Each of you who knew our ancestors personally had different memories of them. This page is dedicated to those memories and I encourage you to submit your thoughts to this page, so we can all learn more of the people that we are descended from.

Thank you.

Julius Harm

Julius C. Harm was the son of John Harm and Kathryn Avers Harm, not to be confused with his half-nephew, Julius C. Harm, son of John Henry Harm, Sr. & Augusta Wieck Harm.

FROM KEN HUCHENDORF:

This Julius C. Harm lived with the Huchendorf family northeast of Brookings and helped with the farming. He was a very quiet man who never married. He would visit us at our farm near White, SD always for Sunday dinner and attended all the family picnics.
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Kathryn Henrietta Avers Harm

FROM KEN HUCHENDORF:

My grandmother's mother lived with my grandmother the last years of her life at the farm northeast of Brookings, SD. She died there January 5, 1929 and was buried in the Greenwood Cemetery at Brookings. I was only 3 years old at the time, but I remember attending her funeral.

I did not know John F. Harm as he died before I was born, but I do remember Kathryn Harm as I remember her wanting to be close to us kids so she would hide candy in her apron pocket to give to us if we would come near. She spoke German, which was foreign to us, since we could only understand English, so we were afraid and were reluctant to come near. Bless her heart, she was trying to be friends the best way she knew how.
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Augusta Louise Harm Huchendorf

FROM KEN HUCHENDORF:

Grandma Huch was a hard working housewife living on a farm with 9 children. She was a wonderful cook and when we were at the farm on Sundays or holidays would have a meal with 3 or 4 different kinds of meat and all the trimmings. In spite of all the hard work, she was always a cheerful, lovely person and friends with everyone.
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Freda Catrina Johanna Harm King

FROM ALICE WALLING KING:

I was talking with Alice at the family reunion in July 2003. She passed along this bit about Freda, my grandmother:
Freda had a large vegetable garden and several flower beds. Freda loved her flowers. If a flower should come up in the vegetable bed, it was to stay there for all to enjoy. It was not to be picked and discarded like a weed. Alice didn't know that when she first helped Freda to weed her vegetable garden. But she soon found out!

Jay Cecil King

FROM ELMER KING:

Dad spoke some of his early school attendance. Terms were split, with breaks to coincide with planting and harvesting in the farm community. This meant that the winter session was longest. Teachers "stayed around" with different families as part of their pay. This custom was followed in country schools in the area where I grew up at least until the 1930's. He spoke of spelling bees and arithmetic contests that he participated in. Physical punishment seemed routine. Older boys were required to cut small tree branches for switches. Dad never said if he was one that the switches were used on.

Dad's formal schooling ended when he left home. He apparently was self-educated after that. He was good at "reading, writing, and arithmetic". He played the mouth organ and mouth harp (he called it "Jews Harp"). This was more self-education. He played entirely by ear, he could not read music at all. He was quite knowledgeable of the Bible. I remember overhearing him and a preacher discussing the Bible. He was well able to hold his own. One of his sayings when things were going bad was, "Everything happens for the best." I don't remember when I realized that this was a paraphrase of Romans 8:28.

Curly King was, at least part of the time, what would now be called a "homeless" person. He called it "hobo-ing". He was adamant that this didn't mean "tramp" or "bum". From what I remember from his conversations, he followed farm harvest starting in Iowa and into Minnesota, Illinois, Missouri and the Dakotas. The main crops were small grain, hay, and later in the year, corn. He seems to have been an odd job laborer as well. He mentioned such things as painter, roofer and wood yard (I don't know what 'wood yard' means). His transportation was what he called "riding the rails". That meant getting on a freight train while it was stopped or going slow. He camped at time in "Hobo Jungles" with men in like circumstances. These were usually at railroad intersections or water tanks where steam engines had to take on water. He spoke of them pooling resources to get ingredients for "mulligan stew", which seemed to be almost anything or everything edible. He slept with his shoes as a pillow so they would not be stolen.

He spoke of working in "the shops in Illinois". That was a machine shop in Rock Island. He never said so, but I got the impression that he was a foreman or in some other supervisory position. He spoke of living in Bettendorf, Iowa and walking across the Mississippi River bridge to get to work in Rock Island.  He also spoke of selling life insurance for Metropolitan. He mentioned, too, about splitting wood and repairing roofs. Apparently this meant working odd jobs at times. This would also appear to be the period during which he was in the Illinois Militia. The Militia is what is now called the National Guard, not the current political movement. It's this pattern of work that led him to Woodbury County.

This was during the period when personal transportation was transitioning from horses to automobiles. Dad sold the horses and bought a Model T Ford. That's the vehicle I had my first driving lesson on. Dad hauled a tripod derrick on the fenders of the Model T that he used for his well work. He made the derrick from three 2 X 10's, two of which were rigid, with a windlass in between them, and the third folded into them. We used the derrick for pulling engines, butchering hogs, and other lifting also. I have the pulley and rope that was used on the derrick. He later built a trailer to haul his equipment.

There is a difference in our memories as to Dad's chronic health problems. I always connected the start of his digestive problems to an accident he had at about the same time period. All that I remember about the accident was that it occurred while moving dirt with a team of horses on a slip, and two men bringing him home in a wagon. .In retrospect, I doubt the connection. The date and severity of the injury is uncertain. It was probably about 1925

For the digestive problems, our doctor prescribed medication and diet, specifically goats milk. That's why we raised goats.  It must have been controlled, because he worked for many years with this problem.  Much of the time he apparently had no symptoms, but he would not have acknowledged it anyway.

For the last few years prior to surgery, he was not able to do a days work He had ulcer surgery in 1937, at which time his appendix was also removed, although I don't recall it ever being symptomatic. .He died a few days later.

FROM STEVE KING, from what he remembers his father Emmett King telling him:

I do remember Dad telling me numerous times that Annie had died at sea and was buried either at sea or else they were so close to shore that she was buried near Ellis Island, where they landed and were admitted to this country. I was surprised to learn that there was a marker at Rock Branch.

Dad also did tell us that Jay Cecil (Dad never referred to him as Curly) was of Scotts-Irish and English decent. I don't know if this came from his learned dislike for the English in WW II or from his fathers mouth. I also recall Dad telling me that Curly (I'll call him Curly now) had severe ulcers. I did not know about surgery but I was told that Curly laid in pain at home thinking it was the ulcers while he was having what turned out to be appendicitis that was fatal due to the misdiagnosis at home. This is something that should be checked with Elmer.

Dad told us that they did raise a big garden, ate what they needed and sold or traded the rest. They also scooped as many walks and drives in Correctionville as possible along with carrying the Sioux City Journal for years. Dad also told of digging horseradish and selling it. I doubt if they made anything on it. He also said that they would take the wagon or sled to the elevator to get coal to burn. Dad weighed in on the sled and Ernie weighed going out loaded. Dad was a few pounds heavier than Ernie and they got that much more coal. He didn't mention that ethics apply to poor people, too. Ask, too, about  keeping all of the family money in a jar in the kitchen. As I understand it, all of the money that anyone made would go into the jar. It came out in the amounts and at the time that Frieda said. This would be after Curly's death.

In the winter, they also hunted for rabbits. The single shot 410 that they had supplied them with fresh meat but the shells were expensive and must be made to count. They all swam in the Little Sioux River as if it were the pool. They also fished it in the summertime for catfish and other river varieties.

That's some of the memories as I recall. Another suspicion is that Curly might have originated in Lewis County, Missouri. I don't have a map and cannot even check to see if there is such a county. It might be another place to look for a birth record

This site last updated on Thursday, August 23, 2007 

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