Part 1 - Maria Carolina Margaretha Werner

Last spring I began researching my Doll family from Edenkoben, Germany, which I posted about awhile back. They emigrated to the US in 1846 and settled in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The father Wilhelm Doll came to Milwaukee with his married children, their spouses and children, as well as his unmarried children. He was close to 70 years old when he decided to leave behind all that he knew and head for America. What a spirit of adventure. Many people of his time period had already died by the time they were 70 and he decided to start a new life as a farmer in Wisconsin, even though he had worked his whole life as a baker. Back then there was no such thing as retirement. Just work, and more work.

It is tiny to read. But it says christened Anna Barbara, daughter of Johann Wilhelm Doll, master baker and his wife Carolina Werner. Then it goes on to state the witnesses for the christening.This is their 10th and final child.

I have set up the background - now on to the real reason for the post. Carolina Werner, the wife of Wilhelm Doll died in 1844 in Edenkoben. She has been a real mystery for as long as I have been doing genealogy (19 years). No one could ever seem to find her parents because they could not find her marriage record to Wilhelm. Well, I decided to do some careful checking of all of the records that I could find her apart of. I started slowly going through her children's christening records.

I found 3 christening records with Werner's as the witnesses. Carolina's first child born was Johann Georg b-1802 in Edenkoben. The witnesses for his christening were J. Georg Werner and his wife Catharina from Neustadt. Here is the entry below. (One of the Werner's for another christening was Carolina's sister Margaretha).

This entry is in table format. Most all of the entries are in paragraph form like the first image and give a bit more information.

It began searching the church books of Neustadt. There are Lutheran, Reformed and Catholic church books. I began with Reformed because that was the religion of Wilhelm Doll. I did not have much luck at first, so I switched to the Lutheran records. I found Carolina's birth and christening entry.

After many days of searching, I finally realized that Georg Werner and his wife Catharina Brenner each came from different religious backgrounds. Georg was from the Reformed church and Catharina was from the Lutheran church. So, they struck a deal with each other. All of their daughters were christened in the Lutheran church and all of their sons were christened in the Reformed church. This seems normal enough but this was the first time I had come across this mixing of religions. All the other German people I have researched all married within their religion. The Reformed religion were Calvinist. This southwestern part of Germany had many towns with Reformed churches, where other areas of Germany did not have any. Later the Reformed and Lutheran churches were forced to merge.

Carolina Werner was the seventh of nine children. Her father Geog Werner was a master baker in Neustadt an der Haardt which is about 61/2 miles from Edenkoben. Neustadt was one of the larger cities in the area. Many people came from different towns to work there(based on the Burgerbuchs). Wilhelm must of went there to apprentice as a baker and met Georg. Then meeting and later marrying Georg's daughter Carolina. Wilhelm eventually set up shop as a baker in his hometown of Edenkoben where our story began.

I will begin part 2 of the story next time.

Where in the World is My Dad's House?

During our adventures in Iowa, we went through Cedar Rapids looking for the house that my dad grew up in. I texted my mom and asked what the address was and they texted it back as 1601 East Ave......then 1601 E Ave........then 1601 E Ave NE. The memories were coming back. My dad remember that all the streets in Cedar Rapids end in some direction, such as, NW or SE.

I was excited. I now had an address to work with. I typed the address into my phone and attempted to find my way through the streets of Cedar Rapids. For those of you who might not know, there are many rivers, creeks and streams in Iowa. One of those rivers is the Cedar River that runs through the city of Cedar Rapids. It is a large river that serves as a natural break creating sections of the city.

We dutifully followed the directions provided by my phone. We arrived at the single story, cream colored house and I snapped several pictures. Here is one.

I later texted my mom and realized that this is actually not my dad's childhood home. Wrong house! My dad grew up in a 2 story home on a corner. The home was supposedly built in the 1800's. As you can see this is not the home. So, what happened with my "made to order" directions found on my phone? As it turns out, the house pictured above is located at 1601 E Ave NW, not the correct 1601 E Ave NE. 

The one and only time I have traveled to Cedar Rapids, I don't find the right house. Such are the hazards of the GPS. You never know where you will end up. This is not the first and I am sure not the last time I will end up in the wrong place holding my wonderful GPS in hand. Below is the correct home. It is the light colored one on the left corner. I know, not the same as my own picture. Google Earth did not have a street image of the house, only an aerial image. 

