Maria Catharine Emerich - I16923 - Individual Information - Wisconsin and Illinois Genealogy

Maria Catharine Emerich (I16923)

Surname: Emerich
Given Names: Maria Catharine

Gender: Female

Birth: 28 July 1826 -- Schuylkill County, Pa
Death: 11 May 1900 -- Cedar County, Ia

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Personal Facts and Details

Notes

Note

Isaac Achenbach wrote ‎(in source 104)‎,

' 'My grandmother, Zerbe, was born Catherine Emerick in Schuylkill Co.,Penn. on July 28, 1826. She was united in marriage to Jonathan Zerbe in1846. They came west to Cedar County in Mar., 1865. Their familyconsisted of 9 girls and 4 boys. Their daughter, Elizabeth, was mymother. Their 13 children presented them eventually with 86grandchildren. Grandmother Zerbe was a member of the German ReformedChurch.' '

' 'Their first years in Cedar County, they lived in a log cabin, located 3miles east of Cedar Bluff, just south of the Hartman Corners. My mothertold me the cabin sat back in heavy timber. This dense woodland extendedsouth to the Cedar River at this point, however, there were a few smallclearings where wheat, buckwheat, oats and corn were grown. There werefew fences, made of rail, so it was impossible to keep much livestock.Grandfather Zerbe farmed a patch of ground just east of Hartman Corners.There were no seeders or discs then, so the seed was scattered by handand covered by horsedrawn cultivator. Mother often related how she hadto help scare and chase the whild geese, ducks, prairie chickens andpigeons from the field, so they wouldn't eat the seed. They came in suchnumbers at times, they would blot out the sun, and strip a newly seededfield in just a few minutes if it was left unguarded. Some settlers,using homemade fox traps, trapped the feathered intruders and sold them,making enough profit to pay for a small farm.' '

' 'Land, in those days, was cheap. Timber land sold for $1.25 an acre.Prairie land was a little higher, from $2 to $3.00 per acre.' '

' 'Two of my uncles also settled nearby. Jake Emerick lived about 3 milesnortheast of Cedar Bluff on what is known as the Nick Crock farm.' '

' 'Henry Emerick, the first of the family to come west, settled west ofBuchanan. He did very well, and kept buying land until his holdings weremost of the land from 3 miles east of Cedar Bluff to Cedar Valley, 8miles down the river. He owned the Cedar Valley quarries and the land onthe north of themm and up the river to the old Buchanan road. His landextended away from he river about 1-1/2 miles. He also owned a part ofthe little town, Buchanan. Many acres of this timberland, to this dayuntouched by axe or saws is referred to as the Emerick estate, though ithas been divided and is part of a half dozen farms.' '

' 'Grandmother Zerbe passed away in 1899, at the age of 73 years.' '

' 'My father, Lewis Achenbach, was born Feb. 5, 1847, in Schuylkill County,Penn. His parents came from Germany a few years before his birth.Little is known of them, except that my grandfather was very welleducated. He was an attorney and a professor, teaching in both Germanyand America. My father, Leewis, and 3 brothers, Emanuel, Jake and Henrycame west to Cedar County in '69, and my parents were married here in1870. They lived in Cedar Bluff for about 15 years. My uncle, Emanuel,operated a saloon there for a number of years,, and later went toWyoming. Uncles Jacob and Henry farmed 1/2 mile east of Cedar Bluffs.They also moved west.' '

' 'Seven of my older brothers and sisters -- Alex, Emanuel, Laura, Celia,Lewis, John, and Orlando were born in Cedar Bluffs. My father, adept atseveral trades, did some carpenter work, and a lot of stone and brickmason work. He also worked part-time blacksmithing.' '

' 'Remnants of the Sac and Fox Indian Tribes camped across the river. Theywere friendly and provided ferry service with their canoes for personswishing transportation across the river.' '

' 'I was first to be born there. Then Abner, Angeline and Dora.' '

' 'The iron bridge was completed and opened for use in Jan., 1877. Myfather and Milt Shawver, a friend, and neighbors quarried the rock thatwas used in the piers of the bridge. The quarry was 3/4 of a mile downstream and the rock was hauled by team and wagon up the river bank to thebridge site. Two brothers of my mother, Henry and Jacob Zerbe, workedwith the Pratt Construction Co., in the construction of the bridge.During my lifetime, the ground up and down the river has been surveyedthree times as a prospective site for a dam, but nothing further hasdeveloped.' '

