Glenwood City, WI

Yesterday we took a side trip to Glenwood City, WI to see St. John's Cemetery. It is located high up the hill on the old cow pasture of Peter Goossens' farm. I would like to say in the far back northwest corner of this cemetery was the markers for the Goossens family, but truthfully, I have no idea which direction I was looking. Judging by the photos, I'll stick with this corner.

    There are four small square stones or markers laid out with the letter G on them.  I would suppose this was to mark the area which the family wanted for their plots as it does overlook the farmhouse and barn down below. 

There is a large marker located at the back of the grounds with the Goossens name on it, but it was put into place years after the original headstones were laid. 

 Although the stone does not say Peter Goossens on it, the placement is right and the dates listed are correct for Peter Goossens, born 29 February 1860 in Belgium and died 30 April, 1931.  His wife, Sadie was born 10 June 1866, also in Belgium and died 03 June 1925.

It was a beautiful, sunny day and I also found a stone for a child I did not know was born to Peter and Sadie.  There was Frank, born 1898 and died 1899, before the 1900 census. 

This is why one visits the burial grounds of their ancestors.  There were others buried there but I'll leave those for another day and another story.

Lucille Elizabeth Berres

Great Aunt Lucille

Lucille Elizabeth Berres was born in Lakeville, Minnesota on March 15, 1910.  She was the youngest child and only daughter of Mathias Baltes Berres and Susan Tabaka.   In the Federal Census for 1910, Lucille was counted along with her brothers, Charlie, Frankie and Ralph, and mother Susan.  Her father, Matt, was listed as a harness maker.  Also in their home was fellow harness maker and boarder, Frank A Simones, age 22, and another boarder, Robert Shen who's occupation was listed as butcher.  I believe that Frank was the son of Nicholas Simones and Margaret Berres, Matt's oldest sister.

By 1920, Matt Berres' occupation was listed as a coal dealer and this family of six lived on Walnut Street.   By April 8, 1930, when the next census was taken, Charlie had married Philomeana M Hauer and they had two children, Rose Mary and Vincent.  Frank had married Isabel Veronica McMahon, and they were living in a boarding house, 309 2nd Avenue So., in South St. Paul, with Isabel's older brother John, who was a widower with 2 young daughters, age 3 and 7.

Matt now ran an farm implement dealership.  Matt and Susie, as she was listed, had two children still at home.   Ralph, age 22, was listed as the proprietor of an oil station.  But by June of that same year, Ralph left the family home when he married Isabelle Tossey. 

And the focus of our story, Lucille was 20 years old and ran her own beauty shop out of the back of the house.  Lucille found love in the arms of a tall Norwegian named Carl Calvin Christensen.  He was born in Minnesota, the son of Carl H Christensen and Almaria L Lafavor.

Lucille and Carl got married on June 10, 1931 in New Market, Minnesota.  Members of their wedding party are pictured below.  Top left is Al Klotz, Carl Christensen is in the middle and Frank Berres is on the right.  The girls are Catherine Christensen, Lucille Berres Christensen, center and Loretta Tabaka on the right.  Down front, in her role as flower girl, is Lucille's neice, 5 year old, Rose Mary Berres.

Wordless Wednesday - First Day of School - 1933

School started this week and what better way to celebrate than with a picture of James Goossens in kindergarten at St John's school in 1933.  (Hint:  He's on the floor, lower right hand side)

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun - Ahnentafel Roulette!

Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings has posted a new mission.
For those who have accepted the challenge there is .......

Saturday Night Genealogy Fun

1) How old is your great-grandfather now, or how old would he be if he had lived? Divide this number by 4 and round the number off to a whole number. This is your "roulette number."

2) Use your pedigree charts or your family tree genealogy software program to find the person with that number in your ahnentafel (ancestor name list). Who is that person?

3) Tell us three facts about that person with the "roulette number."

4) Write about it in a blog post on your own blog, in a Facebook or Google Plus note or comment, or as a comment on this blog post.

5) If you do not have a person's name for your "roulette number" then spin the wheel again - pick a grandparent, a parent, a favorite aunt or cousin, or even your children!


