The following article was supplied to us by Edyth Conradi Henschen with some of her comments for clarification. In lieu of maps at the end of the article, we have inserted the modern day addresses of the farms named in Edyth’s introduction.
This account was given to me when Bill and I were neighbors of Art and Meta Hoge.
This is somewhat hard to follow at times but gives an idea of what life was like when New Knoxville was young.
I have included a map of Washington Township at the end of this article showing where the Vordermark place was and still is (08587 Center Rd.), where the Oelrich farm was (11409 Bay Rd.), and of course where the Haberkamp place was and is now 7412 Moulton Angle Rd.
I tried for quite some time to find where the Katters lived before they moved to Garner, Iowa and I am now quite sure the place was at 05397 St. Rt. 219.
Things I Remember from the Past
By Miss Anna Schroer, 1966
About the year 1853 a young girl Mary Peterjohan by name, in company of other immigrants, left Ladbergen, Germany to come to her new home in America. The voyage of nine weeks, to cross the seas, was rather pleasant, only a few cases of sickness, no deaths, and the company on board ship agreeable. In due time, the ship with its cargo and hopeful passengers, landed in New Orleans. From there they traveled by boat up the Mississippi to Cincinnati, Ohio, where her sister, Sophia and her family were living. The sister came to America two years earlier.
Mary now was living in America, the land of new hopes, new ventures, and new possibilities. Work was soon found as a servant in a good family, where she had to acquaint herself with the new surroundings, also to learn the English language etc. all of which was not easy. One day her Mistress asked her to get a loaf of bread. In Mary’s language that meant a piece of wood in the form of a board, so Mary asked about the kind, also dimensions of the piece of wood her lady wanted, so after needed explanations, just another lesson learned, - one of the many to follow. But after many tries and some tears, Mary soon learned.
About that time a young man by the name of Henry Oelrich also left from Lengerich, Germany, who also came to Cincinnati, who in time found work in a furniture factory there, where a Mr. Jacob Vordermark, the husband of Mary’s sister Sophia also worked. New acquaintances were soon made among the young people, and so Mary Peterjohn and Henry Oelrich after due time, were married in September of 1856. They lived in Cincinnati for 2 years. A daughter, Dinah, was born to them September 7, 1857. Then in 1858 Henry and Mary Oelrich and their daughter Dinah, thru some of the workers at the factory came to New Bremen to live with a Mr. and Mrs. Henry Vocokler, who also had relatives working in the factory in Cincinnati, and so Henry Oelrich immediately had work in the New Bremen Furniture Factory. They lived in New Bremen a few years. A son Fred and a daughter were born to them there. About this time, Mary’s sister Sophia and her husband (Jacob Vordermark) had purchased a 160 acre farm from the government about 3 ½ miles North East of New Knoxville. Mary’s older sister Elizabeth who had married Mr. Herman Haberkamp also lived on a farm 1 ½ miles north of New Knoxville, O. as was another sister Elsabein who had married a Mr. Henry Katter, so now Henry and Mary Oelrich bought a small farm near Mary’s sister Sophia. They lived on this farm a few years, and then they too bought a farm from the Government at $16.00 per acre. This farm just North and bordering the Vordermark farm was mostly woodland with the exception of 7 acres which was ready to be planted to corn and 20 acres which had the bark on the lower 2 feet of the trees peeled off, so that the trees would die, to be cut the next season.
This new farm was about 1 mile North from where they had lived. Their few possessions were soon moved to the new farm. Now the four Peterjohn sisters were living in America within a radius of 4 miles of each other.
So now Henry and Mary must clear the land to get it ready for the plow, cutting down the trees by hand with axe and saw. The best trees were cut for building. Good logs were sold to the sawing mills, and others were split into fence rails and firewood. Shrubby and knotty wood was felled and rolled together and burned. My Mother, Mary Oelrich, was 8 years old at this time. Fred and Christine 5 and Sophia 2. The older children had to help carry the brush and roots to the fires, which were kept burning sometimes day and night. Their father would get up during the night and roll the logs to the fires to keep them burning, and so they soon had 20 acres ready for the plow. In the next 7 years 100 acres were cleared.
The house which was their home, was a log structure about 45 x 25 feet. Having a rather high ceiling, and divided into two rooms, a kitchen about 30 x 25 and the other a bedroom 15 x 25 feet. A porch running North and South the whole length of 45 feet along the East side of the house, boarded up at the North end, where a narrow stairway led to the attic. The attic which was often used to store grain, was open the whole length of the house, along the Eastside, the floor of which was tightly fitted, also a small window in the North and South end of the attic. The rafters of the roof were hand hewn and held together with wooden pegs. The shingles for the roof were also hand hewn. The kitchen had a large fireplace, the North end, in front of which was an area 6 x 10 feet covered with brick. There were two small windows one on each side of the chimney also a small window by the door to the East leading on the porch. At this time the house had only a dirt floor. Around the outside of the house were boards placed close to the ground. In winter, straw and leaves or manure were put over the boards, also snow was shoveled up against the house to keep out wind and cold.
How did they clean the dirt floor? By shoveling off the dirty places, and hauling in fresh ground with a wheel-barrow. The walls of the kitchen were plastered, as was the bedroom. The ceiling was of sawed 2x8 timbers, to support the stored grain. There were two windows in the bedroom to the south. About 1868 a floor of sawed Ash flooring was put in the kitchen and bedroom, also a frame structure 15x15 ft. was added to the West side of the house together with a small porch.
