Surname Saturday: Louis Koehl and Catherine Reuss

Louis Julius Koehl
b. 22 Aug 1881, New York
& Catherine “Katie” Reuss
b. 1884, New York
m. 20 Apr 1904, Kings County, New York
|--Louis Koehl Jr.
|----b. 1 May 1905, New York
|--Peter Koehl
|----b. 1909, New York

This is the family of Louis Julius Koehl, the brother of my husband’s great-grandfather Henry “Harry” Koehl and the son of Julius Koehl and Josephine Lochner, and Catherine “Katie” Reuss.

Louis worked as a butcher and later as a carpenter. By the 1920 census the family was living in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and on the 1930 census the family was shown living in Delaware County, Pennsylvania.

I would love to share information with anyone related to/researching this family; you can contact me at my e-mail address, which can be found by going to my profile page (there is a link to that page in the About Me section to the left).

Surname Sunday: Philip Kern and Augusta Marie Koehl

Philip Kern
b. 7 Aug 1878, Germany
& Augusta Marie “Gussie” Koehl
b. Aug 1879, New York
m. 25 Apr 1905
|--Helen P. Kern
|----b. 1908, New York
|--Ruth A. Kern
|----b. 1916, New York

This is the family of Philip Kern and Augusta Marie “Gussie” Koehl, the sister of my husband’s great-grandfather Henry “Harry” Koehl and the daughter of Julius Koehl and Josephine Lochner. I believe that Philip was the brother of John Kern, who married Augusta’s sister Julia Koehl. Some time between 1920 and 1930 the family moved from Brooklyn, New York to Bergen County, New Jersey.

I would love to share information with anyone related to/researching this family; you can contact me at my e-mail address, which can be found by going to my profile page (there is a link to that page in the About Me section to the left).

Surname Saturday: Frederick William Tönjes and Magdalena “Lena” Koehl

Frederick William A. Tönjes

  b. 24 Jun 1879, Bremen, Germany

& Magdalena M. “Lena” Koehl

  b. 1876, New York

  d. Apr 1969

  m. 14 Nov 1900, Kings County, New York

|--Adelina Tönjes

|----b. 10 Sep 1901

|----d. 31 Jan 1902, Kings County, New York

|--Josephine Tönjes

|----b. 23 Aug 1903, New York

|----d. May 1975, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California

|---& Thomas

|--Ernst Tönjes

|----b. 16 Nov 1908, New York

|----d. 20 Aug 1990, Orange County, California

|---& Rowena Booraem

|----b. 15 Nov 1910, New York

|----d. 8 Sep 1991, Orange County, California

|--Hermine A. Tönjes

|----b. 3 May 1911, Brooklyn, Kings County, New York

|----d. 3 Oct 2004, Lebanon, Lebanon County, Pennsylvania

|---& Elmer H. Booraem

|----b. 13 Nov 1902, New York

|----d. 20 Sep 1991

This is the family of Frederick William A. Tönjes and Magdalena “Lena” Koehl, the sister of my husband’s great-grandfather Henry “Harry” Koehl and the daughter of Julius Koehl and Josephine Lochner.  

Based on a passport application I found on Ancestry, Josephine Tönjes appears to have made a trip with her aunt and uncle Josephine Koehl Glashoff and Peter Glashoff to Germany in 1923.

I would love to share information with anyone related to/researching this family; you can contact me at my e-mail address, which can be found by going to my profile page (there is a link to that page in the About Me section to the left).

