Keeping contact

Nothing really exciting today, other than the fact that I got to listen to George
and Drew talk genealogy. In addition to the timeline that I have started, I have started the basics of some letters that I plan on writing to these long lost cousins that I mentioned over the weekend.
In reviewing my notes from those conversations, I remembered that the middle son actually told me that he heard that his grandma, grandpa, and one of his uncles (Nathaniel?) were buried in Bowman cemetary, but we don't have anything to confirm it yet. Until then, I'll just keep searching.

Famous mentioning

Well, I was curious to find out why I have gotten a couple of comments on my blog and was pleasantly surprised to find out that The Genealogy Guys actually mentioned me on their podcast. Thanks a ton guys - it is very much appreciated. I am kind of hopeful that perhaps someone out there can think of an avenue that I have not already traveled. After all, if George can find Brisco Holder, then maybe I stand a chance at finding Jacob Sommerfelt.
I spent a little bit of time trying to do a time line of this particular family and I'll have to share what I have soon. At least what I know of the facts - and then try to fill in more where I can.

Cold calling

Boy there is nothing more nerve-wracking that cold calling someone and then trying to explain that you are a long-lost relative. Here is the story: After considerable effort in trying to find any further information on Jacob Sommerfelt, I decided to go out on a limb.
It started with me calling the Wichita County Clerk again and then getting the idea of calling a few of the clerks form the adjoining counties. All with the same result that they did not have anyone named Sommerfelt or Sommerfeld anywhere in their books - let alone someone named Jacob Sommerfelt.
All of this was quite frustrating, so I sat back and tried to figure out another approach. What I settled one was I decided to use an online phone book and try calling some long-lost cousins. I searched for the maried last name of one of the sisters of my great-grandma Schulz. Then narrowed the search to Wichita Falls, TX because that is the last place I knew of them at.
That search produced three telephone numbers and I started calling and asking if they knew of a relative named Tillie (which is what this sister went by in life). Go figure that the last one I called is the only one that had heard of her - but the miracle is that he was her son.
After talking for about an hour, we hung up and I had the phone number of one of his brothers.
I ended up cold calling him too and we had a great conversation for about a half an hour. When I hung up with him, he gave me the phone number for the third brother. I called him the next day (Friday) and we chatted for about 45 minutes. These connections were wonderful to establish and I was so thrilled. The trouble is that I am in Utah and they are in Texas. However is was nice to meet the, even if it was just over the phone.
Unfortunately, even after these wonderful chats that we had, I still didn't get any closer to finding Jacob. I did; however, get closer to family which is a very gratifying experience.

I have not forgotten

Well, I have been pretty busy in my personal life, but I have not forgotten Jacob and Minnie, or their family. In scouring the newspaper findings, I did not see a single reference to Jacob Sommerfelt or Sommerfeld. This has been unfortunate. I feel like I am back at square one, but I have got to push through this. I am starting to research again and am thinking about calling the Wichita Falls County Clerk again. Here goes nothing. I am starting today.

What was lost

Well, I continue to investigate everything that I can. I have not been able to find any more information on Nathaniel, nor any information on Minnie's burial. I feel like I am in serious need of some local family help. Then I had a glimmer yesterday evening. On a whim I decided to search for Jacob again. Basically because I was curious as to what local newspapers would have been in operation, during his life. If there was a newspaper open in Wichita Falls, and anyone got wind of his death - perhaps there could have been a small obituary.
I discovered that there were actually two main newspapers in operation for 1907 to the mid 1980's. There was the Wichita Daily Times and the Record Times. I have not yet found anything thing online from the Record Times, but I did find an archive of the Wichita Daily Times, from 1911 to 1923. I figured that it might be a long shot, but I took it anyway. I searched on Sommerfelt and got nothing, I searched on Jacob and had a list longer than my arm. Then I searched on Sommerfeldt, since that is a common alternate spelling - and I got a hit! To further cement my belief that maybe I found something - I searched for 'Jacob Sommerfeldt' and came away empty-handed. However, not to be discouraged, I changed my search to look for 'Jakob Sommerfeldt' to try the traditional German spelling of his first name - and the same date popped out - August 12, 1921!
Now it is time to scour all 12 pages of this paper to see if I can find any more information. I suddenly feel like I might have found a missing brick in the wall that I have been facing. Just enough that perhaps I might be able to peek on the other side and perhaps find a way to bring it down. Here goes nothing!!

