In the steerage the family slept on a straw-covered plank bunk with barely enough room for four – let alone five. After much seasickness all of Guri’s children suffered from measles and her youngest son died. < Click Here to Listen to the Audio Version of the Story, as Read by Julie Buckley, the Great-Great Granddaughter of Guri. The greatest ... Read More »
My great grandmother Maja Greta Andersdotter may have immigrated from Sweden to the US twice. She was born in Grevbak, Skaraborg, Sweden on Dec. 13, 1847, to Anders Johansson and Maria Svensdotter. She was the eldest of what eventually were six children in the family, including one who died in infancy. In the early 1850s the family was influenced by ... Read More »
Click Here to Listen to Audio Version – Written by Charles Drekmeier and Voiced by Peter Drekmeier, Former Mayor of Palo Alto. Grandpa Henry Drekmeier spent happy hours skating on the frozen estuaries of the Rhein near Bremerhaven where he was born. I suspect this may have been in the late 1860’s since he fathered the first of his five ... Read More »
Click here to listen to story as read by Francis’ great-granddaughter, Holly Brady, a resident of Palo Alto. Francis Squair (seated with his 3 brothers and 2 sisters) was my great-grandfather. He was born in the Scottish Highlands just east of Loch Ness in 1848. After studying pharmacology at the University of Edinburgh, he and his brothers immigrated to Chicago ... Read More »
Johannes Hokannson was a religious man, an itinerate preacher in Sweden. His wife, Cecilia came from a wealthy family. Cecelia’s family helped her and her children considerably, but even so Grandpa said they were poor in Sweden. The state church disapproved of such preachers in Sweden; hence, he left with his wife Cecelia, and the six youngest of their seven ... Read More »
Hans (1846 – 1908) was born in Denmark and immigrated to Illinois in the early 1870’s. Probably he left to avoid being drafted into Bismark’s German army. A short time later, he and a close friend, Martin Nelson moved to Texas. Then Hans sent for his German fiancée, Ida, (1852 – 1931) to join him. Hans’ brother Jorgen Theodor Vinther ... Read More »
Christian Juergen Alpers completed a course of study to become a Lutheran pastor in Hermansburg, Germany and then, in 1875, immigrated to an area southwest of New Prague, Minnesota where about fifteen German Lutheran families had settled in the mid 1850’s. The school was one of several institutions sponsored by German mission societies, and the graduates were sent to locations ... Read More »
My grandfather, Morris Edmond Kraus, emigrated to America in 1881, presumably to escape conscription into the army of the Kaiser. His home was a village, Barendorf, that is near the town, Schonberg, in Saxony. He came to Ohio to live with an uncle, John Pentzel, who had arrived about 10 years earlier. Through relatives Morris obtained a job in a ... Read More »
Click Here to Listen to the Audio Recording – Read by Carolyn Williams, the Great-Granddaughter of Millie and a Resident of Palo Alto, CA. “You are all arrested, come along,” declared Officer Pete Walsh of the Butte, Montana police force. In the midst of a heavy snowstorm, Captain Millie Lick (Lueck) and her six fellow Salvation Army soldiers were taken ... Read More »
Percy Tredegar Morgan was born in London in 1862 into a distinguished family of Welsh origins. At age 21, after learning bookkeeping, auditing, and other skills, he left England for the United States to work for mining companies in Nevada, Denver and Montana. His experiences and legacy of just the first 15 years of his life in America are amazing. ... Read More »