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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Showing posts with label 1937. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 1937. Show all posts

Wednesday, November 30, 2011

Boosterism, WPA style

 From a booklet we've visited before on HH comes accounts of a few businesses you'll recognize if you grew up in the St Cloud area.  The whole book is fun to read--it was a tourist guide written by the WPA writers project, and published in 1937.
Here's the history of the car shops in Waite Park, and surprisingly, the grain elevator near the Fire Station south of Cathedral HS, and the "Watab Paper& Pulp Mill" in Sartell:


This was 1937, remember.  The VA had been open for 13 years and had 47 buildings.  Patients there were vets from WWI, I suppose, but look at the staff enumeration.  Pretty interesting:

Tuesday, May 10, 2011

A Family Gathering

On Saturday, I went to Buckman for a surprise 80th birthday party for Girlie's son Joe. 

Skip this part if you already know it ☺:
PAUL HESCH (1846-1900) had 13 kids, one of whom was
JOHN HESCH (1878-1926), who had five kids, one of whom was
Mary GIRLIE BLOCK (1903-1989), who had eight kids, one of whom was
Harvey JOE, who was born in 1931...ok?


I was invited not because Joe and I are close (we only met last fall when I asked him if he was a Popp) but because I'm the genealogy nut in the family now.  THAT pleases me like crazy, partly because I DO know who married Frances Braun and where they lived (fer instance), and partly because of the wonderful stories people tell me about the family's past, like this:


Chatting with Joe's sister Doreen, she recalled how harvesting was done round robin, where a group of neighbors threshed at one farm after another till all their fields were done.  She remembered the crew in 1937 included "Mickel" (my dad!).  She said it had to be '37 cuz she was about 11 that year.  She was really impressed and horrified by a bet he won:  In the field, someone found a nest of newborn field mice, and dared dad to eat them....and....ack!...he did.  He was 24, really cute and full of the devil.  
How else would we have this precious story if I didn't go to birthday parties??
BTW, yes, I googled "baby field mice" but those photos are WAY too real for this post, trust me.