Surname Saturday: Paul Haas and Frances Koehl

Paul Haas
b. 29 Jan 1876, New York
d. 22 May 1946
& Frances Koehl
b. 8 Feb 1874, New York
d. 1966
|--Herbert Haas
|----d. 1903
|--Viola Haas
|----b. 7 Apr 1905, Kings County, New York
|--Paul J. Haas
|----b. 1910
|----d. 30 Nov 1911
|--Franklyn J. Haas
|----b. 4 May 1913, New York
|----d. 22 Dec 1999, Bloomingburg, Sullivan County, New York
|--& Myrtle Stowbridge
|----b. 30 Jul 1911, Brooklyn, Kings County, New York
|----d. 28 Sep 1959, New City, Rockland County, New York

This is the family of Paul Haas and Frances Koehl, the sister of my husband’s great-grandfather Henry “Harry” Koehl and the daughter of Julius Koehl and Josephine Lochner. Paul and Frances are buried in the Koehl family plot in Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York.

I would love to share information with anyone related to/researching this family; you can contact me at my e-mail address, which can be found by going to my profile page (there is a link to that page in the About Me section to the left).

Julius Koehl Address Study

Below is a list of addresses given for Julius Koehl in Brooklyn, New York from 1870, when I was first able to find any mention of him (on the 1870 census), to 1907, when he died. I have also listed his place of birth for all instances when it was mentioned. Early reports are very general, but Julius’ death certificate cites Meisenheim as his place of birth (the informant was probably his oldest daughter Josephine Koehl Glashoff), and that location was also given by daughter Magdalena Koehl Tonjes on the 1920 census as her father’s place of birth. The addresses are consistent; from 1870 to 1880 it was 12 Union Street, and from 1892 to 1907 it was 125 15th Street. The street view image from Google Maps shows the building currently located at a nearby address for 125 15th Street.

The next set of images show the locations of the residences of Julius Koehl’s eight surviving children at the time of his death in 1907. The first image shows the list of children with addresses from the probate papers; the second and third are the map and list I created for “My Places” on Google Maps. It looks very much like there are only six place markers, but in the Borough Park area (where my husband grew up) two markers are obscured by a third one: oldest sibling Josephine Glashoff, my husband’s great-grandfather Harry Koehl, and Magdalena Tonjes all lived within a block or two from one another. The northernmost two addresses belong to Julia and Augusta Kern, who probably married brothers.

Surname Saturday: Family of Herman Binninger and Lillian Koehl

Herman Binninger
b. Sep 1869, Germany
d. 13 Nov 1916, Kings County, New York
& Lillian “Lillie” Koehl
b. Apr 1872, New York
|--Lillian Binninger
|----b. Feb 1894, New York
|--Andrew Binninger
|----b. 4 Nov 1896, Brooklyn, Kings County, New York
|--& Carrie
|----b. 1895, Germany

This is the family of Herman Binninger and Lillian “Lillie” Koehl, the sister of my husband’s great-grandfather Henry “Harry” Koehl and the daughter of Julius Koehl and Josephine Lochner. Herman was a butcher, as was Lillian’s father; the 1910 census indicates that Herman owned bowling alleys. Herman and, I believe, Andrew and wife Caroline/Carrie are buried in Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn. I cannot find a reference to Lillie; perhaps she remarried or perhaps she is the “Caroline L.” listed as being in the same plot.

I would love to share information with anyone related to/researching this family; you can contact me at my e-mail address, which can be found by going to my profile page (there is a link to that page in the About Me section to the left).

Surname Saturday: John A. Kern and Julia Koehl

John A. Kern
b. Jan 1866, New York
d. 22 May 1948, Kings County, New York
& Julia Koehl
b. Mar 1868, New York
d. 1960
m. ca 1891
|--Julius Henry Kern
|----b. 28 Mar 1895, Brooklyn, Kings, New York
|---& Ida A.
|----b. ca 1898, New York
|----m. ca 1925

This is the family of John A. Kern and Julia Koehl, who was the sister of my husband’s great-grandfather Harry Koehl and the daughter of Julius Koehl and Josephine Lochner. I do not know whether John and Julia had any children in addition to Julius Henry. I suspect that John Kern may have been a relative of Philip Kern, who married Julia’s sister Augusta M. “Gussie” Koehl. This family was living in Brooklyn at the time of the 1920 census, but by the 1930 census had moved to Bergen County, New Jersey.

