Month: March 2014

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Helbling Family Home & School, Lawrenceville, Pennsylvania, Part 2

This entry is part 2 of 4 in the series Helbling Family Home & School
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Franz Xavier Helbling and Maria Barbara (Helbling) Helbling, c1860s? Family portraits and reprinted in St. Augustine (Lawrenceville, PA) Diamond Jubilee pamphlet, page 40.
Franz Xavier Helbling and Mary Theresa (Knipshield) Helbling, c1880s? Family portraits and reprinted in St. Augustine (Lawrenceville, PA) Diamond Jubilee pamphlet, page 40.

[For the first part of this story, see “Helbling Family Home & School, Lawrenceville, Pennsylvania, Part 1.“]

After the loss of the eccentric “Teacher” at the Helbling school, efforts to continue the Catholic education of local children were reinforced. Father Hotz provided another teacher to board at the Helbling home as well, Mr. George Rutland.

From St. Augustine’s Parish History 1863-1938, page 13:

By this time news of the primitive school had spread and many parents applied for the admission of their children. The room, however, was too small to accommodate all who applied, hence, like the good soul he was, Mr. Helbling fitted out his unused storeroom for a school room. A goodly number of pupils attended especially children by the family name of Kalchthaler, Stein, Bischoff, Fleckenstein, Burckhardt and others. The first scholastic year might have started a little late in the fall of 1854 and had but a short interruption between the departure of the first teacher and the arrival of the second. On the third Sunday after Easter, April 29, 1855, the following announcement was made in St. Philomena’s church:

Some months ago a Catholic school was opened in the home of Xaver [sic] Helbling, near the cemetery [Allegheny] in Lawrenceville. Since a larger and more suitable accommodation has been now provided by the same Mr. Helbling, we admonish all the parents of Lawrenceville and the neighborhood who have children of school age, to send them to this school so that they may be trained to be good Christians. We ourselves shall take interest in this school and shall visit it from time to time.
Sometime around September, 1855 saw the beginning of the next school year. An announcement by St. Philomena’s Church stated,
 “Since the Catholic school of Lawrenceville has already commenced and a good opportunity is offered the children of school age to acquire virtue and knowledge, the parents living there are requested to send their children as soon as possible.”

With the addition of neighboring German children, the school had outgrown the facilities that could be provided by the Helbling family. Additionally, it was too far for the short legs of younger children to travel, and had no heat, so was far too cold in the long Pennsylvania winters. The school was thus moved to “Squire Nickel’s Mansion” which was more centrally located at 4016 Butler Street. This big stone mansion had a first floor that could be used for the school, and a second floor that was used as a hall for meetings, dances, etc. The school was sometimes called “Rutland Hall” after its teacher, but then became known as “The Lawrenceville Academy.”

Mr. Rutland probably resigned in 1856.

“Rumor had it that his resignation hinged upon disappointed matrimonial aspirations to the hand of one of Mr. Helbling’s daughters.”

The school continued with a female teacher who may have been Alsatian, as she was fluent in both German and French. (The Helblings hailed from Endingen, near to the German border with France, and family lore was that they were from Alsace-Lorraine, so it is ~correct.) She did not last the year and Teacher Mertz arrived to take over her duties.

To be continued…

Notes, Sources, and References:

1) St. Augustine’s Parish History 1863-1938. Personal copy from a cousin, but the entire history may be found online at http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~njm1/StAugJub-TC.html. Accessed 1-22-2014. Please see this history for detailed references to specific items in the narrative.

2) Helbling Family Home & School, Part 1: http://heritageramblings.net/2014/01/24/helbling-famil…e-pennsylvania/

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Copyright 2013-2014 by Heritage Ramblings Blog and pmm.

 
We would love to read your thoughts and comments about this post, and thank you for your time! All comments are moderated, however, due to the high intelligence and persistence of spammers/hackers who really should be putting their smarts to use for the public good instead of spamming our little blog.

 

Mystery Monday-Helbling or Springsteen Woman and Child

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Unknown woman and child tintype from Helbling and Springstein picture collection
Unknown woman and child tintype from Helbling and Springstein picture collection.

This beautiful image was in with photos of the Helbling and Springsteen family. Looking at other images we have, I think this may be Mary Theresa (Knipshield) Helbling, with one of her children. Facial features are similar, and note the size of her hands in both pictures- very large.  She may even be wearing the same earrings! (Some enhancement in Photoshop may be required for further investigation.)

Daguerreotypes were widely available from the early 1840s to the late 1850s. Ambrotypes first came into use in the US in the early 1850s and lasted until the 1860s, when tintypes became more popular and cost effective.

Mary Theresa Knipshield’s first child was born in 1837, her last in 1862.

Follow along with my posts on the Helbling Family Home and School this week to see another image of Mary that is positively identified. What do you think?

A Little Housekeeping for Feedblitz Users

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"We Help Mommy" c 1956
“We Help Mommy” c 1956

If you get our blog via a Feedblitz subscription, please go back in and re-subscribe using WordPress, the default. I have had some problems with formatting from Feedblitz and getting the subscriptions right with the company, so just prefer to revert to WordPress. Sorry for any inconvenience, and I do hope that you will keep reading!

Anna May (Beerbower) Helbling

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Anna Mae Beerbower, later Helbling.
Anna Mae Beerbower, later Helbling.

Lisa Alzo, one of my favorite genealogy rock stars, is commemorating National Women’s History Month with  “Fearless Females: 31 Blogging Prompts to Celebrate Women’s History Month” on her blog “The Accidental Genealogist.” She hopes these prompts will help us tell the story of our female ancestors. Today’s prompt is: Post a photo of one of your female ancestors. Who is in the photo? When was it taken? Why did you select this photo?

First of all, some may ask why women need a month of their own- Women’s History Month- isn’t that sexist? Yes, in a way, but since “History is written by the victors.” (said Winston Churchill, but you can also substitute ‘powerful’ for ‘victors’), women have a bit of catching up to do. It is especially hard to track women through history as well, since most lose their birth name when they marry (except French women, some Scandinavians, and other uppity women here and there). Most women even lose their first name when they say, “I do,” such as Anna becoming “Mrs. G. W. Helbling.”

Interestingly, women get their first name back when they become widows, so if Anna had predeceased her husband, she would have become “Mrs. Anna Helbling.” This knowledge helps pinpoint when a husband died, or left/divorced, as I am finding out about some of the women in my tree who became “widows” while their husband was still alive.

Since land and money were usually controlled by the male head of household, women again leave no tracks, not even in the US Federal censuses, until 1850.

But I digress with justifying why women need their own history month. Back to Anna May.

 

Anna May Beerbower is one of my favorite ancestors- I feel as if I know her, from the stories I have heard all my life. I actually did meet her, but was just a month or two old; I probably only remember the stories of those meetings, rather than actual memories of those times. My mother always did a good job making sure that we knew a lot about the ancestors she loved and knew.

This photo was probably taken 1895-1905 when Anna May was a teenager. I love the innocence in her face, and how sweet her curls are, especially the perfectly placed curl in the middle of her forehead.

 

There will be more about Anna May in future posts.

 

Notes, Sources, and References:

1) Family photo collection.

Please contact us if you would like a higher resolution image.

Copyright 2013-2014 by Heritage Ramblings Blog and pmm.

 
We would love to read your thoughts and comments about this post, and thank you for your time! All comments are moderated, however, due to the high intelligence and persistence of spammers/hackers who really should be putting their smarts to use for the public good instead of spamming our little blog.