The Monee Historical Society’s Cemetery Walk promised a journey through time, and Christi Holston’s narrative of the village’s movers and shakers delivered.
The annual event earlier this month took an enthusiastic group through the historic, landmarked burial sites of St. Paul’s Cemetery, featuring the town’s prominent early and more recent residents.
The tour was led by Holston, MHS President Emeritus, who spoke from carefully researched biographies.
The stories were varied and captivating.
Oscar Kuersten and Fred Schmidke were close friends, who died together when the boiler of a thrashing engine exploded July 30, 1914, on the farm of Henry Ohlendorf, three miles east of Monee. Because they were so close, their families decided to bury them together.
August and Anna Schurz Schiffer, both natives of Germany, came to America in 1855 and to Monee in 1858. August operated a store at the northeast corner of Compass Lane and Main Street, first built by Orson Dutton in 1853 and purchased by Schiffer in 1858. He was postmaster from 1861 to 1866, built the first grain elevator in Monee, was elected to the village board of trustees in 1874, and served as president from 1875-1876.
Donald Bloesch was born on May 3, 1928, in Bremen, Indiana, son of Herbert and Adele (Silberman) Bloesch. His father and both grandfathers were ministers in the Evangelical Synod, a German church with roots in Lutheran and Reformed Pietism.
Countless children in Monee remember Dorothy Brady as a beloved teacher at Monee Elementary School, where she taught for many years. She was teaching one of the two fourth grade classes in 1963 when John F. Kennedy was shot and calmed the fears of her pupils. She was still teaching decades later. Mrs. Brady was known for being strict, but fair, and for expecting the best from her students and settling for nothing less.
Ellen Gustafson Herrmann, daughter of John and Gladys Gustafson, was born on April 5, 1944, in Chicago, but lived in the Monee area her entire life. She was the beloved organist at St. Paul’s United Church of Christ in Monee, from 1961 until her tragic death in 2022.
Elizabeth “Betty” Diercks was born on January 27, 1927, in Chicago, to John and Marguerita (Tyler) Curran. She had one younger brother, Tom.
A defining experience in Betty’s life was attending Lucy Flower Technical High School for Girls in Garfield Park. She lived miles away in Lincoln Park and had to take multiple streetcars to get to school every day, but it was a great honor to be selected to go to Flower. It was the only all-girl vocational school in Chicago’s history, and created an unparalleled education experience for academically qualified, Anglo, African American, and immigrant students to study alongside one another. Flower Tech not only furthered career and college ambitions but provided students with racially integrated experiences in an otherwise segregated time and place. That education would shape Betty for her entire life, in how she treated and accepted all people, and would be passed down to her daughters.
Christian Koepke was born in Bentzin, Mecklenburg, Germany, December 2, 1840. In 1853, he immigrated to America, and in 1864 married Wilhelmina Buethe. They moved to Monee from Green Garden Township in 1869 and became the proprietors of the German House Hotel and livery stable, with a sample and billiards room, on Chestnut Street. Koepke owned and operated the hotel from 1870 until 1892, when he sold it to Charles Lankenau.
Francis LaFayette was born in Montreal. Nothing is known of his early life. He enlisted as a private in the 100th Illinois Infantry Company G, at Monee, on August 11, 1862, and was mustered in on August 30. The 100th Infantry was assigned to various branches of the Union Army throughout the Civil War. After the war, he returned to Monee and lived with the F. P. Lilly family, working as a house painter. He died in 1900.
Frank Bishop was born 1923, in Hazel Crest, the son of John Cordeau and Ida Mary (Hatwig) Bishop. He married Gloria Buchmeier on February 9, 1946, in Chicago. He was a retired railroad employee and a World War II Army Veteran, who loved to reminisce about his wartime service.
Heinrich Hermann Wilke Diercks (Henry) was born on September 21, 1891, in Monee. He was a sports enthusiast and played on the Monee baseball and basketball state championship teams. He enlisted during WWI and served in Company M 150th Infantry, departing for France from Montreal on October 14, 1918, on the troop carrier Delta.
After the war he returned home and married Adella Wilhelmina Auguste Behrens on July 18, 1920. Henry was self-employed as a successful house painter and general contractor in Monee for the rest of his life.
Hermann Philip Leseberg was born on June 4, 1844, in Aerzen, Lower Saxony, Germany, and Dorette Marie Beneke was born on July 4, 1848, in Neiterschen, Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany. They married on August 6, 1871, and lived in Chicago, where Hermann was an accomplished cabinet maker. He had a shop on Milwaukee Avenue.
In 1878, they moved to Monee after losing all of their possessions in the great Chicago fire in 1871. He owned a furniture store at 29 Oak Road and was the local mortician until his retirement in October of 1906.
Inez Mae Crowder was born on July 6, 1907. She married Richard A. Smit on June 5, 1932, in Pekin. At her retirement, Mrs. Smit had been a teacher in Will County for more than 40 years, with the last 20 years in the Monee public school system. She was the beloved first grade teacher for hundreds of five- and six-year-olds for decades, and you counted yourself fortunate if she was your teacher.
Jacob Gloor was born October 5, 1834, in Bierwiel, Switzerland. He came to America with his parents in 1851 and settled on a farm near Thorn Grove, in an area later called Monee Township.
