This is a photo of my great-great-grandparents, Joe & Clara (SZULTA) TROKA on their 50th wedding anniversary. The date of this photo would be somewhere around 29 Jan 1944 since they were married in 1894. They were married at St. Hedwig’s Church in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. There is a very nice writeup and history for St. Hedwig’s at Wikipedia. Here is a closer photo from the “Polsih Churches of Milwaukee” website.
Getting the idea from Julie at GenBlog, here is my list of most wanted names, places and faces.
| Names | Places |
|---|---|
| Zalewski | Milwaukee, Wisconsin Poznan, Poland |
| Thielke | Ozaukee Co., Wisconsin Württemberg/Mecklenburg, Germany |
| Last | Ozaukee Co., Wisconsin Doeringshagen, Pommerania |
| Firmenich | Ashland Co., Wisconsin Granville, Milwaukee Co., Wisconsin Cologne, Germany |
| DeBroux | Langlade Co., Wisconsin Brussels, Belgium |
| Troka | Milwaukee Co., Wisconsin Poland |
Most Wanted Faces
Been searching for almost ten years to find any relatives (parents/siblings) for Frank J ZALEWSKI, so that I can trace my line to other ZALEWSKI lines. Right now, it’s a little family island.
Peter THIELKE information back into Germany. THIELKE is a somewhat popular name there, so hoping to connect to other researchers.
Peter FIRMENICH family information. Records inidicate they lived in Granville, Milwaukee Co., Wisconsin, which is only a few miles from here. Wondering if some of them are buried close by or where they lived. Can’t find info in the early 1800s census.
Wordless Wednesday’s Photo is labeled “trokas&szultas” in my list. Unfortunately, when I first scanned a few photos from my grandmother, I didn’t label them very well. Though, it was probably labeled something like that in the album itself. There are only two people I think I can pick out. My great-grandfather, Joseph Zalewski, in the middle of the back row and my great-great-grandmother, Clara (Szulta) Troka, third from the left in the middle row. I’m hoping to meet with my grandma and maybe go over some of these photos and see if she knows who they may be.
Digital copy: Original photo in possession of Mary Jane Zalewski
Wordless Wednesday’s photo is a picture of my grandfather Richard Zalewski (in the back) and my great-great grandparents, Joseph & Clara (Szulta) Troka. I don’t have a date down for it, but I assume it’s sometime in the 1950s. Clara passed away in 1959 at the tough ol’ age of 83. Joseph died in on New Year’s Day in 1962 at the age of 90. He probably would have lived much longer, but he was hit by a drunk driver on his way to church in Milwaukee. You can read an excerpt from the newspaper article on my family tree site. Both Clara and Joseph were born in the Poland area and immigrated to the United States. They were married in Milwaukee in 1894.
I’m going to start posting just the photo on Wednesday and then the description of it on “Tell Me Thursday.”
When I bought my house in 2005, I ended up purchasing my grandparent’s house. My grandpa had passed away in 1999 and my grandma was moving into an assisted living apartment since she hurt herself in a little fall. I did get a very nice deal on the house. It’s perfect “starter” house, being the house that they bought new in 1955 and that my dad and his siblings grew up in.
When she moved, a bunch of boxes were left in the basement. Most of it was just things like blankets and pots and pans, things she doesn’t need right now. I found one box a few months back when I was taking inventory that I saw had funeral cards and old newspaper clippings in it. Today, I decided to just browse through them to see if there were any of my ancestors that I could use to squeeze out some more information.
I only found a few funeral cards on the top and they were probably of old friends, I assume, and not relatives. But, I did find a nice collection in the news clippings box. Most of the items were just random clippings of recent photos and articles from the newspapers. But, I did find a nice selection of old obituaries, though. A couple were straight from the newspapers and a few others were copies. The obituaries that I found were from Emma Jane (FIRMENICH) COOK (my gg-grandmother), George S COOK (Emma’s 3rd husband), Margaret (STEARNS) BRAATZ (my gg-grandmother), Frank F BRAATZ, Sr (her husband and my gg-grandfather), and Margaret (SCHUMACHER) STEARNS (her mother and my ggg-grandmother.) Most of the obituaries didn’t have any new info of note, but the big find was the last one. In my tree, all I had was “Margaret” listed and her death date. This obituary gave me her birth info and her surname, which is brand new to me. Plus, it listed all of her siblings and locations. I need to start looking for SCHUMACHER now, any tips?
Another treasure find in the box was some old letters written to my grandfather from his parents in 1941. It seems, from the address that he was in navy school in Pensacola, Florida. There are about 5-10 letters all written from March 31, 1941 to April 27, 1941. One weird note here is that my great-grandmother, his mother, Emily (TROKA) ZALEWSKI, passed away on May 1, 1941. In the later letters that I just quickly scanned through, there is no mention of being sick, etc. So, this points to her death being quite sudden as she was only 45 years old at the time. Maybe my grandfather saved these letters due to the fact that he was away in Florida when his mother died. There are no letters beyond the April 27th one. I am in the process of scanning them so I can read them and archive them. This is the only comunication from my great-grandmother that I’ve found. Then, I plan on taking this box over to my grandmother since I’m assuming she’ll want it.