I would love to share information with anyone related to/researching this family; you can contact me at my e-mail address, which can be found by going to my profile page (there is a link to that page in the About Me section to the left).

Surname Sunday: Julius Koehl and Josephine Lochner

Julius Henry Koehl
b. 1839, Meisenheim, Germany
d. 16 Mar 1907
& Josephine Lochner
b. 1842, Wurttemberg
d. 17 Jan 1895
|--Josephine Koehl
|----b. 11 Feb 1867, Brooklyn, Kings, New York
|----d. 1949
|---& Peter H. Glashoff
|----b. 3 May 1866, Gluckstadt, Germany
|----d. 6 Oct 1937
|----m. 1899
|--Julia Koehl
|----b. Mar 1868, New York
|----d. 1960
|---& John A. Kern
|----b. Jan 1866, New York
|----d. 22 May 1948, Kings County, New York
|----m. ca 1891
|--Margaretta Helena “Lena” Koehl
|----b. 26 May 1869, Brooklyn, Kings, New York
|----d. 22 Oct 1875, Brooklyn, Kings County, New York
|--Lillian “Lillie” Koehl
|----b. Apr 1872, New York
|---& Herman Binninger
|----b. Sep 1869, Germany
|----d. 13 Nov 1916, Kings County, New York
|--Frances Koehl
|----b. 8 Feb 1874, New York
|----d. 1966
|---& Paul Haas
|----b. 29 Jan 1876, New York
|----d. 22 May 1946
|--Julius Koehl
|----d. bef 26 Apr 1876
|--Magdalena M. “Lena” Koehl
|----b. 1876, New York
|----d. Apr 1969
|---& Frederick William A. Tonjes
|----b. 24 Jun 1879, Bremen, Germany
|----m. 14 Nov 1900, Kings County, New York
|--Henry “Harry” Julius Koehl
|----b. 4 May 1878, Brooklyn, Kings, New York
|----d. Feb 1965, New York
|---& Anna Christina “Christine” Fichtelmann
|----b. Feb 1882, New York
|----d. May 1961
|----m. 1898
|--Augusta M. “Gussie” Koehl
|----b. Aug 1879, New York
|---& Philip Kern
|----b. 7 Aug 1878, Germany
|----m. 25 Apr 1905
|--Louis Julius Koehl
|----b. 22 Aug 1881, New York
|---& Catherine “Katie” Reuss
|----b. 1884, New York
|----m. 20 Apr 1904, Kings County, New York

This is the family of my husband’s great-great grandparents Julius Koehl and Josephine Lochner. I wrote a post on this family soon after I started this blog in 2008, but have learned a great deal more about this family since then, particularly in the last few weeks. As you can see, there are still gaps - death dates are missing for several of the children - but I have a plan of action. For one thing, I will be sending off for death certificates and mortuary certificates for the two children who died young - Margaretta Hellena and Julius. Some of the sources of information are: the death certificates of Julius and Josephine Koehl, the probate records for the estate of Julius Koehl, census records - including two New York state censuses, birth, death, and marriage information accessed through the Italiangen.org website, city directories, passport applications, tombstone photos, World War I and World War II enlistment records, and naturalization documents.

I would love to share information with anyone related to/researching this family; you can contact me at my e-mail address, which can be found by going to my profile page (there is a link to that page in the About Me section to the left).

What I Learned Wednesday: 22 June 2011

Lots more on the Koehls this week! This includes:

1. Finding the full name of the husband of Magdalena M. “Lena” Koehl - Frederick William Tönjes. This was the last of the sons-in-law of Julius and Josephine Koehl that I needed to find. There now remains only the maiden name of Katherine/Katie, wife of Louis Koehl, brother of Henry Julius “Harry” Koehl, my husband’s great-grandfather.