Since we are on the topic of my dad's childhood.  Here are a few pictures of  the school's that my dad attended. First is a picture of Franklin Middle School.

Next is Washington High School.

Okay dad. The middle school looks like it is still the same but I don't know about the high school. I did see on wikipedia that it was built in 1956. So maybe you attended your sophomore, junior and senior years at this particular high school?

Babies - Not to be forgotten!

This week I discovered a great website called WRG or the Whitney Research Group. As I said before, my grandmother is Yoland Whitney. Her family is where I first dipped my fingers into genealogy. The Whitney family is a historic American family. The first Whitney family must of been the adventurous type, taking their chances in America, and arriving in Massachusetts in 1635, not too many years after the first Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock. They served in all the major wars beginning with the Revolutionary War.

On a fluke, I decided to look up some information on my ancestor Joseph Whitney. The one that settled in Iowa. This is when I found the Whitney Research Group's website. It is set up as a wiki, so that all members can contribute to the wiki, to the research being done on the Whitney family. I am currently trying to become a member. As you can imagine, there are a lot of Whitney descendants, from every walk of life and from all over the United States. There is also a Facebook group for Whitney's. Note - the WRG was not started by Mormons, just people who like their family history.

As I began clicking on "my" Whitney people, I saw several children of Joseph Whitney that I did not know existed. I thought I knew everything I should know about Joseph Whitney. Well....apparently not! Joseph first married Martha Peterson 7 March 1850 in Lee County, Illinois. Not so fortunate - she had a short life and a short marriage, dying 25 April 1852. Previously unknown to me is that Joseph and Martha had a son together. His name is Henry B. Whitney born 3 June 1851 in Lee County, Illinois. He died 27 September 1852, at the very young age of almost 16 months. Lee County, Illinois does not have birth records available for this time period nor do they have death records. They have marriage records and cemetery records. I did not find Henry in the Evergreen, aka the Peterson cemetery where his mother is buried. So.... no record of Henry, right? Surprise! The Joseph Whitney Family Bible!

The woman who posted the information about Henry, found it recorded in the family bible that had been passed down to her through her maternal line beginning with Inez, Joseph's daughter. Recorded in the bible is Joseph's birth and death, his 2 wives births and deaths, his children's births and deaths, and his children's marriages. Bible records are considered a valid source and in the case of a lack of other records, they become the primary record. How grateful I am for the tradition of family bibles and genealogy.

The next surprise child I found is Joseph and Dorothy (Dorothy is Martha's sister) Peterson Whitney's first born child. After Martha died, Joseph married her sister Dorothy 30 December 1852. Their first child Jonathan was born 28 September 1853 in Lee County, IL and died in the same place 1 November 1853.

Two babies that would otherwise remain unknown, if not for family record keeping and the tradition of preserving and passing down family heirlooms. I wish I had that family bible to treasure and pass down but the descendants of Inez Whitney have done a fabulous job. What more could I ask.

Prairieburg - Whatever you do, don't get off the road.

On to more stories from our trip to the Midwest. Of course on our travels to the Midwest, we had to pay a visit to the great state of Iowa, since my dad grew up there. My dad was a city boy. He grew up in Cedar Rapids but his mother Yoland Whitney was a country girl, born and raised in Prairieburg, as many of the Whitney's were. Prairieburg is about 30 miles northeast of Cedar Rapids.

Prairieburg was where life in Iowa began for the Whitney's. Apparently in 1855 there was a plan of sorts hatched between Joseph Whitney (Yoland's grandfather), his brother in law Charles Chadwick and his uncle Alvah Whitney, to travel from Lee Center Township, Illinois, where they were all living, to the land office in Dubuque, Iowa to buy land from the US government. Land available for those who were willing to work hard and make a life for themselves in the unsettled parts of Linn County, Iowa.

Alvah, the older and more experienced uncle led the way. Alvah had already purchased 800 acres in Lee County, Illinois and a few years later would purchase another 200 acres there to make it an even 1,000 acres. At the land office in Dubuque, with the younger Joseph and Charles under his wing, he did buy 320 acres of land in the rolling hills of Iowa. Joseph bought 320 acres as well and Charles bought 160 acres. All this acreage was found in the township of Boulder - which would house the town of Prairieburg where my said grandmother, Yoland Whitney was born and raised.

(Just a note - *A few years later, in 1857, Joseph bought another 240 acres in Boulder Township.)

