Henry & Annette
A couple of weeks ago I was searching through some old
photo albums looking for a picture to go with a that week’s Embers
post. Among the photos I came across the
yellowed obituaries of my paternal grandparents. I set them aside to read later and continued
looking for my picture. This week I got
around to reading those two newspaper clippings. Mt grandmother passed away five years before
I was even born. My grandfather died
when I was just three. Since I really
didn’t know my father’s parents I was hoping that I would get at least some
nuggets of new information. I found that
both of the obituaries did have a few new crumbs, but both of them inspired
more questions than they had answers.
My wife had a cousin who had compiled a record of the
family tree that reached back several generations into Germany and then came right
up to the 1990’s. It was interesting to
see my family listed there, including our four children. I also have cousins who have done serious
studies of the ancestries that at least touched Ireland’s shore up through the
year 2000. I am a bit jealous of whoever
has those family histories currently.
My grandmother’s name was Annette. I know someone else by that name through work
and Cursillo connections, and only recently learned that no one in her family
calls her by that name. To all of them
she is Nettie. Both of my parents were
very formal and a bit of what most people would describe as “straight-laced”. It’s hard to imagine them using a nickname
for the family matriarch. My father did
call me “Danelski”, but he also told a lot of inappropriate Polish jokes, so,
as I aged, I became very skeptical that it was intended to be an affectionate
moniker.
My grandmother died at home when she was just 57 years
old. The obit states that she died after
a short illness, but I remember my mother telling me that she complained of
severe headaches for years. I wonder if
it was a case where family didn’t put a lot of credibility into something that
was really a symptom of a serious ailment, or perhaps it was a missed diagnosis
because of lack of medical understanding at the time.
There is no mention of her parents, so there’s no
generational help. Most curious to me is
that there are two sisters listed. One
is a Mrs. Alfred Wagnitz of Kaukauna. My
mother grew up in Kaukauna. I wrote of
finding a Wagnitz grave marker there recently (see Embers, Etched in Stone,
May 12, 2026) Could it be that Mrs.
Alfred Wagnitz and my grandmother were sisters who somehow met and married two
cousins? It seems plausible.
My grandfather Henry’s obit speaks more to his ties to
various business associations than providing family information. Again, no mention of who his parents
were. There are two surviving sisters
mentioned, neither of whom I have ever heard mentioned before. One of them is listed as living in Kaukauna,
so maybe she’s the connection.
It mentions that he was a WWI veteran with the 121st
Red Arrow Field Artillery Division.
Google lists three major battles that they participated in, and refers
to the division as “highly decorated. Henry
was a member of the American Legion, the VFW and the DAV. My mother told me that my father had broken a
number of his fingers, some several times when he played semi-pro baseball as a
catcher. Because some of them were
fairly crooked, he did not pass his physical when he tried to enlist in
WWII. She said that he was highly
disappointed; she was relieved. If his
father had been a decorated war veteran I can see why my father wanted to make
him proud, but he never got the chance to do it on the battlefield. My siblings and I quite possibly owe our
existence to those broken fingers.
On the lighter side, his obit does verify a story that
my father told me years ago. Grandpa
Wagnitz was one of the founders of the Green Bay Packer Lumberjack Band. He was the drum major, and he used a
lumberjack’s cant hook for his baton. It’s
satisfying to know that we have a deep family connection to the Packers. It
could also help explain why I compelled to be a Packer fan.
I am grateful that I came across these two obituaries
several weeks ago. I’m thankful that my
mother clipped them out and saved them. Reading
them intrigues me to continue to get to know them better even as time threatens to widen the distance between us.
His Peace <><
Deacon Dan
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