield.

Bessie's one child (that she died shortly after giving birth to) disappeared.  She most likely died.  I've posted previously about my efforts to track down Bessie's child (turns out her name is Betty...another Elizabeth.  I suppose her husband, Dennis, name the child after her when she died).  I want to know what happened to her.  To be certain of what happened to her and if she has died, where is she?  Her story needs to be told.

I've got a couple leads, but I think that I'll be trying to track her grave down in Bethlehem when I head home to Pennsylvania someday.  See if she's buried in the same cemetery as her father.  It may be a long shot, but it also may be the only shot I've got.

"Mrs. Dennis Dugan.

Unk Hazleton newspaper

Mr. (sic) Dennis Dugan of Bethlehem, died at the state hospital, this city, on Saturday at 11:25 o'clock, following a Caesarian operation for the birth of a daughter who is alive and well.

The deceased, prior to her marriage a year ago last September, was Miss Bessie Quirk, of Jeanesville.  She held the position of postmistress of that town for several years and was one of the Hazleton region's most estimable young women.  After her marriage, the deceased located at Bethlehem, where her husband has been located for some time.  Besides her husband, the deceased is survived by the following brothers and sisters:  Edward, William, Ella, a Hazle township school teacher, Catherine and Mary, all of Jeanesville.

The funeral will take place from the family home in Jeanesville on Tuesday afternoon at 2 o'clock, with interment private in St. Gabriel's cemetery."

[There are two dates hand-written in on the obituary, December 17 and December 14, 1918.  The 17th would be the date of burial and the 14th the date of death]

Sunday's Obituary - William Boegel

The Campbellsport News 26OCT1922

"Old Settler Called By Death

William Boegel, aged 73 years, died at the home of his son Raymond, in town of Ashford, last Saturday evening, after an illness of four weeks with diabetes.

Deceased was born near St. Lawrence, Wis., on December 21, 1848, and resided there until three years of age when he moved to the farm in town Ashford where he has since resided.  On October 13, 1874, he was married to Miss Kathryn Melzer, who preceded him in death.  He is survived by seven children, (all of whom, except William were at his deathbed) they are: William and Peter of Kewaskum, Mrs. Gerhard Strobel of Milwaukee, John, Mrs. Joe Bonlender, Raymond and Theresa living in town of Ashford.  He is also survived by two sisters, Mrs. Anna Majerus of Campbellsport and Mrs. Lizzie LaBelle of Stanley.

The funeral was held Wednesday morning at 10 o'clock from St. Killian's church, Rev. Father Reechel officiating and interment taking place in the adjoining cemetery.  The pallbearers were his six grandsons, Edgar, Erwin, Raymond and Reynold Bonlender and Roman and Oscar Boegel.

The deceased was one of our oldest settler and one of our highly respected citizens."

William Boegel is my husband's great great grandfather.  The obituary didn't tell me anything shocking there.  I knew that.  Just like I knew the names of his children and that he had at least 3 siblings.  The obituary lets me know that his sister Johanna obviously went by "Anna" and Elizabeth was obviously "Lizzie".

What I didn't know was that Anna was married to a man with the surname "Majerus".  I had her married to a John Altenhofen, and guess what?  I had no sources to support that!  I really need to get back to verifying my tree like I had started oh so long ago!  Now that doesn't mean that she wasn't married to a John Altenhofen, but it does mean that I'm got some researching to do to either verify a first marriage or rule him out.

Something else not in this obituary that I would have liked to see?  His parents' names.  I need to confirm them and it would have been helpful.  Time to order a death certificate (among other things). Back to work!

Wordless Wednesday - Aunt Mary and Aunt Kay Quirk

Mary and Catherine "Kay" Quirk.