A day of new names

I am continuing to research and have found nothing on Nathaniel Sommerfelt. I have searched the North Dakota death index, and scoured Ancestry.com. A couple of interesting tidbits of information is that Tillie was issued a birth certificate in Wichita Falls - but the information shows that she was born in North Dakota in 1900. From that information and the fact that Matilda was one of the witnesses tells me that this is Othelia. The interesting fact that really comes out of this though is that there are 2 names as witnesses. The first is Matilda, the second is someone named Carl Kuehn. This is a new name that I have not previously run across in my research.
Another new name that I had not run across is Mrs. Minnie Weidenbach. This name was listed as a contact on the Owens & Brumley funeral home record for Minnie Sommerfelt, along with Rudolph Sommerfelt (which I believe to be Wilhelmina/Minnie's son).
There also seems to be a little bit of confusion regarding Minnie's birthdate. The obituary shows Jan. 16, 1872 - the death record shows 1875 - family records have shown 1865. Pretty nutty stuff.

Little puzzle pieces

Today's findings consist of a single obituary that was uncovered by Owens & Brumley - which is the funeral home that handled Minnie's funeral. The text of this obituary is as follows:

Mrs. Minnie Sommerfelt
Funeral services for Mrs. Minnie Sommerfelt, 75, a resident of Wichita Falls 10 years who died at her home, 1310 Thirty-fifth, Monday, are scheduled for 1:30 p.m. Saturday from the Evangelical United Brethren Church.
Pallbearers will be Veston Lindsey, Charles Davis, J.H. Baucom, W.H. Dickey, Aubrey Bennett, Haskell Mayo and Lawrence Schrader. Interment will be under the direction of Owens & Brumley Funeral Home.
Mrs. Sommerfelt is survived by three sons, four daughters, 22 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.

This little gem brings a few questions to my mind. These are questions that I need to figure out how to answer. I am curious now, whether or not Minnie was a member of the congregation for the Evangelical United Brethren Church. If she was, perhaps they have some membership records or things that I might be able to retrieve some information from.
In reading sequentially, the next question becomes... who are these people that were her pallbearers? There is not a single name that looks familiar. So, perhaps this is another avenue to take, trying to discover who these men are and see if perhaps I can find any information out that way.
The last question that sprung to my mind was this item about three sons and four daughters. I believe I have figured out who the daughters are: Matilda, Othelia, Emma, and Christina. The sons are a little bit more confusing for me, as I have 4 sons that survived infancy and so should have been alive: Nathaniel, Rudolph, Heinrich (Henry), and Arthur (Art). The one that I think that had died is Nathaniel, since I have death dates for all of the rest of the brothers - and the dates are all after Minnie died. Thus, this is a conclusion that I now have to substantiate. The last known location of Nathaniel was in North Dakota and that is where my research will pick up tomorrow. Well, that and trying to answer the other two questions as well.

Not all roads lead to full brick walls

The continuation of the research story, as it unfolds. After contacting Crestview Memorial, I waited for a couple of days to see if they would indeed get back with me - but to no avail. Thus, I called them up to see if any progress had been able to be made. That is when I was informed that I should contact a certain local attorney and they gave me her phone number.
This happened fairly early in the morning, before I headed to work - so I hopped in my car and made the call on my cel phone. After a few minute on the phone with this wonderful lady, who turned out to be a CPA, she took down Jacob and Minnie's names and told me that she'd call back in a little while. It was delightful however that because of my long drive to work, on account of the nice snow storm that hit this lovely Beehive state, she was able to call me back before I reached work.
She informed me that she was not aware of any Sommerfelt's that had been buried out at Bowman cemetery, but that there was a plot of eight grave sites that had never been used - that were registered as being owned by a Sommerfield family. Though the evidence is not rock hard, I believe that these plots actually belong to the Sommerfelt's and that notwithstanding the fact that there are no burials that are recorded there - that this is the final resting place of Minnie Sommerfelt. She and I continued to talk and I gave her more finite dates - so that she could research it on her end. Meanwhile, I am doing everything I can on mine.
This mystery continued to plague my mind until I finally decided to call the Wichita Falls County Clerk again, to see if there was any additional information that I had missed from the first call. Come to find out, there was at least one item that I had not thought to ask before - which was if there was a funeral home listed as taking care of the proceedings. In fact, there was and it was listed as Owens & Brumley - so I found their phone number and gave them a ring.
What I found out from Owens & Brumley was further confirmation of Minnie's death date and the funeral home confirmed that they did indeed bury her at Bowman cemetery. I did ask to see if they could tell me where her grave was and unfortunately they couldn't because they didn't keep those kinds of records back in 1947. So, I remain in the situation that I was in before - I am sure that at least Minnie is buried in the Bowman Cemetery - though I am still not sure about Jacob.
The one really good piece of news that came out of my call to the funeral home, besides this confirmation, was the fact that there was an obituary printed in the newspaper for Minnie and they are supposed to be sending me a copy via email. I'm sure that I'll need to follow up on that. Likewise, I'm sure that I will need to give this wonderful CPA lady a call as well.
Well, looks like I am going to call it a day - so that I can get hot on the trail again tomorrow.