By this time a boy, Henry 7, Anna 5, Mary 3 and Elizabeth 1 were also members of this family. Now there was ample room for the members of this family.
At this time, my Mother was 16 years old. Now the older children must help with the chores, also with the crops and all items that make up living on the farm. This then was the time when the children had to learn about the many duties of making a living, planting and harvesting crops. Most of crops were used for food for the family also for their farm animals, how to harvest and cure and store, so that it would keep. Also to be learned was how to select and store seed that would be used for planting the next year’s crops and how to store garden crops, also apples for family use.
Wheat, oats, and barley were mostly harvested with a scythe or cradle, later with a mower. Women and girls would follow the cutter and tying up the bundles with a wisp of the grain twisted into a rope-like strand. Then it had to be shocked, 7 to 9 bundles in a shock. Then left to dry in the field for a week or two, then hauled into the barn in big hayrack. After going thru a “mow sweat” the grain was ready to be thrashed. The thrashing season was usually a gala time. Some grain in the earlier days was thrashed on the barn floor with a “flail”. Later thrashing was done by a thrashing machine and a steam Engine. Women and mature girls would often help in the mow, throwing sheaves to the men, tabling, or placing the sheaves to have the bands cut and shoved into the Separator. Mother often talked of how such was hard work to help the neighbors with their thrashing meant to do one’s chores at home, then walk thru the fields to neighbors also walk back home again in the evening. No Buick or Ford to ride home in. The next day was more of the same.
After Oats and Barley were harvested, people would sow some Buckwheat, and some turnips by throwing the seed on the field by hand, then using a branch with many fine twigs, pulling it over the field of dry stubble and loose ground, covering the seed so that it could grow, usually have a good crop.
Corn was usually harvested by cutting and shocking by hand, and then husked out in the field. The fodder was tied in bundles, with narrow strips of bark, stripped from your Linden trees, and then shocked, used in winter as feed for cattle, horses and sheep, also for bedding. The grain was stored in cribs near the barn or on the top floor of the hog house, and used to fatten hogs for market and also for family meat supply.
The bread for the family was made at home, the yeast for leavening was also made at home in the form of “dried yeast cakes”. If the “yeast” seemed too weak, it meant a trip to a neighbor to get a few “cakes of yeast” or when someone would go to Wapak or New Bremen, would bring a quart or two of Beer yeast. In the spring of the year, the housewife would use some of the yeast. That was used to make beer for some of the farmers who would have their 50 gallon Beer Barrel filled with Barley mash etc. for beer to use during harvest. Also a “beer stout” made with adding raw egg and sugar to Beer, also to make a very delectable Beer soup made of milk, sugar, salt, Beer and Zwie-back. White bread was not served at every meal. Corn bread, corn mush, Pancakes made from Buckwheat meal, grated potato pancakes or corn cakes, were used for White Bread substitutes. White bread was usually baked in a large brick oven out doors. The brick oven was housed in a small building by itself, about 8x8 feet or so. 10 to 12 big loaves were usually baked at one time of baking. During the warm season of the year, 1 or two of the loaves were “pulled” apart while still hot, with a fork into serving size pieces and then placed in pans and put back into the oven to dry and left in the oven until used. This dry bread did not get moldy.
The brick oven was made by building a foundation of brick, about a foot in the ground, about 8x6 ft. rectangle, by 4 ft. high, then filling the rectangle with ground. Now making an oblong of lathe, bent so that the oblong is 2 ½ feet high. The brick floor having been placed on the tamped-down ground, then place the oblong of lathe on the rectangle, now the oblong must be covered by brick and mortar then left to dry thoroughly, then a fire may now be built in the oven. A door must be built in one end of the oblong. A wide board may be used to close the “door”, using a wooden tree trunk in the shape of a fork, like our grandparents used to do. The door must be open while the fire is going. When the wood has burned to coals, they are distributed over the floor of the oven and left for 10 to 15 min. and then drawn out of the door with a long rake-like implement, then the “heat” of the oven is tested by extended hand into the oven. If one can count 10 or 12 the oven is quite right to put all the 10 loaves in at one time. Close the oven with the board. The tree trunk as a brace to hold the door, leave 1 hour. The result should be an oven full of fully risen, delicately browned and excellent tasting bread. Plus all the efforts of the housewife and the hours of work expended by her without any of the gadgets and labor-saving mechanisms of today, but she had to rely on her own ability. Mostly her own experience and her memory of how best to do. No one will doubt that the Grandparents of yesterday and years were made of what it takes.
Wheat was taken to New Bremen for the Flour Mill and made into flour for bread while one waited, usually meant most of a day, 2 or 3 times a year.
Food for the family had to be mostly produced and prepared at home. During the summer and fall, apples were dried for winter use, Apple Butter cooked and Molasses made from Cane raised on the farm. A barrel of sauerkraut made, green beans by the gallons brined, peaches, pears also wild Plums were always plentiful. Apples and potatoes were stored in hand-made caves, covered with 3 feet of ground. Very few homes had cellars. Good Hickory nuts and Walnuts were free for the gathering. Only the very best nuts for taste, also quality of cracking were used. The rest were left for the hogs roaming the woods.
The Sauerkraut barrel and some potatoes were stored in the kitchen. Pumpkins, rutabagas, turnips and carrots were stored in caves or in the Barn under heaps of straw, fed to the cattle also often used by the family – eaten raw, or cooked.