The route to finding Lena Koehl Tönjes’ husbands full name was very indirect. I did a search on the name of the only son, Ernst Tönjes. It brought up an obituary for his sister, Hermine A. Tönjes Booraem, which listed both her parents’ names, her husband’s name (Elmer H. Booraem), her sister Josephine Tönjes’ married name (Thomas), and the names of Hermine’s children and their spouses, among other information. It turns out that brother Ernest Tönjes also married a Booraem (Rowena). It doesn’t hurt that there are some relatively uncommon names involved here.

2. A review of some of my Fichtelmann and Scherer information revealed that I actually do know the name of the father of my husband’s great-great grandmother Katharina/Katy Scherer (a couple of weeks ago I mistakenly stated that I did not know his name) - it is Henry Scherer.

So finally my husband’s family tree is starting to fill out and I am more at home with New York and Brooklyn resources. Now I just need to get into New Jersey resources so that I can find out more about my husband’s maternal grandmother’s line, the D’Arcos and Rossis, who settled in Newark.

What I Learned Wednesday: 15 June 2011

This week’s lesson: When doing large newspaper search projects:

1. Never. Ever. Stop. In. The. Middle.
2. Find a REALLY good system for recording how you searched (search terms, by dates, etc.), how you labeled your images, and WHERE THEY ARE.
3. Never. Ever. Stop. In. The. Middle. Ever.

I had a document listing all of the downloads I had already done, but could not locate the last batch, so I had to figure out what search criteria I had used and do it over.

Right after my getting own IT guy, I need a research assistant who is really, really organized.

I also decided to take advantage of my six months’ free subscription to Archives.com, but so far have not found much that is useful, although I did find some newspaper articles on Brinlees. I’ll keep trying.


Koehl Research

This has been a great week for Koehl research. The death certificates that I received for my husband’s great-great grandparents Julius and Josephine Koehl pulled me back to digging around for Koehls in the off chance that Julius’ parents had also emigrated to America. I ended up at Family Search, where I found Julius’ probate file.

Goldmine.

It listed all eight surviving children of Julius and Josephine Koehl, including all the daughters with their married names. And I’m pretty sure I know who the other two are from the list of people buried in the Koehl family plot in Green-Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn.

How do I know there were 10? Well, an odd thing occurred. I pulled up my information on the Julius and Josephine Koehl family and noted that I had no 1900 census information for Julius. Since he died in 1907, he should have been there. I tried “Julius” without the last name but with his birth year plus or minus two years for Kings County, New York and found him. He was a widower by this time, and the census taker had done something strange. In the “Mother of how many children”/”Number of children living” columns were the numbers “10” and “8” - crossed out. The census taker must have asked the questions of Julius, and then realized that they were supposed to be asked only of women.

Two of the married names of the daughters were new information, and the record confirmed a third one I had recently guessed. One of the daughters I found with her husband and family in the census (including New York state censuses); the other I found only as a widow, so learning the identity of her husband is a new piece of information to pursue. (The surname is Tönjes, in case anyone out there is familiar with it.)

So this week I guess you could say that I’m hitting myself in the head with one hand and patting myself on the back with the other.

What I Learned Wednesday: 8 June 2011

The past week has been a week of happy dances big and small.

The big happy dance was for the two New York death certificates that arrived in the mail for my husband’s great-great grandparents, Julius Koehl and Josephine Lochner. Josephine’s record did not have much new information except for her cause of death exact age at death, which I can use to calculate her date of birth (correctly, I hope), but Julius’ death certificate was a goldmine: both parents’ names, the town where Julius was born (Meisenheim), cause of death, and exact age at death. The difference in the amount of information on the certificates was due to the different times at which they died, Josephine in 1895 and Julius in 1907; more questions had been added to the form by the time Julius died.

