The Greulichs

When Larry first convinced me that my families' genealogy would be fascinating ("No, really--this'll be fun!") my only research to date was a connection with an older gentleman on the west coast who said he was related to the Jansons.  I'd posted some mis-information on an online message board one Sunday, and he saw it and contacted me.  

Eventually, he sent me the Janson Family tree going back from my grandpa Anton Janson, including Greulichs who'd married Jansons along the way.  He found the tree in a book written by a Ronellenfitch in Horrenburg, Germany.  I recognized the Ronellenfitch name from Buckman, but I didn't know that that family had also married Jansons over there.  So, cool!

The gentleman from California who'd sent the info was August Greulich, a name I'd never heard before.  But look--evidently, great grandpa Joe kept in touch with other expats from home, even if they'd settled in Kentucky.  

And yes, according to Family Search, there was a Daniel Greulich in Louisville, Kentucky who was born in Germany in 1831, and died a year after he visited Minnesota: September 19, 1910.

I really hope they had a lovely visit. Great grandpa Joe died in December, 1911.

Elizabeth Naber 1873-1911

One of the conundrums Larry and I ran into early in our search was the numerous different Elizabeth Nabers we found.  We eventually discovered that my grandmothers' father, Gerhard Naber, had married twice to women named Elizabeth and with the second Elizabeth had a daughter they named... Elizabeth.  

When great grandpa Gerhard died in Iowa, his widow Elizabeth moved to Buckman with her sons John and Gerhard, and daughters Margaret and Elizabeth.  A third daughter, Katherine, already lived in Pierz (Mrs William Bahns).

Evidently, the younger Elizabeth had kidney troubles* even before they left Iowa, and finally died of it in April, 1911:

 I was struck by the life/death/funeral/burial economy of the announcement in the paper.  Sure, the Pierz Journal was a weekly, and this all happened within a week.  It was strange, tho, seeing it all on one page.

* Bright's Disease is an older classification for different forms of kidney disease. It was named after Dr. Richard Bright, who described the condition in the early 19th century. Lack of understanding of kidney function naturally meant that several different conditions could be considered Bright's Disease. These include inflammation of the kidney, commonly called nephritis. Inflammation may be the result of too much protein being shed through the kidneys, called proteinuria, or hematuria, which causes blood in the urine. As well, Bright's Disease might describe kidney failure due to high blood pressure or retention of fluids.

Those symptoms most commonly associated with Bright's Disease were intense pain on either or both sides of the lower back. Fever might be present and intense edema, or retention of fluids, might cause the extremities to appear extremely swollen. Breath could be labored and difficult, particularly if kidney failure caused fluid to accumulate in the lungs, or was caused by metastasized cancer.

Naber news from 1912

"John T. Schmid, recently from Medina, N. D., has bought the farm of Margaret Naber, better known as the old "Poster Farm" east of Buckman, and moved onto it a few weeks ago".

Margaret Naber was my grandmother, before she married Anton Janson, but HOW did she come by a farm of her own?  We know "John Naber and his mother" moved to Buckman from Petersburg Iowa in the spring of 1910 (his sisters Margaret and Elizabeth moved there, too...was that just understood?)
We know the farm in Iowa must have sold for big bucks (Larry found an article mentioning the great increase in Iowa farm land prices  then), so perhaps the Nabers invested in a few farms instead of just one.  It would have been a good way to bestow a legacy on a child and increase the value of the inheritance at the same time, huh?

More from the Morrison Co Pictorial Atlas

Wow, an '80s photo taken at my cousin Galen's wedding to Ann Held.  I still say he really lucked out ☺, Ann is delightful.  Unbelievable that their youngest son graduated from High School this month.