It's Enough to Break a Graveyard Rabbit's Heart

This past weekend two members of my high school graduating class passed away. One was a dear lady who had been battling cancer for several months. The other classmate was a woman who had been in an abusive relationship, and her death is being considered a homicide. It is so difficult to comprehend such sad events, since we were all together celebrating our 40 Year Class Reunion just a little over two months ago.


(Photo by M. Gentry)

Louis Traub, Civil War Captain

Louis Traub was born in Germany on August 4, 1817. He came to the United States in 1835. After working as a tailor in New York City for several years, he moved to Ohio in 1844. Louis settled in Sandusky, Ohio in 1847. In Sandusky, Louis Traub continued in his tailoring business, and also opened a restaurant which was known as the "Hesse-Cassel" in the 1880's.

Prior to the Civil War, Louis Traub was the commander of Sandusky's "Jaeger Company," a local militia unit made up primarily of men of German descent. The old Jaeger Company was the basis for Company F of the 107th Ohio Volunteer Infantry during the Civil War, led by Captain Louis Traub.

Louis Traub was involved in many business ventures and community organizations, which are chronicled in his obituary in the August 18, 1881 Sandusky Register. Louis Traub died on August 14, 1881. He was buried in Oakland Cemetery. He was survived by his widow, ten children, and twelve grandchildren. Many former soldiers from the Jaeger Company attended the funeral and burial of Louis Traub. Louis Traub's wife Barbara passed away in 1885, and she was buried with her husband at Oakland Cemetery.

See SANDUSKY THEN AND NOW, available at the Sandusky Library's Archives Research Center, to learn more about the German heritage of Sandusky.

Irene Larkins and Tommy Parker go to California Aboard the Challenger

On June 11, 1939, Irene Larkins (sometimes spelled Larkin) and her grandson, Tom Parker, left for a trip to California on the "Challenger." Irene kept a diary of her travels. At 5:15 p.m., the whole family saw Irene and Tommy off at the train depot in Sandusky. The first night, they traveled through Toledo,Elkhart, and arrived in Chicago at 10 p.m. Irene wrote that Tommy was "thrilled to the sky." They sent a telegram to Irene's daughter Doris, and ate at a restaurant in Chicago.

While on the train, they visited the lounge car, where Irene could smoke a cigarette. They wrote letters on "Challenger" stationery. Many days, Irene included what they ate at their meals. On Monday, June 12, while traveling through Omaha, Nebraska, Irene had orange juice and bran with cream, and "very fine coffee." In Utah, Tom and Irene saw the Great Salt Lake and caught a glimpse of the Temple and the Capital Building. They enjoyed the view of the mountains. While going through the desert, it was very hot, even though the railroad cars were air conditioned. Irene passed the time playing rummy with a Mr. Terrell. Later a group, including an aviator from Alabama, a Dr. Rieger, and a German refugee, enjoyed scotch and sodas and sang songs. Irene wrote that they all felt merry!


Family friends named Grace and Mildred met Irene and Tommy at the train station in Los Angeles. While in California, Irene and Tommy got to go inside the studios of 20th Century Fox, as a family friend was employed there. They walked down Hollywood Boulevard, and saw the footprints of many movie stars. Tommy got to swim in the ocean. Of course they went to many "picture shows" while in California. One day they took a boat ride on a glass bottomed boat, and watched the diver swim right under the boat. On June 28, Irene and Tommy went to Forest Lawn Cemetery, where they saw th "Wee Kirk o' the Heather" and "The Little Church of Flowers."

Doris, Steen, and Grandpa Larkins wrote letters to Irene and Tommy while they were in California. By July 5, Tom and Irene were both getting homesick. Later that week, they traveled from southern California to San Francisco, where they saw freighters from all over the world. On July 11, 1939, they boarded the train for the long trip home. In Montana, they saw cowboys dressed in satin. On July 14, Irene made her last entry in her diary of her trip to California. They ate breakfast in North Dakota, and saw Native Americans in their traditional dress. Irene and Tommy had dinner in Minnesota, and noticed that the scenery was beginning to look more like Ohio, with scenes of corn fields and lakes.

While we don't know the details of the rest of the trip home to Ohio, it was wonderful to read the day to day activities of Irene and Tommy's train trip west in 1939. In a few short years, Irene would lose both her beloved father and her daughter, and America would go to War! I am sure that her travel diary provided her with good memories during those turbulent times in the early 1940's.

Below is a picture of Irene and Tommy aboard the G.A. Boeckling, on their way to Cedar Point in 1937. They were great traveling pals!

Joseph Ruemmele

Joseph Ruemmele is buried at Sandusky's Oakland Cemetery. He died on November 5, 1871. He was only 28 years and 9 months of age at the time of his death.