Joseph later donated the land for the Prairieburg Cemetery. He along with many of my relatives are buried  there. As you can imagine, I also have many other relatives buried in the many small towns that are scattered around Linn County.

We began our journey through Linn County by finding and visiting the Lafayette Cemetery. The Lafayette Cemetery is a beautiful little rural cemetery with a white church and corn fields surrounding it. There were also some handy but then again not so handy outhouses located there. I located a number of my great grandmother Anna Blum's family there. Yeah, success!

Our next stop was the Prairieburg Cemetery. After a short drive past a few creeks and around some hills, we found the town of Prairieburg. I had my directions telling me which way to go. We began down a gravel road but then we had the bright idea that we must be going the wrong way. So, we decided to turn around and head back into town in hopes of further enlightenment as to which way to go.

Well, this is where the trouble began. Turning around on a gravel road is no big deal, right? We have lots of dirt/gravel roads in Utah. We are professionals at turning around! It is very green in Iowa, with rolling hills and lots of creeks and rivers everywhere. On either side of the road there was grass and other vegetation growing. Looked okay to me. Nothing much to worry about. Well, as Dan began to turn around, he swung a bit off the road and our car immediately started sliding and tipping down into the seemingly harmless grass. Unknown to us was that the grass was covering up the deep ditches on both sides of the road.

I started yelling as we slid down into the ditch and I watched out my window as the car began to tip. The kids were too horrified to say anything. Dan kept his cool and turned and turned the wheel to keep us from tipping. He then stopped and tried to back up. Didn't work. Then he put it into 4-wheel drive and tried to drive forward and out of the ditch. After turning and I mean turning the wheel, along with the 4-wheel drive, we finally got out and back up onto the beloved gravel road.

After a great sigh of relief, we quickly noticed that something wasn't quite right with our Suburban - the vehicle that was supposed to take us through the Midwest and back to our home in Utah. We drove slowly back into town and parked our car on a side street. Dan got out and began checking the car. In the meantime, I asked a man if he knew how to get to the Prairieburg Cemetery. It took him a minute to recall the cemetery that was actually only a few minutes down the road. He was nice but was enjoying his evening beer or two.

Next came a man with a bag full of Japanese beetles. He had thousands of these bugs crawling around each other in a large clear sack. The man was in his 80's and had a Japanese beetle trap in his yard. He had already collected another bag full earlier in the day. He lived next door to the man with the can of beer.

You see, not much goes on in Prairieburg, so our arrival was causing a small stir. It is a lovely, quiet town but with no amenities to be had. Next came a man on a motorcycle. He told us that he had driven home from Colorado that day on his motorcycle. We asked him if there happened to be a mechanic in town. He said yes and went to go get him from his home, as his shop was closed for the day. He soon came back with the mechanic, who immediately began checking out our woeful car.

As all of this was going on, I continued to have a nice conversation with the elderly man holding the bag full of beetles, while the man with the can of beer listened. It turns out that the elderly man and I were related to each other. He was not a close relative but nonetheless, he was related and knew all about the Whitney family. He told me where the cemetery is and where Harley Whitney owned a farm. It was almost like a movie scene.

The power steering had broken and they had no parts and could not help us in Prairieburg. Without power steering, we drove slowly south to the nearest "big" town of Marion. We found a mechanic in the morning who promised us our car would be fixed by 12pm. Didn't happen. Instead, all seven of us had to drag our luggage through Marion to the mechanics shop and wait until 3pm when the car was finally deemed road worthy.

The final scene of this story is when we finally found the Prairieburg Cemetery. We took lots of pictures as so many of my relatives are buried there. Our trip to Prairieburg turned out to be a memory maker in more ways than one.

What happened to the Mormon monument?

The Jacob Foutz Secrist Monument - Jefferson County, Nebraska


In July Dan and I gathered up our children, our suitcases and headed off to the Midwest. I had never been any father east than Colorado. I know - not very far! One of the items on our agenda was to find the Mormon monument that was erected through the efforts of Wanda Secrist Telford to honor her great grandfather and my 3rd great grandfather - Jacob Foutz Secrist.

