The month of November is upon us with Thanksgiving approaching.
I am Proud & Thankful for my family's German heritage.
While driving through rural Missouri I'm reminded of many towns strategy that apparently worked in drawing Germans to America.
At the close of the Franco-Prussian War in the 1870's, many German immigrants came to America--where they were drawn to Missouri and the new towns with the familiar terrain like their Homeland.
My German heritage started in this country with the arrival in Keokuk County Iowa in 1869-1874.
My great grandparents immigrated from Bettendorf & Tinsdorf regions of Germany.
They met - married and had seven children.
One of those children was my Grandfather who would end up in Lincoln, Nebraska and marrying a young daughter of his then employer Anderson Scott.
(My Grandfather)
(My Grandmother)
My Grandfather later would moved his immediate family in 1919 from a Lincoln, Nebraska farm to an Amorett, Missouri farm... (Where my father was born)
(My father & I)
My grandfather had purchased the land & old farm house from only a picture sight of it while operating his Thrashing business across the States of Nebraska to Southern Texas.
He moved his family in the fall of 1919, lockstock & barrel to the old Missouri farm home.
Then the next spring he built his family a new home from their timber & with his new saw mill business on the farm.
He also started a operational ice plant built along the river.
He would later own most of the downtown business buildings in Amorett.
Later he built a huge Walker Strip Mining Shovel and ran a Strip Mining Operation near Drexel, MO to Windsor, MO, with his two eldest sons until his death in 1938.
My father was taught the dragline - crane operation along side his older brothers and would later be employed for over 30 years operating a crane in the building of Missouri roads & bridges.
With my Grandparents five sons they had a built in labor crew for the multiple business operations that were started by my Grandfather.
At one time they had additional operations of oil refinery & heating oil delivery business from their Kansas oil well property that was later purchased.
My grandfather leased out the downtown buildings for others to run the operations.
Germans are known to be industrious people and I am proud of my heritage.
My own father continued his life's work and was like his father in the ingenuity of anything mechanical.
What a road trip will bring up in memories & my own family heritage.
I hope you were entertained by my family rambles. 😅
Nana
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