Kill and Brown families 1880

 

Catherine Braun Hannigan

Catherine Braun was born in Chicago in 1875 to Joseph Braun, 30 years old, and  Catherine Baltes, 27 years old. Joseph was born in Germany and worked as a carpenter. They lived on the Near West Side with many other German families and changed their name to Brown. The Baltes family were from Britten, Germany near Trier by way of Milwaukee. Many Germans emigrated after the upheaval of the Austro-Prussian war and the strict laws put in place by Bismarck to unify the country. 

By 1880, Joseph has died, possibly while working in South Park, soon to become Jackson Park, during a very hot summer. The widowed Catherine, now goes by Kate Brown, and has three girls, Gertrude 9 years old, Catherine 4, and Mary Margaret 2. They all live with her stepbrother Mathew Kill and his wife, Catherine. (They may have changed their name or it is misspelled in the census as Kew). They list their birth country as Prussia and live at 3706 S. Halsted in the Bridgeport area. Mathew was also a carpenter. Kate Brown worked as a laundress, a washerwoman.             


In 1892, 19 year old Gertrude married an Irish man, David Fitzgerald. They lived at 915 W. 38th St not far from the Armour meatpacking plant where he worked as a foreman.

Kate Brown died at the age of 52 in 1900. The younger Kate, 23 and Mary, 21 moved in with their sister Gertrude Fitzgerald and the three Fitzgerald children: Fannie, little Gertrude, and David. The two young women worked as seamstresses. More about garment workers in Chicago. 

This website from the Newberry Library details the difficult life for German and Irish immigrants in the Back of the Yards at the turn of the last century.

In the next few years, Mary Margaret would meet Joseph Klaus, also a German immigrant, marry and start a family. They had four boys right away, Joseph, Norbert, Roy and Gerald. A year later, in 1905, Catherine Braun would meet and marry Francis P. Hannigan.

David Fitzgerald on the top left, David Jr., Gertrude Braun Fitzgerald, Fanny Fitzgerald, Catherine Braun Hannigan, and Frank Hannigan. In the front is Catherine Hannigan, Gerald Hannigan, Joe or Elmer Fitzgerald, and Frank Hannigan, Jr. This picture would have been taken in 1917 or 1918.

Gertrude passed away a few years later in 1920 and her husband, 

David's fatal accident at the meatpacking plant, took place in 1925.

Mary Klaus also died in 1925 and her son, Roy, moved in with the Hannigans. 

David Fitzgerald - Fatal accident at Armour meatpacking plant 1925

 

Elizabeth Masterson O'Malley

Elizabeth and Dennis O'Malley ~1942

Elizabeth sails to America with six children. My grandfather, James, was six months old. 

Mary Drantz Bechtloff

Marie Catherine Drantz was born November 29, 1883 in Heilbronn, Germany. Her father, Friedrich Bernhard Drautz was 26. Mary's mother, Rosine Wilhelmine Braendle, was also 26 years old when Mary was born. Fred changed the name to Drantz when they came to the US and Marie became known as Mary, my mother's namesake. Mary had three elder sisters, Emma, Louisa, Elizabeth and a brother Ernst who did not survive infancy. Marie was baptized in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Heilbronn. More about the Drantz Family. 

The family left Germany via Hamburg in 1885 and they settled in Gilman, Illinois, a small town 90 miles south of Chicago. 

In 1900, at 16 years old, Mary was living and working as a servant for an elderly Martha Fetheringill and her widowed son, William who was a Railroad conductor. Her sisters Emma and Elizabeth were married, but her sister Louisa also worked as a servant for the hotel proprietor in town.

By 1905, Mary had moved to Chicago and married George Becthloff of South Halsted. In 1906, their first daughter Wilhelmine was born. Later, Wilhelmine would be known as Mabel. 

In 1910, George is a Real Estate Broker like his father who lives next door at 7011 S. Halsted. Mary is busy as a homemaker and she and George have twin girls, Louise and Lucille, two years later. 

More about the Bechtloff family.

In 1920, the family is still at the Halsted address and Mary's brother Frank, his wife Mabel, and their little son, Francis, known as Bud, lived next door. Mary's father-in-law, Casper Bechtloff, passed away in 1924 and his wife Minnie Pyne Bechtloff moved to 7000 S. Green St to live with her daughter, Minnie Jutzi. 

The Bechtloff family is still on Halsted in 1930 and George has moved into the Insurance business. Mabel works as a stenographer for an Automobile parts office but Mary's twin girls are 17 and have a very active social calendar which must keep Mary busy as well. 