The research begins

I have been doing a bunch of genealogy research lately and heard a great tip (www.genealogyguys.com) about keeping some research notes. After about 2 seconds of consideration and realizing that most of my notes are scattered all over the place - i decided to put them where I stand a chance of finding them in the future.
Lately, I have been doing all sorts of research on the Sommerfelt line. The basics are that my great-grandmother was born Emma Sommerfelt, in the US. However, her parents were born "somewhere in Southern Russia" - which we believe that we have now identified as Bessarabia. Jacob and Wilhelmina (Minnie) were Germans that were born and raised in Russia. They were married there and had one child. In 1898, they immigrated to the United States and came through Ellis island. Upon arrival, we believe that they made a beeline for North Dakota, to a German settlement there. We have several U.S. census documents that show them there. In fact, according to this link: Jakob Sommerfelt Naturalization we show that Jacob, formerly known as Jakob, was naturalized. and according to BLM records he received a patent for 160 acres in North Dakota, in 1911.
According to the family stories, in about 1917-18 Jacob got very sick and so they moved to Wichita Falls, Wichita, Texas. Unfortunately, we don't really know if that prolonged his life at all. It is recorded that he died in 1919, though I have found him in the 1920 census. During this time, it was very difficult for them to pay for their children and try to maintain Jacob - so the children that came with them were farmed out to other families in the community as hired help. In the 1920 and 1930 census', several of the children are found with other families. this seems to be verification of this portion of the family tales.
In my quest to understand what happened to them and where they might have ended up and been buried, I have traveled an interesting road. As I have delved back into my family history, I set out with the quest to discover where Jacob might be buried. We have a death record for Minnie, but nothing for Jacob. Truth be told, we were only looking for Jacob. In the end, I have discovered so much more (but I still haven't definitively found where Jacob might be buried).
my search started by looking on the internet to see if there were any clues that I might be able to use to head me down the right path. Searching in Google and other sources led me to find the BLM record that I mentioned above. They also led me, several times, to family trees located on www.ancestry.com - so I signed up for a free 15 day trial. in the end, the information that that provided was verification from the census records - as to where the family was at with each decade.
After exhausting myself in all the searches that I could think of - including the Texas Death Index, where he does not show up. I determined to try to cut to the source. I started with the the Texas Department of Vital Statistics. They were not able to come up with anything for me, regarding Jacob, but they did confirm that Minnie died in 1947. From there, they suggested that I try calling the Wichita Falls County Clerk's office. When I called, I spoke with a very nice lady that informed me that she could not find anything regarding Jacob either, but she did find Minnie. The information that she gave me is as follows: Minnie Sommerfelt died on 3 Feb. 1947, of acute heart failure and was suffering from bouts of senility for several months prior to her death. Her address, when she died, was 1310 35th Street, Wichita Falls, Wichita, Texas. The person that handled her funeral arrangements and such was Rudolph Sommerfelt - which I am fairly certain was her son. The last piece that she gave me was the really incredible piece... She said that Minnie was buried at Bowman cemetery.
From that instant on, I started researching Bowman cemetery, to try to discover anything about it. It is located right near the border of Archer and Wichita counties, in Texas - on the Archer side. I found a registry of the headstones located in that cemetery and eagerly looked for at least her name and really hoping that I might also find Jacob buried at the same place. No such luck. I did find, however; an email address of the person that did the walk through and promptly emailed her.
She responded pretty quickly, I'd guess that is was less than an hour after I sent the email. In my email I asked if she had any pictures any of the headstones that she was not able to read - unfortunately she did not. She had some further questions though, to try and help me with my research. So we emailed back and forth a little bit to see if we could find a crack in the brick wall that I was/am facing. She informed me that there is an Archer Co. cemetery book by Mr. & Mrs. O.V. Hampton, published in 1970, that listed a headstone that had Sommerfelt - but that the first name was unreadable. This stone does not seem to be there any longer, but it was supposedly located two plots away from a Travis, W.L. and right next to a Walbrick who's first name was also unreadable. From there her suggestion was that I call Crestview Memorial in Wichita Falls, to see if they had any records for Bowman Cemetery that might give a more definitive answer.
I then called Crestview and spoke to one of their Family Counselors and he was kind enough to volunteer to do this look up for me. Unfortunately, he called back a couple of hours later and reported that they had never handled a funeral for any Sommerfelt's - let alone the ones that I was looking for. I asked if he had access to any other Bowman records and he said that he didn't immediately, but that he would look into it for me. So I waited a few days before calling back. This all leads us to today - which is a story that I will tell tomorrow.