Soon after the beginning of the Civil War, Jacob enlisted, serving until the end of the war. Jacob operated a saloon in Monee in the late 1860s, on the north side of Margaret Street, between Compass and Locust Place. In 1874 when Monee was incorporated as a village, Jacob was one of three local judges who certified the election results, 43 in favor of incorporation and yes 28 against. He served as postmaster between 1885-88.
Ralph Fehland is a recognizable name in Monee. The Monee Citizen of the Year was founded in his honor in 1997. Few can match his service to the village.
Born on November 21, 1909, to Heinrich and Helene Fehland, he was the oldest of eight children and a lifelong Monee resident. He married Laura Hartmann on September 9, 1934. They had two daughters, Sharon, born in 1942, and Kathleen in 1945.
Ralph was a true Monee civic leader. He was elected to the first board of education of the new consolidated 201-U School District back when it was formed in 1948 and served the Village of Monee as a trustee for several terms and mayor for six years. He retired from the Monee Volunteer Fire Department after 55 years, was a member of the Monee Chamber of Commerce, where he was a past board president and treasurer, and a member of St Paul’s United Church of Christ, where he was a past church board president and treasurer.
Ralph was also a member of the Will County Farm Bureau, Master Mason of Illinois, 50-year member of Peotone Lodge #636, Lodge Council Chapter Consistory Scottish Rite Bodies in the Valley of Chicago, Medinah Temple of Chicago, and Illinois Agricultural Association of Illinois.
Rev. Albert Gaebe was pastor of St. Paul’s Church in 1915.
Simon Miller was one of the leading developers of the village of Monee. A native of Kaisers-Lautern, in the Province of Bavaria, Germany, he was born October 9, 1834, and came to America with his parents, George and Veronika (Imhoff) Miller, in the spring of 1849. The family settled in Chicago.
In 1867 he moved to Monee and, with Conrad Tatge and Augustus Herbert, established a general merchandising business.
In politics, he was a solid Democrat and township supervisor from 1888-1894, so greatly admired by the Will County Board of Supervisors that he was elected in Monee, a Republican stronghold. Miller was the president of the Monee Village Board from 1878 – 1880 and 1884-1887. He was also the first fire chief for the Monee Fire Department, holding that position from 1884-1886.
Thomas Pappandrean, or Tom Pappas as he was known, was born in Megera, Greece, and arrived in New York Harbor in 1909. He settled in Monee and married Francelia Leseberg in 1914.
On September 4, 1931, Tom was sitting in the back of his store playing cards with three companions when Mrs Westphal, the wife of the neighboring soft drink store’s owner, came running in to say they were being robbed. Tom grabbed his gun to try to stop the bandits. There were three gunmen in the store and another sitting in the getaway car, who shot Tom through the heart. Tom was always ready to spring into action to aid someone in need.
Vicki Schmidt was born to Edward and Freeda Brockmiller on March 10, 1951, and grew up in Monee. Her father ran the local general store, and her mother helped out behind the cash register, so Vicki grew up knowing everyone in town, because they all stopped in at Brockmiller’s store when they ran out of bread or milk, or some other staple.
Even as a little girl, Vicki loved art and loved to paint. She would try all different types of mediums, such as acrylic, oil, watercolors, and pastels. Both Vicki and her Mom took drawing lessons from local artist Andrew Gunderson, and it was hard to tell a “Brockmiller” from a “Gunderson.”
Vilas Yando died after being struck by a train in Peotone. The eldest son of Mr. and Mrs. Ezra Yando, well-known residents of Monee, he was born on January 17, 1906. He attended the country school south of Monee and was confirmed in St. Paul’s Evangelical Church on March 28, 1920, by the Rev. A. B. Gaebe.
Christian Schurz and his wife Marianna Jussen were the parents of Carl Schurz, a prominent participant in the thwarted German Revolution of 1848, and an immigrant to the United States who would be appointed Ambassador to Spain by President Lincoln, serve as a Union General in the Civil War, elected a Senator from Missouri, and subsequently was appointed Secretary of the Interior under President Rutherford B.Hayes.
Christian had been a schoolmaster in Liblar, a village on the Rhine near Bonn, then under the rule of France. He was conscripted into the French army, which made emigration to America appealing. He thought George Washington was “the noblest of men, because he had commanded large armies and, instead of making himself a king, had voluntarily divested himself of his power.” After the failed revolution, Carl and his family emigrated to America in 1852, and his parents and two sisters followed in 1853.
Carl provided a home for his parents until they moved in with his sister Anna and her husband, August Schiffer, who operated several Monee businesses. Christian was active in the community, campaigning for Ulysses (U .S.) Grant, and translating speeches for the German-speaking community
Leola Magdalena Sonneborn was born February 9, 1889, in Monee. She was baptized and confirmed at St. Paul’s Church.
On June 30, 1912, she married Fred H. Emde, the son of William Emde and Sophia Sonneman. Leola was a teacher in the Monee public school and served St. Paul’s Church in many ways. She was the organist, a member of the Women’s Guild, Tabea Society, and the Salt and Pepper Band.
She gave piano lessons to countless children in the village throughout the 1950s-1970s in her home, which still is standing next to the post office on Main Street. Piano lessons were 15 cents per child per week. Even though, at the end, her hands were so crippled with arthritis that she could only move the first two fingers of her right hand, she still managed to play the piano beautifully. Leola died September 13, 1981, and was buried in St. Paul’s Cemetery.
After the cemetery tour, guests were invited to the Monee Heritage Center on Court Street for refreshments and genealogy research. A genealogy expert was on hand, with tips for researching family history.