' 'In the early 1880's, my father bought two tracts of timber land from Wm.Marker, 1/2 mile east of Cedar Bluff, just south of the road to Tipton.This land he cleared and built a house there. He continued to buy andclear the timber from land until his estate consisted of 100 acres onwhich we lived, and 80 acres east 1/4 of a mile. A corner of this 80 wasused to locate the one-room school house which provided the reading,writing and arithmetic learning in the community.' ' The Shawver cemeteryis still located just north of where the school house stood. The schoolhouse is gone now and the playground is part of the cemetery. Two of mysisters, a brother, and I were born in the house my father built. I wasborn Feb. 10, 1886, and remember little of events that took place beforeI attended school in 1892. I spent my schooldays in that little one-roomschool house where the average enrollment was about 65 during thewinter. During spring and fall enrollment dropped due to the studentsbeing needed in the fields at home. Some of the young people attendingschool were 18 and 20 years old, and those boys could easily handle theteachers, 'all men', if they had a mind to. Many times during thewinter, we waded thru snow from knee to wasist-deep, to get to school.There were no road crews as today to plow out the roads. I attendedschool until 1902 ‎(during winter months)‎ and completed the fifth grade.' '

' 'My father operated a sorghum mill, and my first recollections of thatwere about 1894. It was located across the road from the old home placein Milt Shawvers timber. Milt and my father operated as partners. Alittle later, my father had a mill west of Spook Hollow on ground ownedby August Schutt. He ran the sorghum mill there for a number of years,finally moving it on his own property. My brother, Abner, and I were oldenough to help with the job. We made and sold a lot of sorghum to thestores in Mechanicsville, West Branch, and Tipton in 100 to 150 gallonlots. My job was to operate the cane press. It was hard and heavywork. I also measured the sorghum into the containers, sometimes gallonbuckets. The production of 90 gallons was a good day's work. We made alot of sorghum for 50 cents a gallon. The sorghum boilers were fueled bywood which was cut by us.' '

' 'The neighborhood young people and I spent many happy hours swimming andfishing in the summer and ice skating in the winter. During the coldwinter months, ice harvesting was done by the entire community workingtogether. Ice from the frozen river was sawed into blocks and stored inice houses. To retard thawing, it was packed in sawdust and did 'keep'until mid-summer. My brother, Orlando, nearly lost his life as a resultof drinking the clear, cold river water while we were harvesting ice,getting typhoid fever.' '

' 'When I was a boy of 14, signs of the old Muscatine trail were stillvisible, and my elders told me about it being made by the settlers makingtrips by team and wagon down the river to Muscatine, to get their cornand what ground into flour at the grist mill there.' '

' 'A half mile east of Cedar Bluffs, in Spook Hollow, there was a trailfollowing the hollow down to the flat and the Cedar River. Abouthalf-way between the road and river, a large lime kiln was located. MiltShawver owned the land and operated the kiln, supplying the lime for thecommunity. That was in 1887. Further down the trail next to the riverwas a large flat area called the Dean Camp Ground. The Dean familyoperated a business in Tipton, and each autumn, the campgrounds took onthe look of a 'tent city,' as the Tipton businessmen took a campingholiday and came there to relax, fish and hunt. At that time, CedarBluff was a hustling little river town. There were 3 grocery stores; allthree carried hardware and general supplies, and had a thrivingbusiness. Our salt, flour, sugar, corn meal, and even the cereals camein bulk. The grocer received them in barrels, boxes and large gunnysacks. The town had two churches, Methodist and Union, two blacksmithshops, one of which was run by my brother, Emanuel, the other operated byH.C. Miller. This man grew a handle-bar mustache long enough to tie in abow on either side of his face. Back of brother, Emanuel's, blacksmithshop, John Walenta operated a harness shop. He hand-made complete setsof harness for $45, a set and did real fine work. There were threesaloons and a creamery. Frank Dance was the last creamery operator. Mybrother, Alex, and Henry Geesey operated the last meat market in CedarBluffs.' '


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	Events of close relatives
Birth	28 July 1826 Schuylkill County, Pa
Marriage	15 June 1846 (Age 19) Jonathan Zerbe - ‎[View Family ‎(F6511)‎‎]
Death	11 May 1900 (Age 73) Cedar County, Ia Cause of death: Dropsy
Universal Identifier	63F32FA8EFADD511973400E02931A951AE73
Burial	Wallick Cemetery
Last Change	22 March 2006 - 16:16:31