"The History of a Homestead"
From the "Waushara Argus", April 9, 1970.
Written by Evelyn Castellion.
(Corrections in brackets and notes have been added)
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 JOHN AND ANNA BRUCKNER
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 LOUIS BRUCKNER
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 JOHN AND JUSTINA STROSCHEIN
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Hello, there! I hope you're not wondering what this column will be about because I'm not quite sure myself. Mainly I will attempt to write about the history of places and people in the Westfield area. (note 1) As this is going to be Westfield's column I hope that all of you will phone me with some questions, recipes, hobbies and opinions, that you will share.
Have you ever tried to trace the history of anything? If so, you will know what I'm going through. As my dear husband and all my friends know, I'm a very "organized" person, who knows at all times exactly "who, what, where, when, and why" of things. That is why every week I will probably have to devote a paragraph to correcting all the mistakes from the previous week, which I hope you readers will notice and cheerfully phone me about. Some times, you see, my "who, what, where, when, and why" gets a "little" turned around.
I slyly chose Annie Dornacker as my first interview. I knew her so I felt that I would be at ease with her, but also, she has been around our children and remained very calm.
It was a nice sunny day when I armed myself with notebook, pencil, camera, and our two youngest, Cheryl and Steven, to set out for Annie's place, which is about 3-1/2 miles from us, around Fenner's lake, on 1st Ave. Annie is a widow and lives in the house she was born in, with her son, Roger, a 6th grader.
The house has seen many people come and go, and the beginning of its history goes back before its time, even. Annie was not only able to give me a lot of information about its latter years, but she was also agile enough to hop down into the pigpen to rescue Cheryl's mitten. That could have been one of the reasons she sent me to her half-sister Esther Janke, for the history of the early years. Anyway, much thanks to them both for the following history.
The original Bruckner homestead was built by John Bruckner about 1860. He married twice, but each of his American wives had died in childbirth. He decided, then, that a girl form the Old Country would be healthier, so he wrote to a nursing home in Holland [Germany] asking for a wife. None of the young workers wanted to go, so they all said a prayer and then drew straws. Eighteen [37] year old Anna Mclausch [probably spelled Micklausch] was the "lucky'' one. When John wrote to her, he told her that he had the largest house for miles around. That it was, even though it was a big log cabin. It had a basement, kitchen, living room and large bedroom downstairs, with the upstairs as another huge bedroom.
Even so, when Anna saw the wilderness here, she wished she could go back immediately. She stayed, though, and they raised three sons, Edward, Sam, and Lewis. Ed and Sam were to move to Colorado when they were older (note 1), but Louis stayed here to farm the nearly 300 acres and to marry Augusta Stroschein, a near-by-neighbor.
They were married when she was 18 [16] and he was 30 [29]. As a wedding present her father helped to build a house for them on the Bruckner land, a few hundred feet from the log cabin, This was in 1896. Augusta had come over here by boat from Germany, when she was five years old. Her father, John Stroschein had received many letters from relatives who were over here, and he came first to see if it was as good here in America as they said. He decided to stay and sent for his family. His wife, Justina the children, Augusta, Willie, Robert, [Willie and Robert did not come from Germany, they were born in WI] and Emil, and Justina's mother, arrived and were very surprised at the wilderness too.
Anna and Justina both must have adjusted and passed on wonderful qualities to their children, for both Louis and Augusta are remembered as hard working, but kind and fun loving parents. Louis would travel whenever an opportunity would arise such as the World's Fair in St. Louis. Augusta would go with him when she could. Any circus, within "horse-traveling" distance, was a must for the whole Bruckner family.
Beside the nine children who were all born in the house, there was usually a grandmother around, as Augusta and Louis took care of both mothers until they died. At one time, Louis tore off the kitchen of his house and used the wood to build his mother a house much closer to his than the log cabin. He added another section to his own house. In all, He added 3 sections onto the original home.
They also took in a l4-year old girl [Fern Walker] from a broken home (note 2) and raised her as one of their own. She later returned after she married, with her husband and lived in the house that Grandmother Anna had lived in. Click here for information about Fern Walker.
Augusta always had lots of chickens and milking cows, which she and Louis would go right up to in the barnyard and milk while the cows stood there and chewed their cud. Besides farming, Louis used to have a sorghum mill and would work out there, cooking sorghum for people form 4 a.m. until l0 p.m. each day.
One day in May 1912, Louis had worked up a sweat pulling a horse marker for early potatoes. He then got on the corn planter and thus got a chill. He came in the house, put on a heavy fur coat, and went to bed. The doctor came but having no antibiotics, could only give him whiskey. A few hours late, Louis Bruckner, was dead at the age of 46 [45]. The baby, Louis, was only 8 months old and Esther, the eldest, was 14. Esther now lives in Oxford, Walter in Madison, Edwin in Holly, Mich., Evelyn in Eugene, Ore., Arthur in
California, and Lewis in Westfield.
Augusta remarried about two [one] and a half years later, a family friend, Fred Henke. He, too, farmed. From this marriage came two girls, Dorothy (Cottrell) of Oxord and Annie. The family's first car was a Model T, which Fred bought when Louis was old enough to drive. When Annie married John Dornacker, Augusta then sold the farm to them and moved to Oxford [about 1943]. She had lived in that house for 47 years. In Oxford after Fred's death, she kept on sewing and doing piece-quilts for her children, 12 grandchildren, and 26 great-grandchildren. She remained alert, although sick, up to her death in 1966 at the age of 87.
Annie and John raised four children, Kenneth, Duane, Mary Ann, and Roger in this house. John died on Nov. 22, 1966, having farmed and dealed in machinery for 26 years. Annie still raises pigs and chickens and Roger has a horse.
I am sorry that I didn't have an opportunity to talk with more of the people who had lived in this house. One can't help but feel that although this house has seen hard times, there were also some very happy times, and that it will continue to do so for a good many years yet.
Notes:
1. Edward was born in Germany and the son of Anna before she married Mr. Bruckner. Edward first moved to Nebraska, married there in 1882, and then moved to Colorado in 1904 after having 13 children in Lincoln, NE. Sam first went to Colorado after Edward was living there.
2. Fern Walker was an orphan (parents died in 1901 & 1903) and is listed in the 1905 census as living with her Fenner grandparents. It is not know what the "broken family" refers to. Fern would have been 14 about 1907.
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