Honest, research is tough!

I bet few of our readers realize how rigorous and time consuming digging up stuff is.  Today, we got a bug about the Kappes family (this photo from the atlases did it), and we were off. 

 Hmm...Family Search?  How 'bout Find a Grave?  Are there Kappes genealogies online already, or maybe on Ancestry?  What does the Pierz Journal have to say about this family? 

This photo of the Joseph Kappes family looks to be from 1890 or so, since the Little Lord Fauntleroy outfits on the young boys would have been fashionable after Frances Hodgson Burnett's book was published in 1885. (See?  now we're into fashion).  

Larry found this newspaper photo WITH names, so that really helps.  

One person I'm looking for is dad's friend Sepp Kappes, who was a plasterer.  Turns out, it wasn't just Sepp--most of the 'Kappes' mentions in the 1910-1915 PJs were about Kappes men plastering someone's house or business, and Sepp wasn't even born yet then.  (The problem with research in the Pierz Journal is that we can't stop reading...argh.  See? It takes time....) 

We still don't know which one was Sepp, or which family he belonged to, but maybe some Kappes will happen by and leave a comment.  BTW, Sepp plastered the inside of our new house in Sauk Rapids in 1959.  LOL...I remember he yelled at us to keep us from running around and/or touching the plaster.  We listened!