1)  Using my husband, Mark as number one, his maternal great grandfather was Mathias Baltes Berres, born in 1876, making him 135 years old.   Divide this by 4 and rounding up gives the number 34.

2)  Number 34 is the father of Maria Ludovica Ivens or Mark's ggg grandfather.  Name unknown.  Strike one!  Try another pitch.

1) Paternal great grandfather is Peter Goossens, born in 1860, making him 151 years old.  Dividing by 4 gives me 37.75, rounded up to #38.

2) Number 38 is the grandmother of Sadie DeWall (wife of said Peter Goossens).  Again I draw a blank. 

I think I should not take up gambling.  I have drawn a blank both in this family blog of the Berres and Goossens as well as my other blog on the Glewwe/Brossoit lines.  I think I need to do a lot more research, or learn to count cards!

Mathias Berres Made the History Book

While doing some name searches on the Berres families that moved to Lakeville, Minnesota, I came across Mathias (gggrandfather of husband, Mark) in a history book.

The following biographies are from "History of Dakota County and the City of Hastings, including the Explorers and Pioneers of Minnesota , and Outlines of the History of Minnesota". By Rev. Edward D. Neill and J. Fletcher Williams. Published in Minneapolis by North Star Publishing Company, 1881.

Page 422

M. Berres - a native of Germany, was born in 1821. After reaching man's estate he came to America. proceeding from Quebec to Buffalo, New York, thence to Washington county, Wisconsin. Here he engaged in agricultural pursuits eleven years. Coming to Lakeville, Dakota  County, Minnesota, he purchased a farm on which he lived about seven years, then bought property in the village where he now lives. His wife was Miss Elizabeth Hammes, married in 1852. They have nine children living.

(And his son, John)

Page 422

John Berres - was born in Wisconsin, in 1853. When a lad of twelve years he moved with his parents to Owatonna, Minnesota, and soon after to Lakeville. After attaining man's estate he purchased a farm from his father, and has since continued in agricultural pursuits. In 1876, he was married to Miss Mary Simons. Mary B., Catherine and Lena are their children.

Now all I have to do is run down to DCHS (Dakota County Historical Society), find the book and see if there are pictures in it!

Why Wisconsin?

Why Wisconsin? 

Why in 1846 would so many families from Germany uproot and come settle in Wisconsin? 

 I think I may have found one possible anwer to this question. On the Wisconsin Historical Society webpage there is this entry about Carl Hasse and the booklet he wrote encouraging his fellow countrymen to go to Wisconsin.

A German emigrant guidebook, 1841

Schilderung des Wisconsingebietes in Nordamerika (Description of Wisconsin Territory in North America)

     "Carl E. Hasse (1802-1872) came from his home near Leipzig, Germany, to visit Wisconsin in 1838. He stayed several months and wrote this 80-page pamphlet when he returned. In it he says he doesn't want to persuade anyone to emigrate to America, but only to provide accurate information based on his own experiences to people who are thinking about it. His account is among a handful of works credited with starting the large-scale immigration of Germans to Wisconsin which peaked after the country's failed 1848 revolution. Hasse immigrated to Wisconsin with his family about 1845, settling in Greenfield, outside Milwaukee. He became a community leader, serving as a justice of the peace and elected twice to the state Assembly (1852 and 1859). After the Civil War, he appears to have followed his eldest son's family to Missouri, where he died in 1872.

     Hasse's pamphlet is extremely rare: only three copies exist in U.S. libraries. This one may have belonged to the author, since it was given to the Wisconsin Historical Society by his granddaughter, the influential librarian Adelaide Hasse (1868-1953). It is entirely in German and printed in the Fraktur script; no English translation is known to exist. Following the text is a large map of Wisconsin and Iowa territories, with an inset of the settled portion of southern Wisconsin, dated 1841."

Wordless Wednesday - RoseMary Berres

Wordless Wednesday – a great way to share your old family photos! Create a post with the main focus being a photograph or image. Some posters also include attribute information as to the source of the image (date, location, owner, etc.). Wordless Wednesday is one of the longest running “memes” in the blogosphere and is an ongoing series at GeneaBloggers.