Friday, June 20, 2008

Sommer family at Oakwoods Cemetery

Last Sunday my cousin Terry and I searched the final resting place of Katherine Ball, in Oakwoods Cemetery located here in Chicago. We searched and searched for Katherine's grave to no avail. I sent a letter to the cemetery asking for some help and Kim in the office at Oakwoods was kind enough to call me and give me a lot of information! So, this afternoon, three of my children and I stopped at Oakwoods Cemetery again believing we would be lucky and find our "missing ancestors".
Boy did we luck out too! My youngest son Jeremy, found a very large monument with the name Sommer on it. (Kids can move around cemeteries so much easier than adults!) Sommer is Katherine's maiden name. Katherine does not have a marker on her grave but, Kim told me that she is buried in the Sommer family plot. Not only is Katherine buried there but so are fourteen other relatives! Here is the breakdown...
Adults
Katherine Ball, Julia Sommer-----Katherine's sister, Phillip J. Sommer----Julia's husband, Frederick J. Sommer and his wife Elizabeth Sommer, Jacob F. Sommer and his wife Phillipina Sommer, William J. Buis and his wife Margaret Buis and Elizabeth J. Eberhart.
Children
Elizabeth Sommer, Anna Sommer, Frederick Sommer, Arthur Sommer and Ernest Sommer.
Wow! I took pictures of each and every marker. Of course I researched some dates of marriages and dates of death for everyone I could find. Once again I contacted Cynthia at Chicago Genealogy to copy as many of those death certificates and marriage certificates that she can find!
Searching Ancestry from my local library I was able to find many of these relatives on the Federal Census records. For instance, on the 1900 federal census Julia and Philip have two children Elsa (10yrs) and Philip (8 yrs). Frederick and his wife Elizabeth are also living with them. I believe that Frederick and Elizabeth are Philip's parents only because they had been married forty years in 1900 and Philip was 37 years old at that time.
I now have some work to do, putting all these relatives on my family tree! There's lots more research to do now as well, what with all these additional Sommer relatives and their descendants. Plus, I am not absolutely sure of how some of them connect to the others.
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The Family

The family. We were a strange little band of characters trudging through life sharing diseases and toothpaste, coveting one another's desserts, hiding shampoo, borrowing money, locking each other out of our rooms, inflicting pain and kissing to heal it in the same instant, loving, laughing, defending, and trying to figure out the common thread that bound us all together. ~Erma Bombeck

Genealogy Pox, author unknown

WARNING: GENEALOGY POX IS VERY CONTAGIOUS!

SYMPTOMS: Continual complaint as to need for names, dates and places. Patient has a blank expressions, sometimes deaf to spouse and children. Has no taste for work of any kind, except feverishly looking through records at libraries and courthouses.
Has a compulsion to write letters. Swears at mailman when he doesn't leave mail. Frequents strange places such as cemeteries, ruins, and remote desolate country areas. Makes secret night calls and hides phone bills from spouse. Mumbles to self. Has strange, faraway look in eyes.

NO KNOWN CURE!

TREATMENT: Medication is useless. This disease is not fatal, but gets progressively worse. Patient should attend genealogy workshops, subscribe to genealogical magazines and be given a quiet corner in the house where he/she can be alone.

REMARKS: The unusual nature of this disease is that the sicker the patient gets, the more he or she enjoys it!