Jacob Foutz Secrist joined the LDS Church in 1844 in Illinois. He and his wife, Ann Eliza Logan were living in Olge County, Illinois when the missionaries came through. Olge County is in Northern Illinois. In the middle, almost at the top. They were among the first Mormons to come west to Utah, arriving in October 1847 with the Hunter/Foutz Company. The co-captain of the pioneer company was Jacob Foutz, Jacob's namesake and uncle. Jacob also had an aunt - Elizabeth Foutz who joined the LDS church as well.

In 1848, after arriving in the Great Salt Lake Valley, Ann Eliza - Jacob's wife was baptized. I love to know my 3rd great grandmother had backbone. She didn't join the LDS church just because her husband did. She waited until she was ready - until she felt good about it. She would need that backbone later.

Jacob and Ann Eliza settled with their baby daughter Louisa in Farmington, Utah. They had lost their first daughter, also named Loueasa (just spelled differently) in a tragic accident. She had fallen in a tub of very hot water and suffered for hours until she finally died from her extensive burns. They went on to have 3 more children - Mary, Jacob and Heber. Heber being my 2nd great grandfather.

In a "special conference" held 28 August 1852 in "Great Salt Lake City", Jacob along with 4 others were called on a mission to Germany. Only a couple of weeks later Jacob left on 15 September to begin his journey to Germany to preach the gospel. He left his wife 8 1/2 months pregnant. Ann Eliza delivered their fifth child only 2 weeks later. Jacob actually had a dream while traveling east that Ann Eliza had delivered a son. Based on his dream, Jacob sent a letter to Ann Eliza requesting that she name their son Nephi. She named their son Heber Nephi.

Jacob served for 3 years. On his journey back to Utah, Jacob became a captain of a pioneer wagon train heading to Utah. Jacob contracted cholera and became ill 29 June 1855 and died near the Little Blue River, Jefferson, Nebraska on 2 July. He was buried in a tin box near the banks of the Little Blue River.

Now fast forward to 1976. Wanda Secrist Telford researched the Oregon Trail and the diary of Charles Smith, a member of the pioneer wagon train that Jacob was captain of to locate the place where Jacob was buried. Wanda was able to work with a Miss Carpenter from the Jefferson County, Nebraska Historical Society to erect a monument to honor Jacob and 13 others in his wagon train that died. On 20 June 1976, as apart of the Jefferson County Bicentennial celebrations, the Mormon monument was erected.

Well now, back to my summer trip in search of the monument. We follow the directions I found on the Internet passing field after field of corn and soy beans - fields everywhere! We eventually drive through the metropolis of Powell.

This is the sign across the street from the Town of Powell sign. Someone has a sense of humor!

We eventually arrive at the white historic school house where the monument is supposed to be. Well, we look around and can't see it. I start looking closely at the grass for a cement base that the monument would of rested on. I first find the top of the torn down monument lying in the grass by the fence. It was still intact. Then I find the cement base and pieces what was the monument under a cedar tree. Here are the pictures.

So, this is the sad ending to our quest to find the Mormon monument in the corn and soy bean fields of Jefferson county. Apparently, sometime between 2008 and now, someone decided to destroy the monument. I don't know why. All of the other monuments were left in place around the historic school house. Below are the pictures of the other things there at the historic site and  a picture of the Little Blue River - very close to where Jacob Secrist was buried in his tin box, never to see his family in Utah again.
He loved his family and I have many letters he wrote. Another time I will share some of his thoughts. But, I will end with these words. "I say, may the Lord bless you all of my children with health and long life and peaceful days is the prayer of an affectionate father. In the name of Jesus Christ, amen.

The Little Blue River

My Sister - Regina

I have been thinking for some time now that I would write a post about my sister Regina who passed away many years ago. Earlier this week while I was on an early morning hike by myself - I was adding up how many years it has been since Regina died. 28 years ago this last April Regina's life on this earth ended. But, before I get to the end of her story, let me go back to the beginning.

It is interesting how as I get older many memories fade but so many of my memories of Regina are still clear in my mind. Regina came to this earth two years before I arrived. Regina and I are the closest in age out of all of my mother's children. I have many memories of Regina and I playing together as we grew up. We spent some part of everyday playing together. We swam, rode bikes, played softball, walked to AM/PM - the local convenience store, played house and school, built blanket forts and the list goes on. We also fought with each as I was I terrible tease. But, we always forgave each other and began our fun again. Because of Regina I always had a ready companion. I was lucky.

