HESCH HISTORY: Freedhem, Minnesota

This branch of the Austrian Hesch family is descended from Johann Hesch and his wife Marya (Schlinz) Hesch, who came to America from Oberschlagles, Bohemia with three sons: Paul, Mathias, and Anton. +++Johann & Marya settled in Buffalo County, Wisconsin but moved to Pierz, Mn in about 1885. .+++Mathias settled in Waumandee, Wisconsin and moved to Pierz in 1911. +++Anton never married but farmed with his dad in Agram Township, where he died in 1911.+++And Paul, my great grandfather, settled five miles away, in Buckman, Minnesota. He died there in 1900.

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Sunday, September 9, 2012

Freedhem, Minnesota

What, you ask, do I know about Freedhem, Minnesota?

Almost nothing, except I used to work with someone from there. Looking at the atlas photos, I recognized a few names, then looked on a map to find where Freedhem is. Ah, northwest of Pierz!

From the pics below, it was a cool little pioneer town once, with more than one business, two churches, a cluster of houses and, by 1910, a twelve-piece string band who were proud enough to have their picture taken together (scroll down)...no small feat for a tiny town out on the prairie.

Here's what Clara Fuller had to say about the town in her "History of Morrison and Todd Counties, Minnesota" (1915):

(I assume no Swede wanted to pay to be in her book because she mentions the kind, hard-working, open minded Swedish people in Little Falls as well as in the towns mentioned, but no one by name...☺).