Edward and Viola

When the inspector was going through our future house, he told us that he thought the house was built in the 1910s or 1920s due to the thickness and style of the basement walls.  None of the documents that accompanied our house indicated an actual date.

Well, I got curious, so I went over to the La Crosse Public Library to the Archives to see if I could figure it out.  And wouldn't you know, David (the very helpful archivist) and I figured it out fairly quickly.

It seems that the best way to find out when a house was built, at least in La Crosse, is to determine when water lines were run to the lot.  Our lot got water on Oct. 23, 1923.  Now, in the Assessor's records for 1923, there was no valuation for a house on our lot, but David thought that because all the yearly records were handwritten, it didn't make it into the tax record that year.  It showed up in the 1924 records though.  In 1923, our lot was worth $275.  In 1924, our lot was worth $400, and our house was worth $4000.  We assume, then, that the house was built in late 1923 or early 1924.

In looking up these records, I also learned that a Mr. William Schroer originally owned our lot and the lot to the south of us.  It appears that in 1923 he built houses on both lots.  He continued to live in the house on the lot to our south, and sold our house to Mr. Edward J. Kreutz and his wife Viola R.

Because David is the curious type, and I was not disinterested, we looked in the city directory to learn more about the Kreutz household and their time in our house.  We pulled out directories for approximately every 10 years, beginning with 1924.

1924: Ed was an estimator for Segelke and Kohlhaus Manufacturing.
1934: Ed was an assistant estimator for S & K Mfg.
1943: Ed was promoted to vice president for S & K Mfg.
1953: Ed rose to president of S & K Mfg.
1963: Ed was a draftsman at North La Crosse Lumber
1970: Ed was still a draftsman at North La Crosse Lumber

We figure that Ed rose through the ranks to president, and then either retired (he was born in 1891, so he would have been 72) or the company folded, and he went to work at a less taxing job as a draftsman.  Viola's name was missing from the 1970 entry, and we learned that she died in 1967.  Ed was no longer listed in 1980, and we found that he died on November 10 (spooky!), 1974.  They are buried in the Catholic Cemetery with their daughter and son-in-law.

So, who moved in after the Kreutz's?

1980: Anthony Kromke, relief machine operator at Safeway Foods; Michelle Kromke, chief pharmacy technician at St. Francis Hospital.
1990: Carl Barnes, salesman at Frank's Liquor of La Crosse

And there we stopped.  We could have looked at shorter intervals or continued for more years, but I was getting hungry (it was way past my lunchtime), and I had found what I had come looking for.  I will probably go back another time and fill in some of the more recent gaps, but for now, I am delighted to know a bit about the early history of my house and the family who loved it so much as to live in it for 50 years.

kinfolk

From Reiser

It took me long enough, but I finally got all my old relatives' photos scanned in and labeled. It was great fun discovering the threads of relations back into the early 1800s, and seeing how they looked - mostly stern and severe, it seems. Did smiling in photos not come into fashion until the late 20th century? If you want to see how I got my good looks, feel free to browse my relations by clicking on the photo above. It should take you to one of the three albums of my kin.

back in time

Lately, I've been doing some genealogical work with some documents and photos that I found while cleaning out some closets at my mother's house. I've been able to work my way back to Germany through a couple lines of ancestors, and recently I've found pictures to go with many of the names I've been running across.

Some of them are really great, like the picture postcard of some relatives who traveled down to Arkansas and got their picture taken with some donkeys by N.E. McLoed, "Wild West and Rustic Photographer."


Another good one is a photo of a building whose burned out windows indicate it was recently destroyed by fire, but whose facade is covered in a layer of ice and hanging icicles. The note on the back says, "Napoleon, February 10, 1899. 22 degrees below zero." It seems that the fireman's hose doused the fire and then created an ice palace!


I haven't been able to place the following relation, but she obviously has a dramatic side. There are a set of a few photos of her in various poses, but this one is the funniest. The notation on the back says, "Help! Mouse! Kill it!"

There are hundreds more I haven't gotten to yet, and I'm hoping there are quite a few more good ones in the bunch.