Soon after that I received an e-mail from Betty Lou Benjamin, Fichtelmann Finder Extraordinaire, who had sent off for burial information on a “mystery Fichtelmann” in the Fichtelmann family burial plot. It turns out the person interred in the grave was not a Fichtelmann, but rather Catherine “Sharer,” mostly likely the mother of Katharina/Katy Scherer, John A. Fichtelmann’s second wife and my husband’s great-great grandmother. No maiden name was provided and we do not know who her husband was, but this is still something to go on (her age was also provided). So two of my husband’s family lines have been taken back to the great-great-greats.

I have also come across a few items that have led to me to learn the fates of some of the children in the Brinlee lines. One of the lines is the family of Thomas Belase and Lela Sarah Jones, who lived in Coalgate, Oklahoma. The 1930 census entries for this family are interesting - for the states of birth of Thomas and his parents, the entries indicate Oklahoma, Mixed blood, Choctaw - and the exact same information is listed for his children. The same information is listed for the husband (Clyde Mowdy) and children of Sarah’s daughter Grace by her first husband, Joel Jasper Carlton.

What I Learned Wednesday: 27 April 2011

This week I am learning more about research in New York. I received a couple of scans of Fichtelmann family death certificates from another Fichtelmann researcher, and I took that as a sign that I need to get on the ball with getting documentation for some of my husband’s families. I e-mailed Evergreen Cemetery in Brooklyn for burial information on Katharina Scherer Fichtelmann but have not received a reply, yet. I also mailed out request forms for death certificates for Julius Koehl and Josephine Lochner Koehl. My next task is to get in touch with Green-Wood Cemetery to find out how to get burial information for all the family members listed in the Koehl family plot.

Most of this involves straightforward research procedures, but it is still a bit of a change of pace from researching my own family, most of whom lived in the southern states. Initially, my main goal in researching my husband’s family was not very ambitious: I wanted to at least document each line back to the original immigrant - and since the earliest immigrants seem to have come over around 1850, with the majority arriving between 1890 and 1910, that’s not terribly far back to go. I also hoped to get some clue as to where in Italy/Germany/Romania the various families originated, but I knew that I could not count on this.

Surprisingly, thanks to my fellow Fichtelmann researchers Mary Lou Benjamin and J. E. Felbinger and to my in-laws’ fortuitous discovery of my husband’s grandmother’s birth certificate (which led to my discovery of the ship manifest giving her home town in Italy), I now have at least two new points of origin in Europe; a third location, Moinesti, Romania for the Greenbergs, is already known.

However, I am still interested in documenting the families here in the United States. For instance, it is intriguing that my husband’s great-grandmother and her sister were going to meet a Vincenzo D’Arco in New Jersey; his great-grandmother married a Nicholas D’Arco, so this may be a brother.

In the coming weeks I am hoping to build up a decent section in my Genealogy Toolbox for New York and New Jersey research.

20 Random Things About My Family Tree

Thanks to Jennifer Trahan of Jennifer’s Genealogy Blog for coming up with this idea – I think a lot of us genealogy bloggers prefer writing about our family tree to writing about ourselves!

1. One of my distant ancestors was the pastor of a Brooklyn church that my husband occasionally attended as a little boy with his grandfather (not the same building, I imagine, but still…).

2. Among all the Baptists, Presbyterians, and a handful of Methodists in my family tree, I was surprised to find some Quakers.

3. My great-grandfather Hiram Brinlee Jr.’s oldest child was born in 1864, and his youngest child was born in 1908 (from different wives).

4. My great-great-grandfather Joseph Madison Carroll Norman’s oldest child was born in 1856 and his youngest child was born in 1898 (he had three wives and 26 or 27 children).

5. My great-great-grandfather Hiram Brinlee Sr. and his brother George Brinlee were tried for murder during the days of the Republic of Texas.

6. My (I don’t know how-many-times-great) Uncle Micajah Clark surveyed Thomas Jefferson’s land.

7. My (?6g) grandfather Isaac Norman’s land was surveyed by George Washington.

8. My great-great-great-granduncle Collin McKinney was one of the framers of the Texas Declaration of Independence and the Constitution of the Republic of Texas.