The depression era was not easy on the Bechtloffs as George lost his insurance business and the next record was his 1940s WWII registration where he is working as a janitor for the Board of Education. (Mabel's husband, Frank Gavin, worked for the Board of Ed so it is likely that he got his father-in-law this job. It must have been hard to get a good job in those days.) George passed away a few years later in 1942 and Mary moved in with her daughter Louise, newly married to her husband Ray Heineman.

Don Heineman recalls that he shared "a bedroom with Grandma Mary," a fact that embarrassed him, but was common in those days. Grandma would take him on neighborhood walks to visit her German lady friends, one being Alice Logeshult. They had to climb the back stairs to the second floor apartment that was filled with African violets. He put up with these visits because he knew he would get an ice cream soda on the way home. Halsted Street was "a world long gone. There was a butcher shop with sawdust on the floor, where they made their own sausages; a soda shop with white tiled floor and along soda fountain counter, a bakery, and other various shops."

Mary Drantz Bechtloff passed away from a sudden heart attack on April 25, 1953. She and George are buried in St. Mary's Cemetery in Evergreen Park. 

Lucille, Mary Drantz Bechtloff, Louise, Mabel

This home belonged to Lucille's mother-in-law Catherine Braun Hannigan

Clara Dieden Schoentgen

Clara Martha Dieden was born in 1881 in Chicago to John Dieden (46 yo) and Anna Maria Crone (32 yo). John's first wife passed away in 1874 from a tragic accident so Clara had four older step-siblings. Clara was John's 9th child and Anna's fifth. They lived at 43 Chicago Ave and John's occupation is listed as Saloon Keeper. They lived down the street from John's brothers and the Dry Goods Store his stepfather, John Herting, owned. Two of Clara's elder sisters worked as dress makers. 

In 1906, 25 year old Clara married Nicholas Schoentgen who was 36 years old. 

In 1908, their first child Augustine "Gus" was born. Helen was born a year later in 1909.

In 1910, the Schoentgens lived at 1111 N. Wells in Chicago. They lived next door to Clara's mother, Anna, and several of Clara's siblings, including a younger sister, Helen. 

By 1920, two more children had been born, Virginia in 1911 and Esther in 1913. The family lived at 222 Beethoven Place. Nicholas, 50 yo, was a furniture salesman and Clara was working as a waitress. 

In 1930, Clara is 50 and they live at 1044 Franklin Street. Nicholas, 63 yo, is unemployed and Clara is a sales lady in a retail store. Gus is 22 yo and works a clerk in a retail store and Helen is 20, also working as a clerk. 

Nicholas died on April 29, 1935 at the age of 67. His funeral was held at St. Joseph's and his occupation was listed as Oliver Typewriter Salesman. He is buried in St. Boniface Cemetery near the Diedens.

Helen married Jim O'Malley in 1938 and they moved to Detroit where Jim worked in the Rotogravure business. 

In 1940, Clara is 59 and lives at 1111 N. Wells in the same building as Maude Dieden who was the widow of Clara's older brother, Frank. Gus, 32 yo, still lived with Clara and worked as a butcher and then enlisted in the Army that same year. Esther, 25, worked as a mail clerk. Also living in that building were several of Maude's children: Eugene, Donald, Grace, Richard, and daughter-in-law Mildred. 

In the next few years, Gus would marry and move to St. Louis but he passed away in 1952. Esther lived her life a single woman and passed away in 2003. 

In 1950, Clara is 69 and lives at 4106 Barry Ave with her daughter Ginny and her new husband Lee Colsant and their eight children: Richard, Louise, Lee, Raymond, Joseph, Virginia, Rosemary, Loretta

Clara passed away in July 1953 and is buried in St. Boniface with her husband, parents, and her daughter, Helen. 

Chicago O'Malleys

Mike O'Malley arrived in Ellis Island in 1906. He was going to be staying with his nephew Michael Fahey who lived at 57 Superior St. Elizabeth and the six children arrived on Oct 6, 1907 and listed Mike's address as 129 Dearborn St. 

The next record that we have for his family is Sarah's baptism at Holy Name Cathedral in 1909. The family's address was 84 Sedgwick St. 

In 1912, Alice O'Malley passed away at 6 months of age and the family was living at 1145 N. Franklin. And this is where the family would stay until 1930 when they have moved to 5300 Lovejoy on the city's north side.  

Michael O'Malley passed away on May 21, 1952 and Elizabeth Masterson O'Malley passed away on November 24, 1957