Family History Notes and Photos by Bob Mesenbrink

Wow. Did I just write that title? When Dad was a Hobo? My Dad, Russell Mesenbrink, was anything but a hobo. When I think of a hobo, I think of a bum, somebody traveling around, living off the handouts of others, but that certainly wasn't Dad. He worked his whole life. He did everything he could to make a living, even in the Great Depression. According to  Wikipedia , the term hobo originated in the late 1800s. A hobo is a migratory worker and is different from a tramp or a bum. A tramp is a migratory non -worker, and a bum neither travels nor works. One thought on the origin of the word is that it derives from "hoe boy" or farm worker. So when I think about that, it pretty well describes my Dad in the mid to late 1930s. He traveled west from Iowa, partially to see relatives who lived in Idaho and Montana, but also to work. He did this two or three times at least. But most significantly, he hopped trains to get there. A lot of people did it during the depression years,

Augusta Nipkow was my great grandmother, although she died long before I was born, and I never knew her. She was an immigrant from Germany, coming over as a child with her parents. She was born in Pomerania, which was a German speaking region, a part of Prussia at the time. The Potsdam agreement at the end of World War II gave Pomerania to Poland and expelled the Germans living there. So, if you look at a map of the area now, you will see Polish, not German, city names. Augusta was born in Butow, and it was a little tricky to find this place as there were a couple other larger Butows that don't really make sense to be her birthplace. I haven't found a birth record for her, but her family was in the area around Stargard, and there is a Butow about 25 miles east of there which I believe to be her birthplace. See  Finding the Nipkows . Her obituary states she was born February 2, 1865. Here is an 1872 passenger list showing her with her family. The top of the right side shows

My dad, Russell Mesenbrink, served on the battleship West Virginia (BB-42) during World War 2. I never heard a lot about the time he spent in the war, a bit relayed to me by my mom, but nearly nothing from him. He was a cook. Dad kept some memorabilia from his time in the service. I remember seeing the Japanese occupation money he saved from the war, and being in awe of it as a child. But nothing was more mysterious than the pictures of some of his shipmates, mostly without names, in the family albums. I always wondered who these men were, where they were from and what happened to them. John Henry Robertson John Henry Robertson - This is one of few that was identified. He was born in Litchfield, Illinois in 1923, died in 1995 and is buried in the National Cemetery in St. Louis. He grew up in East  St. Louis. I haven't found any more information on him. Silvio Rende Silvio Rende was easy to pick out from the book "USS West Virgina Crosses th

I noticed a pattern of some of my ancestors dying at their children's homes. It seemed strange to me at first, and I wondered how common this was in my family. I found more cases like this and the thought of some bizarre family curse briefly passed through my mind. It still seems odd to me, but it is understandable. It was normal for a parent to move in with a child when they couldn't care for themselves. Nursing homes just weren't used the way they are today. And visits to children's homes sometimes involved a long trip. Travel was more difficult then than now, perhaps leaving them in a weakened condition. There are probably many reasons for the timing that caused ancestors to die at their children's house's. My great grandfather, Jonathan Stephenson, who lived near Arion, Iowa, died of a stroke in 1919 while visiting his son, my grandfather, Fred Stephenson, who lived about 30 miles away near Castana. My great great grandmother, Salucia Squibb, died in 191

My mother showed me these papers when I was in high school. I was absolutely amazed by this genealogy, written by my great grandmother, probably in the early 1950s, showing her ancestors and descendants. It took a while to get to that point though, as you might imagine, especially once you see the papers. But eventually I was able to get it sorted and make sense of it all. In fact, I don't think I've found a single significant mistake in her papers. the information in there formed the basis of my research on that line. It is truly a family treasure. It was the main reason for my interest in genealogy. My mother also told me that she hand-wrote copies of these for each of her numerous grandchildren, my father being one of those. But I'm not sure that really happened. I've yet to run across another copy, but no doubt that was her intention. Whether or not she was able to make all those copies, I want to publish her work here for the benefit of her descendants, as she in

