Wedding Wednesday -- Ken and Phyllis (Egli) Schmidt -- August 17, 1955

My parents, Ken and Phyllis Schmidt dated for four years before they got married. My mom had to finish nurses training [student nurses in her school were not allowed to get married] and my dad was doing alternative service for conscientious objectors. They were both Mennonites.

Ken and Phyl's engagement photo

This picture was taken in Dad's room at a boarding house in Pueblo, Colorado.

They are reading their engagement scripture, which for the life of me I can't find! I think it is written on the original slide. I'll have to dig it out.

Ken and Phyllis and their parents, Emery and Edna Egli and Harvey and Beatrice Schmidt.

They were married in Mom's home church, Manson (Iowa) Mennonite. Their reception was at her parents home.

The entire wedding party

Mr. and Mrs. Kenneth Schmidt

Wedding Wednesday -- Cornelius Smith and Katie Unruh -- married in 1904

Cornelius Smith (Schmidt), son of Tobias and Luvantina (Decker) Schmidt

married

Katherine Unruh, daughter of Peter B.  and Anna (Frey) Unruh

on

August 18, 1904

at

the Office of the Probate Judge in Marion County, Kansas

Wedding Wednesday -- Fred B. Schmidt and Matilda Wedel

Fred B. Schmidt and Matilda Wedel are my great grandparents. Obituaries and other family records list their marriage as 1895 but, according to the Barton County, Kansas, courthouse records, they were married 30 December 1896 by the Justice of the Peace in Great Bend, Kansas. 

This picture is their wedding portrait.

Both Fred and Matilda's families were of Russian Mennonite background. Their families left the Ukraine area of Russia during the great Mennonite migration of the late 1870's. Fred was born in 1874 in Karlswalde, Russia to Benjamin Schmidt and Catharina Siebert. His family immigrated to North America in 1875. Matilda was born in Kansas in 1878 to David Wedel and Justina Decker who immigrated in 1874. They both grew up in the Pawnee Rock area of Barton County.

Fred and Matilda lived and farmed in Barton County for the first years of their marriage and then in the spring of 1910, they moved to Kiowa County. They moved their family of seven children in a lumber wagon to their new home. The moved could not be made in a day so they stopped for the night in Lewis, Kansas and stayed in a hotel. This was a new experience for them all  --  to sleep in a hotel and eat in a restaurant.

The cattle and furniture were moved by rail to Greensburg. They all lived in the granary while a house was being built and moved into the new house just before harvest. After they moved to Kiowa County, they had two more daughters.

They were a typical farm family for the era. They raised wheat, corn, barley, oats, potatoes, hogs, chickens, ducks, geese and cattle. They planted big gardens and had their own milk, cream, butter and eggs. They also butchered their own hogs. Butchering days were always exciting. Neighbors would help each other butcher and it was a big day for everyone.

The Fred B. Schmidt Farm in Kiowa County.

Fred and Matilda lived the remainder of their lives in the Greensburg, Kiowa County area of Kansas. In the 1930's, Fred encouraged his family to start a Benjamin and Catharina Schmidt reunion. It is still an annual event in Greensburg.

Matilda died in 1944 and Fred in 1955. They are both buried in Dundee Valley Cemetery, Dundee, Kansas.

-Rita


SOURCES:

Ancestry.com. Philadelphia Passenger Lists, 1800-1945 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: MyFamily.com, Inc., 2006. Original data: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Passenger Lists of Vessels Arriving at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1800-1882. Micropublication M425. RG036. Rolls # 1-108. National Archives, Washington, D.C. 

Dundee Valley Cemetery (Barton County, Kansas; section 16, township 20S, range 14W). Grave markers.

Hiebert, Clarence, compiler. Brothers in Deed to Brothers in Need. Newton, Kansas: Faith and Life Press, 1974.

Kansas. Barton County. "Marriage Records." Records Dept., Barton County Courthouse, Great Bend, Kansas.

Schmidt, Pearl and Grace Unruh. "Family of Fred B. Schmidt." Personal memories. Copy in possession of author.

Wedding Wednesday - Peter and Annie Peterson

My great grandparents Peter Pedersen and Anna Peterson were married on January 22, 1891. They chose to use her spelling of the Peterson name as their married name. They were the first couple to be married in the Augustana Lutheran Church in Manson, Iowa.

Fifty years later, in 1941, they celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary,

and in 1945 their story was published in the local newspaper.

Manson (Iowa) Journal, August 16, 1945

This article tells their story. She immigrated from Sweden as a very small child. He immigrated from Denmark as an adult. They met in Manson and spent the remainder of their lives there.

Thanks to Heather at Leaves for Trees for suggesting this graphic!