9. The above-mentioned George Brinlee, from my father’s side, served under General Edward H. Tarrant, a distant relation on my mother’s side of the family.

10. I am related to Samuel Clemens through the Moorman family (not through either of my Clemens lines as far as I know).

11. I am related to John C. Calhoun through my Hamilton/Calhoun line.

12. Three great-grandfathers, two great-great grandfathers, and a slew of 2g and 3g uncles served in the Civil War. There may have been additional relatives from the Smith line who also served, but since Lizzie Smith is my big brick wall, I do not know who they are.

13. My great-grandfather Hiram Brinlee’s first wife was Dicey Caroline Boone, a great-granddaughter of Daniel Boone.

14. There are an awful lot of clergymen among my ancestors. My family and I are quite surprised at this.

15. One of my mother’s sisters had the nickname “Wreck” because it was said that she make wrecks of all her boyfriends.

16. The parents of Clarence Brinlee (my subject for A Noble Life), James Edward Brinlee and Mary Ann Sims, were first cousins.

17. Two of my first cousins once removed, Guy Leon “Square” Brinlee and Vernon Argos “Bun” Brinlee, were locally famous eccentrics. They would not hunt or kill animals not would they allow them to be killed on their farm property. They never had their house wired for electricity. They led colorful lives with several different interesting professions that I hope to tell about in a future post. There was also a rumor that “Bun” actually got married at one point when his parents (“Hoss” and Myrtie Brinlee) were out of town, but was too afraid to tell his parents, so he just returned home and never mentioned it. I believe I may have found out who he married and hope to get more of the story.

18. Several members of previous generations in my husband’s family were apparently “connected.” (Points to anyone who knows what that means. Hint: His family is from New York and New Jersey.)

19. One of my husband’s grand-uncles was a well-known pianist who died young. There are still piano roll records of him playing the piano.

20. There were Tennessee moonshiners in my older half-brother’s Roberts and Phillips lines. One of them was a bigamist and served on both sides in the Civil War (his 300-page service record contains witnesses’ statements to that effect).

Highlighting the Koehls

I'd like to feature a family on my husband's side for a change. Researching his ancestors is quite different from researching my own. Most of my families are Southern and came over from the British Isles no later than the mid-18th century. My husband's family lines come from Germany, Italy, and Romania and the earliest immigrants among those apparently date to the mid-19th century. They immigrated to New York, New Jersey, and Canada. As a result, I have to learn to use a different set of resources.

Here is what I have been able to learn about the family of Julius Henry Koehl and Josephine Lochner, my husband Stuart's great-great grandparents:

Julius Henry Koehl
b. 1839, Prussia
d. bef 1900
& Josephine Lochner
b. 1842, Wurttemburg
d. bef 1900
| Josephine Koehl
| b. Feb 1867, New York
| ..& Peter Glasshoff
| ..b. May 1866, Germany
| m. 1899
| Julia Koehl
| b. 1868, New York
| Lena Koehl
| b. 1869, New York
| Lillie Koehl
| b. 1872, New York
| Frances Koehl
| b. 1874, New York
| Lena Koehl
| b. 1876, New York
| Harry Julius Koehl
| b. 4 May 1878, Brooklyn, Kings, New York
| d. Feb 1965, New York
| ..& Christine Fichtelmann
| ..b. Feb 1882, New York
| m. 1898
| Augusta Koehl
| b. 1879, New York
| Louis Julius Koehl
| b. 22 Aug 1881, New York
| ..& Katherine “Katie”
| b. 1884, New York
| | ...Louis Koehl Jr.
| | ...b. 1906, New York
| | ...Peter Koehl
| | ...b. 1909, New York

This information is based primarily on census information and the Social Security Death Index. If you are related to this family or researching it, I would love to share information with you. If you are familiar with methods and resources for researching these areas, I would welcome any advice.