But, because of Regina I also began to learn early in my life about the realities of being mortal and that this life is temporary. My first lesson in the realities of being mortal took place when we were living in Pleasant Hill, CA. I was in first grade and Regina was in third grade when one day after school as I was walking to the bus to go home for the day - one of the people that worked at the school approached me and explained to me that Regina had blacked out and rolled under one of the waiting school buses. I remember sitting on some steps as this situation was explained to me. I was just 6 years old trying to understand what had happened to my sister.

Because Regina and I were so often together, I had the experience of being present a number of times when she would "black out". There were times when I was alone with her and felt scared as I did not understand why she was blacking out and how I could help her. But as I think back now, I am sure that I was not alone. I am sure in those mortal moments, when earth and heaven were meeting that Regina had someone there aiding her and prolonging her time on this earth.

Recently, I read an account of a woman had a near death experience. She drowned while kayaking in Chile. She was married, the mother of 4 children, a spine surgeon and a christian. She remembers not feeling scared as she was trapped underwater and drowned. She felt peace and love surrounding her. She left her body and went with a group of heavenly beings. But as she reached a certain point she had to return to her body. Her mortal experience was not over.

An angel explained to her that she had specific things that she needed to do before her time on earth was over. One of the things she needed to do was help her family deal with the future death of her son, Willie. Her son was alive and healthy at that point but would die in the coming years.

She explains to the reader that when her son Willie was about 4 or 5 years old that one day she was just chatting with her son and made the random comment, "When you are eighteen..." Her young son then said,"But I'm not going to be eighteen." She then said, "What did you say?" Her son looked at her seriously and said, "You know. I'm never going to be eighteen. That's the plan. You know that." He acted as though I must already know the plan for his life. She never shared this conversation with anyone until Willie's eighteenth birthday approached and then she finally shared it with her husband. Willie did pass away suddenly after being struck by a car while doing dry land training for the ski team he was on.

As I read this account, I thought of Regina's life. Her life's plan was similar to Willie's - in that she was never going to grow old. Although she would come very close, she was never going to reach her 14th birthday. She would come and go all in a short time.

Her last day on this earth was a perfect one. It was everything a young girl would want, especially Regina who loved to be outside. It was a beautiful April day in Fairfield. It was warm and sunny. We played outside most of the day. We were then invited to go swimming at a friend's house. Of course, we went. We swam with our friends. As I was swimming in the deep end of the pool, Regina was in the shallow end and stopped breathing and slipped under the water. There was an immediate commotion and I turned around in the deep end and saw the other people in the pool lifting Regina out of the water. They carried her to the patio and the poor mother of the house where were swimming at called for help and began CPR. The ambulance arrived quickly and began trying to get Regina to breathe again. I then left the backyard and walked home.

Later, at home my sister Teri told me that Regina had died. It was all very hard to understand, especially since Regina had previously blacked out in our local public swimming pool. So, being young and full of faith, I thought Regina would be fine. I had watched her recover many times, so of course she would recover again. So, when I was 11 years old (almost 12), I learned the final lesson, that this life is temporary. It was a very hard lesson to learn at such a young age. It changed me. I could never go back to my youthful innocence and simple faith again. It wasn't until I was in college before I finally felt at peace with my sister's death. Now, I can say that I am extremely blessed to have a sister who is ever aware of my life and who continues to guide me along the journey of my life until I reach the end.

Tender Times

These last five months have been a tender time in my family. I have attended three funerals - one in December, one in April and one in May. It has also brought my family closer together, with more occasions to show each other our love and give each other our support in these difficult, tender times.

I feel somewhat hesitant to write about these experiences because they are private, personal experiences held close to my families hearts. But, I did want to say that there have been three people in my family who have passed from this life. My cousin - Brynn Clausen, my uncle - David Walker and my grandma - Ernestine Cowley. Each person has had there own individual impact on this family and will continue to - as they are each so close to us and forever connected to us.

There is a song that I think of when I think about those I have lost. It is "Lead Kindly Light".  The last verse of this song goes as follows: So long thy pow'r hath blest me, sure it still - will lead me on. O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent, till - the night is gone. And with the morn those angel faces smile, which I have loved long since, and lost awhile.

I have felt the cold hand of death reach out and take those that I loved from my life and into the next. I say it this way because each time it felt cold and empty. But, I do know that there is more than I can yet see. As the scriptures say, "For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then shall I know even as also I am known." - 1Cor 13:12    "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him."  - 1Cor 2:9