Eggs were produced by hens that had to find their food where ever they roamed. They roosted in the trees of the orchard during mild weather. In winter they roosted on the partitions of the cow stalls, in very cold weather on the cows. My mother often carried 6 to 7 dozen eggs to the store in New Knoxville, together with 6 to 8 pounds of butter which had been churned on the farm. Butter sold for 7 to 8 cents per pound. Eggs brought 5 to 6 cents per dozen. Later Mr. William Kruse would collect butter and eggs for a better price to send to Cincinnati by canal boat.
Hogs were fattened, then butchered, and sold as whole carcasses in New Bremen where they were cut up, salted, then smoked and sent to Cincinnati markets by Canal Boats.
Money from wheat, corn, barley and hogs was all used to pay for farms and taxes. Often calves were butchered when a week old, when not needed for herd replacement, as there was no market for veal. During the summer months such calves were killed when a day of two old as there were no ways to keep meat in the summer. For the family meat supply, hogs were butchered in winter, cut up, then salted and later smoked to use during the summer. Sausages made were also smoked, so were some ribs and backbone. Some ribs and backbone were put in brine for a few weeks. Livers were hung on the fence to freeze.
Fresh meats of any kind were not to be had anywhere during summer. The brick oven was also used to bake large panfuls of apples without sugar, and the drying of apples, peaches, pears, or plums for winter snacks. Around the turn of the century, the then modern housewife used the brick oven to bake cookies, pies, angel food and large tube pan cakes. Again it would be used to roast meats, and foods that needed long baking hours. Sugar in my mother’s was day expensive. Light brown or bake sugar as it was then known sold for $.05 cents per pound. Sand sugar or granulated as it is known now, sold for 6 to 7 cents a pound. Jams and jellies were made more or less by the cooking down method, using 1 cupful sugar to 2 to 3 cups of fruit juice, then cooking until a skin formed when cooled. 10 or 12 small glasses of preserves were considered a whole lot. Mother remembered that her mother told her not to tell anybody that 10 cans of some currants and gooseberries had been canned.
Times and conditions were getting better for the family. Along about this time, Mr. & Mrs. Katter, they were Mother Oelrich’s sister and brother-in-law who had moved to Garner, Iowa, a few years earlier, came to New Knoxville, O., to pay their relatives a visit. Mr. Katter related about the conditions and the possibilities of the Garner area etc. describing the very rich black soil, with no “stumps” to clear away. Land all ready to plow and seed. (When Father Oelrich had quite by now finished clearing 100 acres of woodland) must have him wondering just how much he had for nothing, so Father Oelrich formed the opinion that Iowa would be the place to live, a better life sure for all of the family.
So in 1875, Father Oelrich, thru his brother-in-law, Mr. Katter of Iowa, bought a farm in the Garner area, so from now on they worked to get ready to move to Iowa. Mother Oelrich nor any of the children were much inclined to leave New Knoxville, nor their friends etc.
When my mother was 18, she was allowed to be a “hired” girl – with Mr. & Mrs. Lutterbein – living in New Knoxville. Mother Oelrich thinking it was good for any girl to live out some time. My mother often verified this, saying that the time spent with the Lutterbeins had been of much help to her. Mother Oelrich and Mrs. Lutterbein had become acquainted while both lived in Cincinnati. Mother liked this stay in New Knoxville very much, yet this had to come to an end after a 6 months stay as her help was needed at home. So, in May of 1876 Mother came home to help with the farm work, also much work getting ready to move the family to Iowa. My mother and my dad had struck up acquaintance while she lived with the Lutterbeins. She was not especially interested in “Dad” for she had set her heart on going to Cincinnati to learn to be a milliner. The Lutterbein “Store” in New Knoxville seemed to have fascinated mother as also had the visit of Katie Oelrich, the only daughter of Mother’s Uncle Fred Oelrich living in Cincinnati. Mother and Katie Oelrich remained friends all their lives.
Now then was a time of happy childhood days, also this could not go on. Their younger days had been spent mostly at home, school, during winter months catechetical instruction, Saturdays from 9 a.m. until 3 p.m. during several months of the years. This instruction period was considered more important than rural school. Mostly the children attended 2 years, yet many parents sent their children three years. Each year on Easter Sunday was confirmation, a very impressive commitment service for those young people who had finished their 2 or 3 years of catechetical instruction. In those days, the girls of the class some times numbering in the 20’s wore their first floor length black dress, which was to be the “Best dress” for some time. The boys of the class wore their first good black suit. Some boys also received a watch. After confirmation young people were considered grown up. Before the age or 8 or 10 children would sometimes hide or even were told to hide when strangers came to the house. Children were seldom taken to church. People living 8 miles or even more, mostly walked to church. Church service would take all of 2 hours and then another hour to visit with relatives and friends and get home, have dinner, do chores. That was the order of the day on Sunday. To attend Sunday service was to be at the church by 9 a.m., listen to what the man at the “light post” at the end of the brick walk from the South end of the church to the road, had to announce. At 10 a.m. church service began. Church hymns were sung according to Chorals – very slowly and an interlude of a few notes between each line. Visiting among relatives was mostly during the week. Children did some visiting on Sunday afternoon among the neighbors, then visiting of young people mostly Sunday evening. The young man “seeing his girl” - not in a dashing roadster or Rambler, but over miles and miles of rough roads, even thru fields and woods, via shoe leather, until next Sunday. Also no telephone calls thru the week. Sometime during the 1870’s Sunday school was introduced in our church, and young people attended Sunday afternoons at 2:30 until 4:00 p.m. Many of them, walking home miles in the country, doing the chores and then walking to church for the 7 p.m. service. Today, 80 years later it is Sunday school at 9:00 a.m., Worship Service 10:15. No evening service. Everyone living 2 blocks from the church drives to church. After church often eats out for Sunday dinner and occasionally drives to some distant town.