A search of the Civil War Soldiers and Sailors database provides the military unit in which Joseph Ruemmele served. He was a musician in Company H of the 72nd Ohio Volunteer Infantry during the Civil War.

The IGI portion of FamilySearch indicates that Joseph Ruemmele was the son of Charles F. and Mary A. Ruemmele.

While we do not know the exact connection, if any, another Mr. Ruemmele, August, was active in publishing a German newspaper in Sandusky in the 1850's. See the Sandusky History website to view an image of August Ruemmele.

Elijah Brown, Civil War Veteran

Elijah Brown was one of the several Sandusky residents who enlisted in the Massachusetts 55th regiment in 1863. You can read about the African American men who wanted to enlist in the Union Army during the Civil War in the Sandusky Daily Commercial Register of June 6, 186, which was reprinted online. Most of the men from Sandusky who enlisted in the Massachusetts 55th Infantry served in Company I.

According to Elijah Brown's death certificate, available via Family Search Labs, he was born on December 13, 1844 to Bazil and Mary (Wilson) Brown. He lived at 916 Hancock Street in Sandusky, and his occupation was firefighter. Elijah Brown died on April 3, 1915, and was buried in Section 5 of Oakland Cemetery. A brief article about Sandusky's "Freedom Fighters" is found at the Sandusky History website.

1852 Ad in Sandusky Newspaper about Oakland Cemetery

An advertisement in the Decmeber 30, 1852 issue of the Daily Commercial Register invites Sandusky area residents to have the remains of their loved ones reinterred at Oakland Cemetery "upon reasonable terms and in a proper manner." While there were other burial places in and around Sandusky, Oakland Cemetery appears to be the earliest cemetery owned by the city of Sandusky, which had substantial acreage.

A brief history of Oakland Cemetery is found on pages 327-328 of HISTORY OF ERIE COUNTY, OHIO, edited by Lewis Cass Aldrich:

In the year 1849 a committee of the council consisting of F. T. Barney, John M. Brown and Foster M. Follett was appointed to again select a location for a larger and more appropriate cemetery tract ; and in 1850 another committee, consisting of councilman Solomon. C. Moore, was appointed for the selection and purchase of a tract of land for the purpose of a cemetery and city poor farm. The negotiations of this committee resulted in contracting for a tract in Perkins township, and one hundred and thirty-six acres in extent, with Jane S. Williams, at the agreed price of four thousand seven hundred and one dollars and ninety cents. It was on this tract that the beautiful Oakland Cemetery was laid out. The project of erecting a poor house for the city seems to have failed, and the city sold such part of the land as was not required for the purpose of a cemetery. The portion retained comprises between fifty and sixty acres, and only a portion of it is as yet laid out.

The Oakland Cemetery is well adapted for burial purposes, the grounds being laid out in exceedingly good taste. A large and convenient superintendent's residence is built upon the tract. Although not within the city limits Oakland Cemetery is one of the institutions of the city, and owned by it. Its management and control is vested in a board of cemetery trustees, a body created by an ordinance of the common council of the city, and, at present, is comprised of the following persons : W. G.. Hastings, John G. Strobel and Louis Duennisch.

Oakland Cemetery is the largest cemetery in Erie County, Ohio. The website of the Oakland Cemetery provides a database for genealogical searches. Many early residents of Sandusky and Erie County are buried at Oakland Cemetery. The city of Sandusky holds Memorial Day services at Oakland Cemetery each May.

Lewis W. House

Lewis W. House was the son of Lindsey and Mary Ann Young House, and the grandson of Perkins Township pioneer settler Julius House. Hewson Peeke wrote in his book A STANDARD HISTORY OF ERIE COUNTY, OHIO that Lewis House was "a very enterprising and prosperous farmer and breeder of livestock."

Lewis House married Miss Jennie Parker, a sister of George B. Parker. (Lewis House and Marion House were siblings, and they married siblings, Jennie Parker and George B. Parker.) Lewis and Jennie Parker House had one child who survived infancy, Miss Ada Parker. Jennie Parker House died when she was only 31 years old. Lewis House married Dollie Veader, following the death of his first wife. Lewis and Dollie were that parents of eight children: Guy W., Ethel, Byron, Annabelle, Rachel, Alta, Lois and Faye.

When he was 90 years old, Lewis House died at his home in Berlin Township of Erie County. His obituary was carried in the November 1, 1949 issue of the Sandusky Star Journal. Lewis W. House was buried with his second wife Dollie, in the Perkins Cemetery.

Below is an article from the March 31, 1941 issue of the Cleveland Plain Dealer. The article reported that Lewis W. House, the second oldest resident of the area of Perkins Township which was taken over by the U.S. Government during the Second World War for a munitions factory, was upset by having to leave his home and soil that he and several of his neighbors and relatives loved so well.