One of my favorite items from my Dad's childhood is a poster he made presumably for a school contest. I would guess it was made around 1925 or 1930 when he would have been ten to fifteen years old. It is an ink drawing that I have in my office. The poster is well done, I'd say, but what makes it most interesting to me is it's topic: prohibition. Prohibition was in effect between 1920 to 1933. Dad, being born in 1915, wasn't old enough to be directly affected by prohibition, but no doubt had heard a lot about it. I get a kick out of the line of liquor bottles ready to rush in as soon as the door opens and Beer is allowed in. I don't know for sure that this was a contest, and if so, how Dad did. It was definitely a keepsake, and one I'm glad was kept. Of course, Mesenbrink is a German name, and one associates Germans with beer. So this poster didn't seem to be in line with what I knew of my Dad and his family. It's safe to say it was only an assignm

My grandfather, Fred Stephenson, died shortly before I was born, so I never knew him. He spent his entire life in the area west of Denison, Iowa. But several years ago my Aunt Edna mentioned how her dad sold everything and moved to Windom, Minnesota, only to turn around when he got there - because of the deep snow. The story intrigued me, but I didn't have much to go on until I found some articles in some archives of the Denison Review found at a wonderful website, http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov, provided by the Library of Congress. Here is the chronology: January 26, 1916: Sale date of Wednesday, Feb. 9, reserved by Fred Stephenson on his farm near Dow City. February 2, 1916: Sale bill published. Included are 9 head of horses, 36 head of cattle, and 50 hogs, and also a large amount of machinery. The sale bill states that he had decided to quit farming. October 1916: He bought a couple of lots in Arion and gives them to his mother, Lillian Stephenson. The next year, Ma

Well, it's been quite a ride. I started this just a few days ago thinking it would be interesting to learn a little bit about Pomerania, where Augusta Nipkow and her family came from. And I started writing Part 1 of this series not knowing what I would find. But since records are added at a rapid pace these days, there was more to be found than I realized. First off, although I believe that Augusta was born in Butow as was said, I did not any direct evidence of that. Nothing I found contradicts it though. Her parents moved around a lot, and they certainly left proof of that. And although her parents moved around a lot, her grandparents and extended family probably didn't. Working back, here's what I found: 1872 - Nipkows left from Stettin and settled in Jackson County Iowa 1872 - Nipkows lived in Hohengrape 1865 - Augusta born in Butow 1862 - Otto born in Klutzow 1858 - Parents, Friederich and Wilhelmina Huebner married in Klempin 1827 - Birth of Daniel Frederich

In Part 1, I presented the information I had on Augusta Emilie Nipkow and her parents, Fredrich Nipkow and Wilhelmina Huebner and their origins in Pomerania. Augusta said she was born in Butow, which I have concluded (at least for the time being) is the present-day village of Bytowo, Poland east of Stettin (Sczcecin). Their immigration record says they came from Hohengrape, present-day Chrapowo, Poland, which is southeast of Sczcecin. My next step in research is to determine what records are available for these villages. At the time the Nipkows left there, these were German villages, Prussian to be exact. Wikipedia has a " List of municipalities in the Province of Pomerania" which indicates that Butow was in the District Saatzig. A website full of information on German locations is  http://wiki-de.genealogy.net/. It lists Hohengrape being in the Soldin district. Other place names higher up in various bureaucratic hierarchies are Berlinchen, Brandenburg, Berlin, Landsberg,

I thought it might be fun, and perhaps a bit risky, to go through the steps I take in researching a family. I don't know where this will lead, if anywhere, at this point. But to be honest, I did uncover a good hint the other day while researching on Ancestry, so that gives me a decent place to start. The family that I am talking about is that of my great grandmother, Augusta Emilie Nipkow, who married Henry William Mesenbrink. Henry William and Augusta Emilie Nipkow Mesenbrink Married September 20, 1882 Henry and Augusta were married in the Lutheran Church near Spragueville, Iowa, near the Mississippi River in Jackson county. Their families had moved there in the recent past, Henry's family having come from Minnesota to rejoin his brothers by 1869, and Augusta's family having come from Germany in 1872. Augusta taught Sunday School and apparently had strong Lutheran roots. This is important to me because of the part of Germany that Augusta came from. Her obituary stat