My mother would often recall the times spent at Sunday school, and also catechetical instruction sessions. She remembered her lessons well that she had learned while Rev. Kuckherman was her pastor, also her teacher. Rev. Kuckherman was a very serious minded pastor and teacher to his congregation.
School days were not many in my mother’s young days. The children were sent to school when they could be spared at home and health and weather permitted them to attend—Hoelscher’s Schoolhouse, about 1 ½ miles south from their home. They had to help clear the land, also help with the chores. The Oelrich children had a good home. They always had good food and plenty of it too. Their father was a hard worker and so the children had to work too, yet he was good to his family. He in his young days did not have it like he could give it to them, but he expected them to obey him. His parents were very poor. At the age of 9 he had to work out, and was often whipped by the man he worked for. Their mother was of a more gentle nature, would often help them to do and be better. She would often tell them Bible stores also about her home in Germany and often mother and children would join in a sing fest. Grandmother surely must have been a good teacher. The stockings for the family were mostly wool from the sheep on the farm, washed and spun, then colored, blue, brown, red, black, then used to knit stockings. Some of the wool would be taken to New Bremen to be woven into cloth for men’s everyday shirts and children’s clothes. For the better clothes they bought cloth from the store. Stockings were often knit in 2 colors, also checks or stripes, making them almost double. Stockings were mostly knit by the father of the family.
Such then was the life of the happy family before they were abruptly in a different world of their own. For on July 6, 1876 during the noon hour, a severe electrical storm came up, and Father Oelrich stepped out on the porch, running north and south along the east side of the house. He stood on the south west corner of the porch and looking toward the west when he was struck by lightning. A piece of one of the logs of the house was split off 2 x 1 x 1 foot and thrown to the ground. The stroke travelled to Father’s body, then his boot, ripping open the side of the boot and part of the sole, to the wet floor to the ground and instantly killed. He was 45 years old.
They had been cutting wheat that morning. The fields were already too wet to harvest. Now all plans must be revised. Mother’s uncles, Mr. Haberkamp and Mr. Vordermark helped to harvest the grain etc. My mother too was seemingly catapulted into a work far from her dreams. After coming home from her six month’s stay as “hired girl” at the Lutterbein home, she had been thinking of helping her parents for the summer and then going to Cincinnati, there to learn to be a milliner. After the sudden death of her father in July, and mother’s health not good must have seemed almost like tragedy for the 19 year old girl. Then the death of her mother in December of the same year, also the finding of the 13 year old sister, Sophia, already dead beside her on awakening in the morning. The concern of the assembled relatives and friends, that the sister may not be dead, the sending for the doctor while the assembly waited to verify by outing the main artery in the arm, there still thinking the girl might not be dead, then in 3 weeks her marriage to the man she did not really love. (As she was not interested in getting married) yet her close relatives and friends advised her to marry and take over the care of Henry and Mary, also to have a home for the brother and sister to come to. Surely they too must have often wished for a time, tho maybe brief, to be together again as in times past in the same house which they could call home, tho some members were missing, some too young to understand their grief and heartache, yet they often came home again when time and occasion permitted. It was the home they could come to in case of sickness etc.
Soon after Father Oelrich’s death, Mother Oelrich stated that she could not work as much as she had done. It was soon apparent that her health was declining fast, so she helped to place the children with relatives and friends there being no orphanages in those days. Elizabeth, age 3, was placed with Mr. & Mrs. Herman W. Meckstroth, before the mother died. She had a very good home. Remained there until she was 16 when she died, death being due to cancer.
Fred, 17 to live with the Herman Schroer family, my Dad’s uncle and Aunt as “hired man”. He lived with this family until he married Miss Sophia Kuck. They bought a farm about 7 miles north of New Knoxville where they lived until he gave up farming. Three sons and two daughters were born to them. His oldest son and his wife then continued farming the home place.
Christine 15 to live with the Ernst Hoelscher family, lived with them until she was 20, then she was employed in the Rev. Kuckherman family. Rev. Kuckherman was pastor of the Reformed Church in New Knoxville at that time. Christine lived with this family until 1891 when she married Wm. Richter, a student at Heidelberg College, Tiffin, O. Henry Oelrich too attended college in Tiffin where he became acquainted with Wm. Richter. Later after Henry Oelrich had come “home” then exchanging letters, Wm Richter came to New Knoxville to sell books. W. Richter and Christine promptly “fell in love” and soon married. They then lived in Tiffin, Mr. Richter to finish college. Later he left school and after a year he decided to take Christine and their son Frank to Oregon to live on a farm, where they lived the rest of their days. They had 5 children, three boys and 2 girls.
Sophia 13, died quite suddenly of complications, during a siege of measles when all the children were stricken with the disease in February – 2 months after the mother’s death.
