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Show Years later, in the horse and buggy days, John K drew the attention of his children to the very spot where the little two-room adobe house stood in which he had been born on 15 March 1872. "It was just west of that Jim Staker barn," he would say, pointing a finger to indicate direction. And when the barn was no longer there and a new brick house had been erected near the site, he said, "Mother's little cabin was about where Bob Nelson built his new house-but it was slightly east of it, really." The fact that it was important to him to tell his family where he had been born emphasized the importance of it to them also. They knew that his beginning had been humble, and also knew that his mother, Wilhelmina, had been very dear to him. That little house stood in the block north of her husband's other home where his first wife and family lived, and where Wilhelmina had been working for several years while the first wife was having her babies. Even after her marriage , Wilhelmina continued to help the first family until the time two years later when her own children began to arrive. And, living so near she was still able to lend a hand. Joseph Charles was her first child, born in the little cabin 18 February 1866. Then Fritz Abel, Wilhelmina's second child arrived on 21 January 1868, and died four weeks later. Tora Lucinda was born 4 November 1869, and John 29 |
