Piehl Family Lot in Union Cemetery

My great great grandparents, Ferdinand and Augusta (Jaensch) Piehl, and two of their children are buried in Union Cemetery in Salem Township, just outside Oak Harbor, in Ottawa County, Ohio. (Click on images to see a larger view.) Ferdinand and Augusta were both born in Germany,but came to the United States when they were still single. They were married at St. John Lutheran Church in Oak Harbor, by Rev. J. Bauch, on December 12, 1880. Early records sometimes list Ferdinand's first name as Gotthold or Gottlod. They had a total of nine children, the oldest daughter being my great grandmother Lena Piehl Yeager.



















Here is a family picture of the Piehl family, taken about 1906.


















Back row: Lena, Hulda, Christian, Emma, Martha
Center: Anna
Front row: Bertha, Ferdinand, Wanda, Augusta, Amanda

Ferdinand was a farmer, and he spoke only German. Amanda Piehl died on May 22, 1906, after contracting diphtheria. She was the first of the Piehl family to be buried in Union Cemetery.














Mrs. Augusta Piehl passed away on December 13, 1906. Her cause of death was listed as dropsy of chest.















The only boy in the family, Christian Piehl, died on March 4, 1913, at the age of 24.
















Ferdinand Piehl died on September 17, 1927, of heart disease.
















In 1995, I visited with Wilma Voight Hanck, the daughter of Emma Piehl Voight. She said that every summer there was a large family reunion at the Piehl farm. Aunt Bertha and Aunt Martha lived close by, and they always helped out. Wilma said there were enough cousins to have four baseball teams! There was a lot of delicious food, including thick homemade biscuits, and lots of visiting and family pictures were taken. Oh how I wish I could have gone to one of these reunions! After the death of Grandma and Grandpa Piehl, and their children began to have large families of their own, it seems that the tradition of the annual reunion ended.

Many thanks to cousins Al Hemminger and Fred Wargowsky, for helping me to learn more about the Piehl and Jaensch families.