Henry 10 who had been rather sickly while yet the parents lived, was quite a charge for my mother. At times he would not eat, just saying, “I am not hungry”. Then again would eat only small quantities. Was often very irritable so at the age of 10 the sudden passing of his father who was struck by lightning affected all the children for sometime after. Every time an electric storm came up, they would assemble in the house until the storm had subsided. The sudden death of his sister, his teammate in work and play, the leaving home of his only brother and 3 sisters, the sale of some of their possessions, a now married sister and a brother-in-law to be his “boss” etc. were likely no panacea to Henry nor to his sister Mary who now were making their home with my mother and dad. The taking care of Henry and Mary 6 was often a very big problem for my mother. I remember her saying at one time, that had she been able to take Henry and Mary on a wheelbarrow to where their mother could take care of them, that would have seemed to be a small chore.
Mary 6 too lived with Mother and Dad. When she was 16 she went to Iowa to live with her Uncle and Aunt Katter, there she was “hired girl” for some time, then came again “home” and hired out here at times. She then suffered a severe nervous condition, or breakdown, so the Doctors said. Was sick quite a long while. One of the Doctors was a Homeopath. He had my Father go to a thick woods, to get some roots and berries of which my Mother had to make a fresh tea every day which my Aunt Mary was to take-Blue Cohosh, Prickly Pear, May apple, were among the articles my father gathered. Now whether the “Herbs” did the trick or whether the being again among close friends or whether it just took time for Mary to get herself together again, is not known. She was very sick for a time. I remember while she was so very sick at our house, my sister Cora and I had to be very quiet. Sudden noise or excitement would cause her to have difficulty in breathing etc. She eventually recovered to be in good health. She later took a course of instruction in sewing with a lady in New Bremen. She then lived in the Aufderhaar home the foster parents of her sister Anna, where the two sisters did very good work in Custom sewing. After a few years in the dressmaking business, she married Herman Hoge, a carpenter by trade. Her husband eventually was owner and President of the Hoge Lumber Company of New Knoxville, Ohio. She was mother of 14 children, including a set of twins. There were 7 boys and 7 girls, eleven lived to adulthood.
Anna, 8 was to live with Mr. and Mrs. Henry Wierwille, to help with the care of their two young children. She was there 1 year, when she was taken very seriously ill and high fever, evidently caused by overwork, so the doctor said. When the fever left it was found that her left foot was lame. The opinion given was that the fever settled in her foot causing it to be lame. Could possible have been Polio. She was “home” with Mother and Dad until she was well. Later she came to live with a childless couple, living in New Knoxville, a Mr. and Mrs. Henry Aufderhaar where she had a good home, also helping her sister Mary with custom sewing, until she was 30. She then married a widower, Henry Koepke, a blacksmith by trade, living in New Knoxville, the father of 5 girls. She then had 5 children of her own, 2 girls and 3 boys. The two youngest boys being a set of twins.
After the death of the Mother in December (death due to cancer) the children were mostly on their own, with the help of and assistance of Mother Oelrich’s sisters, Mrs. Vordermark and Mrs. Haberkamp both living near the Oelrich farm, who would often come to see how the children were getting along. My Mother related all the children would unite in singing during the long winter evenings. Mr. and Mrs. Vordermark and Mr. and Mrs. Haberkamp now must help to take care of all the necessary items, getting the members who were to take their places in the homes where they were to live, also to get ready for the necessary sale of some possessions, ordered by the county so that each child receive its individual right to the Estate, and now a guardian had to be appointed. Then in early February all the children had a severe siege of measles, they soon recovered, with the exception of Sophia. She was very sick. The rash was already fading. My mother sleeping with her, when giving Sophia some medicine, the cork for the bottle became lost, Sophia helped to find the cork, next morning on awakening, my mother found that her sister had died during the night.
On March 8th, 1877 my Mother and Dad (Dinah Oelrich & Mr. Schroer, Jr.) were married. They made their home on the Oelrich farm which was also the “home” of Mother’s sisters and brothers. By order of the court, a guardian had been by this time appointed for the children under age. A Mr. William Fenneman, a business man in New Knoxville, a very able and understanding man who took good care of them. A few weeks after Mother and Dad married, a sale of the farm chattel by order of the court was duly held, for the protection of the minor children’s property, Mr. Fenneman being in charge of the sale.
The farm was to be held in trust by the guardian until the children were of age. The farm of 160 acres of which 100 acres were clear, was valued, plus the grain, machinery, cattle and money at close to $20,000.
Mr. Fenneman taking over the guardianship of the children, like a father told them that if he knew that he would have trouble, he would not take care of them. They were to obey, and do what is right, and furthermore, should anybody do them wrong, they should report to him, because it was for him to see that they received their due rights.
Yet after a little more than 3 years, Mr. Fenneman passed away very suddenly, due to severe Lumbar Pneumonia, age 45. My father was then appointed to take over the guardianship of the children’s property. My Father had to go to Iowa to make a settlement with Uncle Katter as some money had been paid down on the farm that Mr. Katter had bought for Father Oelrich. Now then Mother and Dad rented the Oelrich’s farm also taking care of the children’s welfare, etc. They lived on the Oelrich farm 5 years. They then lived on Grandfather Schroer’s farm adjoining the home place, as my Grandfather could not do the work alone any more. The Oelrich farm was rented out to Mr. Schultz who was on the farm until Henry Oelrich bought it. Dinah Oelrich 19, married Mr. Schroer, Jr., 25 March 8th, 1877. The ceremony was performed in the parsonage of the Reformed Church of New Knoxville by their pastor, the Rev Kuckherman.
My mother was rather aggressive, and of an inquisitive nature, loved travel, also pretty things. Sincere in doing the right, would often recall the explanations of Bible stories and verses during catechetical instructions by Rev Kuckherman, her teacher. She had a good husband and provider. Yet at times, she could not quite forget that her dream life in Cincinnati might not have presented as many problems as did the seemingly planned life that was here to live.
