Surname Saturday – Still working on the Ruslers

Will Rusler is the boy standing in back

Today I’m writing about the seventh child of Michael Anthony and Augusta Wilhemina Rusler.  William W Rusler was born on the farm in York County, Nebraska on November 8, 1886 (or 1887).  I thought he had married Laura Etta Morrison late in life and they had  no children.  But as I was looking through his records today I discovered that he had been married before and had a child in his first marriage.

I have not been able to find him in the 1910 census but in 1917 on his WWI draft registration he says he is married and has an eight year old child.  On the 1920 census he is living in York County with his sister, Pearl, and her husband, and it says he is divorced.  In 1930 he is living in Custer County, Nebraska and is a Trucker for a Freight Hauling company and he is married to Laura Etta.  On this census when asked the age of their first

William & Etta Rusler

marriage he says 21 and she says 16.  But she is three years older than he so they were both married before.  Which means he married for the first time in 1908/9 and immediately had a child in order for him/her to be eight in 1917.  Laura is enumerated in the 1920 census living with her parents in Dix, Kimball, Nebraska as a married woman with the last name Walker.  In 1940 William and Etta are renting a farm in Buffalo County, Nebraska but soon after the census they moved to Eagle, Idaho because this is where he filled out the WWII draft in 1942.

William & Etta Rusler Tombstone

Laura Etta Morrison Rusler died in Idaho February 19, 1954.  William died in Caldwell, Canyon County, Idaho on June 25, 1958.  They are both buried in Wilder Cemetery, Canyon County, Idaho.

So here again I have more work to do.  Who was William married to in 1909?  When did William and this wife divorce and what happened to the wife and child?  All questions I will have to find in Nebraska as I can’t seem to find the answers online.

Friday’s Faces From the Past

John E Tracy & Linnie Livingston
Pryor, Oklahoma 1909
Who is Linnie Livingston and why are the Tracy’s in Oklahoma?

Bertha Mabel Rusler Chase

Fred & Bertha Chase Wedding

Bertha Mabel was the sixth child of Michael and Augusta Rusler.  She was born February15, 1885 in York Nebraska.  She married Fred Chase about 1907 and they had a farm in Algernon, Custer, Nebraska.  Their daughter Mary was born March 31, 1913.  They had a second daughter eleven years later in 1923 named Lillie Genice.  My Grandma Mabel was named after her Aunt Bertha.  Bertha died May 15, 1967 in Arcadia, Valley, Nebraska and Fred died in 1950.

Mary and Earl Sterns

Mary Augusta Chase married Earl Sterns late in life and as far as I have been able to tell they had no children.  Mary died January 1, 1972 and is buried in the Mason City Cemetery, Custer County, Nebraska.  In the 1940 census before Mary and Earl had married, Earl was living with Fred Burtzloff.

Mary and Lillie Genice Chase

Lillie Genice Chase married Fred Burtzloff.  The Burtzloffs’ had several children.  Edward, Barbara, and Lillie Mae.  Lillie Genice Chase Burtzloff died August 5, 1995 in Broken Bow, Custer, Nebraska.

Mary Chase

Mary Chase

Fred, Bertha & Mary Chase

Fred& Bertha Chase

George D Rusler

The fifth child of Michael Anthony and Augusta Wilhemina Rusler is George D Rusler.  George was born April 9, 1882 in York, Nebraska.  He died November 3, 1892 at the age of ten.  I don’t have any other information about him.  I have seen a picture of him in a coffin with his parents standing on either side.  Someday I hope to have a copy to add to this post.  I can’t imagine the kind of pain his death caused his family.  The cause of his death is on my list of things to research next time I am in York, Nebraska.  If anybody reading this has more information about George I would love to see it.

Tuesday’s Tip – 31 to the rescue

I am an organizing freak.  There, I admit it.   I love office supply stores.  I like to have my stuff organized and I really like organizing products.  I recently found a home party company I loved so much I had to become a consultant.  Thirtyone gifts is the name.  I admit, I signed up mostly to get the great products, but I also enjoy selling them.  You may be asking yourself, what does this have to do with Genealogy?  I am glad you asked…Genealogy research can get very cluttered – not only do you need to keep all files on ancestors, the copied records, archived documents, old pictures and etc… in order but you also need to stay organized when you are on the road doing research.  And I love that I can get such great quality organizing products and not only do they match but they are cute too!  So here are some great 31 products that I love for my genealogy stuff.  There are a bunch of patterns to choose from.  If you love the look and want to get some of your own check out my website: http://www.mythirtyone.com/rosannaward.

Fold-And-Go Organizer is great for taking notes on the go with a pocket for pens and a zipper pocket to hold your reading glasses.

Organizing Utility Tote with a Fold N’ File inside is great for keeping your files in order on the road. Lots of pockets for all your extra stuff!

Flat Iron Case makes a pretty portable scanner case

Matrilineal Monday – McConaughy family

I don’t have as many stories to write about my maternal ancestors.  Mostly because my Aunt Terri has done such a wonderful job researching this line that I haven’t had to put quite the amount of work into it as I have on my  paternal line.  Because of Terri I know some really cool things about this side of my family.  Like the fact that I descend from a Mayflower family, and that on this branch alone I have over ten (I think she has found 14 actually) American Revolution patriots.  This information took my Aunt Terri alot of time and research to prove and I am so thankful to her. It is great to have another genealogist in the family.   But now I need to go back and use the records she has shared with me to find the stories behind the facts.  So I am going to spend some time each week getting to know one of my maternal ancestors and then write about him/her every Monday.  Maybe I can even get Aunt Terri to share some stories of her own.

Stay tuned next Monday for a little story about Beryl Catherine Richert, My Great Grandma.

Census Sunday – Another Example of my Tangled Tree

It wasn’t until I took a good look at this 1920 census for District 51, Anaheim, California that included my third great grandparents’ on my maternal side that I realized another tangled branch on my tree.  Gerhard & Helena Siefken were living at this time with their daughter and her family on a ranch in Anaheim.  The daughter’s married name was Helena Clodt.  Clodt…wait…that’s a name I’m familiar with.  My second great grandmother Louisa Scheel Siefken married  Ferdinand Clodt after her first husband, my great great grandfather Diedrich Siefken died.  Diedrich was the son of the Gerhard & Helena Siefken I had found in the census.  But Ferdinand, her second husband, had an older brother named George Clodt who married Diedrich’s older sister Helena.  Until I saw this census I hadn’t realized the connection on both sides but thanks to Ancestry.com’s new “merge duplicate people” feature I can fix this parallel line much more quickly than I could have in the past.

1920 Census District 51, Anaheim, California