My Father was of a quiet and inventive nature, thoughtful and understanding. Intent on teaching his children the necessary and useful lessons by doing, and observations, to obey orders, and to do our work well. Much concerned about our future welfare, we were a family of 7 children, three girls and four boys. We shall always especially remember our parents for the staunch faith in God which was theirs.
This is an addendum to Anna Schroer’s story.
An apple orchard of fifteen to twenty trees was considered a must for each farmer. Apples were mostly used for eating out of hand as a snack any time of day. They were stewed or baked or used for making cider to drink or for making vinegar. “Dried apples” were made and mostly eaten by the children of the family.
Bushels of apples were used to make the year’s supply of 20 to 25 or more gallons of apple butter, the making of which meant gathering 20 to 30 bushels of good cider apples. These were then taken to the cider mill, where the apples were put through a grinder, then into a large press, yielding about 50 gallons of cider. This was then kept until the next morning, when very early it was put into 30 to 50 gallon copper kettles to be cooked down to half its amount or less. Then one or two bushels of peeled and quartered apples, prepared by a group of friends and neighbors the night before, were added to the still-cooking cider. Now with a long-handled “stirrer” began the long hours of constant stirring so as to avoid scorching the bottom. This continued until the apple butter did not drip from the “stirrer” when it is lifted above the now very slowly cooking apple butter. It is then that the fire is raked away from under the kettle, the butter then ladled into clean heated stone crocks or glass jars. It will keep for a year or more without sealing, when tightly covered with a tied paper over the top of the crock after it is cold. It was now usually almost midnight and time for bed since the kettles had been kept boiling since 4 A.M. that morning. But now another item had been added to the year’s supply of food. This process was usually repeated two or three times a year.
The evening before the day for the apple butter cooking, a few neighbors were asked to come in to help peel and quarter the choicest large apples of best cooking quality and fine grained. Often mostly the younger people came to this “apple peeling.” After the two bushels of cut apples were finished, a short gala time was had drinking and testing the cider and usually doughnuts were served with the cider. Now for the walk home through the fields or along the much traveled foot paths and maybe another day to help some other neighbor with their “apple peeling.” The kettle used only for making apple butter was of the finest shiny copper. It was hung over a sturdy 10 to 12-foot cleanly-shaven pole. It was supported on each end by two forked props, and held by a tripod of heavy iron. The “stirrer” was made of ash wood. A board 20 inches or more long, and about five inches wide at the bottom. This board has five or six inch-wide holes in the wide end and a larger hole in the top for the seven to eight foot handle necessary for the person stirring to keep a safe distance from the fire. The kettle and the “stirrer” were very carefully stored to keep the sides and bottom from being bumped and forming small hollowed places in the bottom or sides of the kettle. This is very important to keep the apple butter from having a burnt flavor.
Vinegar was also made on the farm by simply “laying away” a barrel full of cider to sour. The result was usually vinegar of very fine quality. Vinegar was much used by the housewife in earlier days to add to fruits and vegetables for its keeping qualities. It was added to drinking water during hot weather to make a cooling drink as well as being medicinal for intestinal disturbances. Cucumbers were put in brine during the summer. During the fall and winter months they were taken out of the brine and freshened with water changes. This was done a few times until almost all the salt was removed, then put into a solution of half vinegar and half water. Adding a little honey at serving time made them very delicious.
Vinegar was also used to clean metals and set dyes for the woolens from their sheep. Vinegar added to the laundry rinse water for colored clothes made the colors brighter.
A grape arbor was also considered a must for the family in earlier days. Grapes were mostly eaten fresh, some for an occasional pie, but not very many were used to make grape jelly. Jellies of any kind were considered to be too expensive. Grape wine was made on the farms. The very ripe grapes were washed and picked from bunches. Only the fully ripe good grapes were used. They were then put in clean earthen jars and crushed. To each gallon of crushed grapes was added one-half gallon of hot water-must not be boiling hot. This was stirred well, covered tightly and set in a warm place to ferment. After about 20 to 24 hours, when fermentation has begun so that it is bubbly when stirred, it was strained and all the juice pressed out. Only wooden spoons or ladles were used and earthen, glass or enamelware. Then add two to three pounds of granulated sugar to each gallon of juice, mix well and set in a very warm place, tightly covered with one layer of cloth as it needs some air at this stage to complete fermentation, usually from three to five weeks. Then drain off the clear wine and seal rather tightly, but not altogether tight. Now set in a cool place to ripen for three to six months. Then seal tightly. Wine of any kind was used as a medicine in case of colds. Also as a stimulant in cases of summer complaints, dysentery, etc. A wine soup was made with about one quart of sweet milk brought to a boil. Then a mixture of one egg, one half tablespoon of flour, two tablespoons of sugar, a bit of salt was added to the boiling milk. Continue boiling for one minute, remove from heat and add a half cup of wine. Serve with zwieback. Often during harvest time wine and some sugar was added to the drinking water. It would also be served with bread or zwieback as a snack before bed time.
Soap for family use was made on the farm during the fall and winter months. Used fats and scraps of fatty meats were collected in crocks. Lye for the soap was made in a part of a large hollow sycamore tree, which was used to make a “barrel-like” container four to five feet in length. This was set on a platform, one side of which was one to two inches lower for better drainage. A three-to-four-inch layer of straw as placed in the bottom of the barrel, which was then filled with wood ashes collected from the fireplace or stove or brush piles early in the spring. Occasionally some water was poured into the barrel to moisten and settle the ashes. Then when time came to make the soap enough water was added over a period of days to start the “flow” of lye, which was collected into crocks. When enough lye had been collected some of the lye was poured into a large iron kettle hung on a strong pole which was supported on each end by two forked props, over the place for the fire under the iron kettle. Also, some of the collected fats, and scraps, having previously been washed, were added. All of this was then boiled until the mass was like a thick soup, and when the long wooden ladle was lifted from the mixture the air would blow white strands of soap. It was then left to cool, then cut in pieces to dry. Sometimes the soap was better after a second boiling with more lye added. The result usually made a soap of good quality. If the housewife wanted a clean bright kitchen floor, she would place about a gallon or two of wood ashes in a crock, pour some boiling water over the ashes, let stand for an hour or more, dip off the lye and add some to the water in her scrub pail. Also some would be used in the family weekly wash water. The result was a cleaner and brighter wash.
Milk was extensively used as a drink and in cooking. Refrigeration of milk was not possible in earlier days. Fresh milk was strained into half-gallon crocks and set on the floor of the vegetable cave during the summer. Each crock was carefully covered by a square piece of board and the crocks stacked on top of each other-maybe two to three high. Each evening the cream was carefully ladled off, set aside to sour and later churned into butter, to be sold or exchanged for merchandise. The milk from which the cream had been removed, which when it was sour, thick and set like a custard was served with some sweet milk, brown sugar and a bit of cinnamon or nutmeg – a very good dish. Sour milk or clabbermilk, as it was then known was used for making of pancake batters, for cottage cheese and some families made longhorn yellow cheese. The milk not used for food was fed to the farm animals
Lengths of large hollow Sycamore trees were used for grain storage, set up in the corner of the barn. There would be a small opening at the bottom to let out the grain and a stout end of a ladder set up on one side to the top.
Sycamore logs were also used to make troughs by sawing the log in two lengthwise, and the ends fitted tightly together with boards. The inside walls were smoothed with an adz. Smaller troughs, made on the same order, were used to feed cooked mash to the milk cows during the winter months. The “mash” consisted of chopped oats, cowbeets, small potatoes, apples, turnips, very small ears of corn, leaves, small heads of cabbage, carrots, rutabagas all of which were put into a iron kettle, which was stationary in a frame of brick and mortar usually in a utility building. A lot of water was added to the mixture and then cooked for hours. The warmth of the cooking was much appreciated by those members of the family doing the chores, since the brick oven was kept going every day. There was plenty of wood to burn so that the warmth was constant. Also, this was a place for neighbors to exchange plans and news and help the younger members crack nuts for the hickory nut barrel in the corner, or popping popcorn on the coals under the kettle. Also, apples were always on hand. Toasted marshmallows or wieners were not known then.
In cases of sickness the early settlers depended mostly on herb teas. These were used for many ailments. Herbs were gathered in the summer for medicinal purposes. For tiny infants a tea of catnip, flowers and leaves was used. This was also used for older children in cases of summer complaints, cramps, for malarial fevers or the three-day ague. Raw onions with raw cucumbers in vinegar on bread and butter were used for colds. Elderberry blossom tea was considered good for colds. For a baby’s cold an application of goose grease and a bit of kerosene mixed together was applied to the chest and then covered with a woolen cloth. Also some of the goose grease mixture was applied to the soles of the feet, then gently warmed by the fire place and then put to bed on a warmed feather pillow.
Men frequently took generous doses of whiskey for most common ailments. “Wormwood” on whiskey was used for upset stomach, dysentery, suspected food poisoning and insect bites. “Balsam apple” on whiskey was used for accidental wounds, inflammation and also for old sores on man and animals.
Boils and carbuncles, so prevalent in those early days, were treated by soaking bread in a small quantity of heated sweet milk. This was placed on a piece of muslin with a generous sprinkling of elderberry or chamomile flowers added, placed on the boil as hot as could be borne and kept warm. This poultice was changed every hour until the boil broke open.
To call a doctor in those days meant going by horseback to the nearest town to get some medicine or on occasion wait until the doctor came in from his calls and then maybe wait until he made a still more urgent call that had come in earlier. If necessary, he would accompany the caller to the sick person. Now we think in terms of minutes when we must wait on the phone for the doctor to answer.
For sore throat bread with a blue greenish mold would be soaked in warm water, then drained and the water used as a gargle. Its effect was like penicillin.
In the days of the early settlers a few hives of bees were kept for the honey they produced. Honey was used to ease sore throat and to put on wounds. It was also used as a sweetener for cooked fruits and as a spread on bread.
A few geese were usually kept on the farm to fill the many feather beds that were needed-usually two for each bed in winter-one to sleep on and one to use as a cover. Two or three pounds of the small fine feathers were needed for one feather cover. These feathers were also used to fill pillows.
Sheep also played quite a role in the family needs. They produced the wool to spin into yarn for knitting stockings. The finer grades were taken to the New Bremen Woolen Mills to be made into cloth for men’s everyday shirts, children’s dresses etc.
Lambs, not needed for replacements, were slaughtered for meat in early winter. The pelts were salt cured and dried then used a covers on seats of farm implements and wagons. The large pelts were used over the knees when driving in winter.
Sheep tallow, having great healing qualities, was much used for sore hands during corn husking season and wood cutting time, and on sores on farm animals and also on sore nipples of nursing mothers. This tallow was also applied on leather boots making the leather very pliable and keeping it soft.
It seems the early pioneers knew how to help themselves.
Extra note:
The four sisters living closely to each other in the New Knoxville area were:
- Sophia Peterjohann and Jacob Vordermark
- Mary Peterjohann and Henry Oelrich
- Elizabeth (Magdalena) Peterjohann and Herman H. Haberkamp
- Elsabine Peterjohann and Henry Katter
Mary’s children:
Dinah Oelrich - 1857
Fred Oelrich - 1859
Christine Oelrich - 1861
Sophia Oelrich - 1863
Henry Oelrich - 1866
Elizabeth Oelrich - 1873
Mary Oelrich - 1871
Anna Oelrich - 1868 – 1930
Anna Schroer, the author of this story, was Dinah’s child.
The following article about Miss Anna Schroer was published in The Evening Leader on June 20, 1970.
Retired Nurse Recalls Graduation 61 Years Ago.
Miss Anna Schroer, New Knoxville, Member of First Class to Graduate from Hamilton Mercy School of Nursing Saddened by its Close
Miss Anna Schroer as she received her diploma in 1909 as a registered nurse, a member of the first graduating class at Hamilton Mercy School of Nursing
With the graduation of 34 students on June 14 from the Mercy School of Nursing in Hamilton, the school came to a close after 64 years of student nurse training. One of the alumni most sad to see the closing of her alma mater is Miss Anna Schroer of New Knoxville. Now 87, Miss Schroer was one of the two first graduates of the school. That was back in 1906. The other graduate was Mrs. George (Catherine O’Neill) Bramlage, who died eight years ago.
“I certainly didn’t think I would live to see the day the last class would graduate from the nursing school,” Miss Schroer said yesterday morning. An announcement was made in January, 1968, that the diploma program of the Mercy School of Nursing would be phased out to make way for an associate degree program in nursing under the auspices of Miami University. Findings of national and local studies contributed to the decision of the hospital and school administration to phase out the diploma program. Though many persons received with regret the statement of the closing of the nursing school, others viewed it as a forward move in the education of nurses.
Miss Schroer said she lived in Iowa after leaving New Knoxville as a young girl. “Then one day while working the field, I was overcome by the heat. It took a while for me to recover but that is when I decided I wanted to be a nurse. My father said he would help any of us children in whatever profession we chose, so I first went to nursing school in Marion, Ohio,” Miss Schroer said. “The doctor-owned hospital there went bankrupt so we heard about the new hospital established 14 years earlier by 14 Catholic nuns from Ireland which was opening a school of nursing and that is where I went, much to the disappointment of my church minister.
“It was much different than now. In those days we had two weeks vacation a year and when we left home we knew it would be a year before we could see our families again. Now the young people come home every week or two.”
For 14 years following the opening of Mercy Hospital, the nursing care for patients was given by the Sisters. In 1906, due to the increase in treatments and responsibilities, and the demand for a school for nurses, Sister Mary Raymond Finn, RSM, founded the Hamilton Mercy School of Nursing.
This planning was consistent with what was being done by the greater number of hospitals throughout the United States.
The first two graduates returned to the hospital many times after their retirement. One of the times was in June, 1956, when Mercy Hospital observed its Golden Jubilee of the School of Nursing, when a full length picture of the two was featured along with other pictures of the buildings on posters and in the Mercy Hospital News as well as other newspapers. This is also when the Gonzaga Memorial Hall was dedicated. “This hall,” Miss Schroer said, “was a wonderful new nurses’ home with relaxation quarters, baths, entertaining, music, restaurant, washing and ironing facilities, roof garden – a wonderful home for student nurses.”
Another memorable occasion for Miss Schroer was the return to Hamilton in 1966. Her classmate, Mrs. Bramlage had died during the decade and she was the only living member of the first graduation class. There were six other students in the school at the time the first two members graduated. It was in 1966 that Miss Schroer took her class pin of 1909—a solid gold pin about the size of a half-dollar—with her to the 60th anniversary celebration of the School of Nursing and presented it to the Sister Superior for their historical collection, a welcome gift.
Miss Schroer continued nursing at the hospital for 30 years after her graduation and then returned home to help care for parents, now deceased. She and her brother, Richard, live together now in their home east of New Knoxville on Highway 219.
Miss Schroer recalls her living quarters were on the fifth floor of the hospital, reached by a hand-pulled cable elevator with a low grill fence across the opening. She remembers the shaky elevator which took the patients from the first to the second floor and how the nurses and student nurses had to scrub the rooms and beds after the patients were dismissed from the hospital. A registered nurse’s pay at that time was three dollars a day for special duty which meant staying in the room with the patient night and day.
Thirty-four registered nurses were graduated on June 14, this year, when Miss Schroer made her last trip to the Hospital School of Nursing. Three students graduated from the Mercy Hospital School of Medical Technology. This school is also affiliated with Miami University at Oxford, Edgecliff College and Xavier University in Cincinnati. After completion of the year of training at Mercy Hospital, graduates are eligible to take the National Registry Examination for medical technologists. Over the many years, up to and including 1970, a total of 1,174 students have been graduates from the Mercy School of Nursing: nurses who are now serving throughout the world. The largest graduating class was in 1946, the United States Cadet program with 42 graduates, and second largest was in 1969 with 41 graduates.
Through all the years only one male applicant was enrolled in the school, Kenneth Gardner, who entered the school in September, 1967; however he enlisted in the United States Air Force and did not complete his training.