Herbert William Altenbernd

M, #100, b. 1 November 1915, d. 20 March 1999
Relationship
1st cousin 1 time removed of Sheila Sue Altenbernd
Father*Carl Conrad Altenbernd b. 6 September 1883, d. 27 September 1963
Mother*Martha Lydia Sophia Gerstenberger b. 14 April 1885, d. 12 December 1967
     His common name was Herb Altenbernd.

     Photo of front: Herb Altenbernd and Irene Schaake
Middle: Hugo Hoelszel, Frieda Schaake, and Helen Altenbernd
Back: Frances and Hildegarde Hoelzel. Original photo in the possession of Sue Myers (#130.)


     Herbert was born on 1 November 1915.1,2,3 He was the son of Carl Conrad Altenbernd and Martha Lydia Sophia Gerstenberger.

     Photo. Original photo in the possession of Sheila Altenbernd (#172) as of 2023. Front: Ruth Hoelzel, Helen Altenbernd, ?
Back: Frances Hoelzel, Irene Schaake, Clara Hoelzel and possibly Herb Altenbernd.4

Front: Ruth Hoelzel, Helen Altenbernd, ?
Back: Frances Hoelzel, Irene Schaake, Clara Hoelzel and possibly Herb Altenbernd


     Photo. Original photo in the possession of Sheila Altenbernd (#172) as of 2023. Clara Hoelzel and possibly Herb Altenbernd.4

Clara Hoelzel and possibly Herb Altenbernd


     Photo.



     Photo of Herb Altenberd, Will Altenbernd, Irene Schaake. Original photo in the possession of Sue Myers (#130.)

Herb Altenberd, Will Altenbernd, Irene Schaake


     Photo taken by Photo is missing on this tag.


     Herbert worked. He worked as Farmer.
     The following information is from the records of John Altenbernd.

Herb married Bessie Bullock of Lawrence, doing so over the objections of Aunt Mattie. Bessie was an orphan girl, a nobody, Mattie said. They had two children -- Robert and Sandra, both now married. Herb and Bessie separated when the children were still young, then later divorced. Herb kept Bob and Sandy. Herb married Peggy around 1950 and they have a son, Kerry, and a daughter, Penny. Herb and Bessie had always lived in Lawrence while Herb farmed. Bessie refused to live in the country. But with Peggy, Herb built a house between ours and Uncle Carl's on the west side of the road.

End of information from John Altenbernd
------------------------
Herb is listed in the 1956 Lawrence, Kansas telephone directory living at RFD2. His phone number was VI3-3145.

Herb had heart surgery in January 1991.

Herb had prostrate surgery in January 1992.

Herb had a stroke in March 1992. There was some temporary paralysis on the right side, but this passed by the time he entered the emergency room. Herb suffered some problems with his speech. As of August 1992, Herb is undergoing speech therapy twice a week. He speaks slower than he used to, but you can understand what he is saying. He is anxious to begin driving again, but the doctor has told him he will need to wait another 6 months.

In a visit to Kansas in September 1992. I noticed that Herb's home was up for sale.

     Herbert William Altenbernd married Helen Marie Daniels, circa 1950.4
ME by John Altenbernd

Ordination Day


Ordination Day was a day to be approached with some degree of fear and trembling as well as with joy and anticipation. It marked the end of a lot of things as well as marking a beginning.
I was 25 years old. I had been in school ever since I was 6, and that had been a long time. There would now be no more of that. While school carries with it a great deal of responsibility, it is still a kind of sheltered responsibility. From here on I would be on my own. Instead of being a student under somebody, I would be the head man.
The farm house in Kansas would no longer be my home. And I did love that place. I had neither the desire nor the natural talent and knowledge to be a farmer, but I did love being there and working on it. There's a great difference between working on a farm and having the know-how to run it. My genes were primarily from the Stoerker family rather than from the Altenbernds, and I was smart enough to know that early on. Any attempt at farming as a living would have been doomed to disaster. I hated leaving the farm, but I've never had regrets for having done so.
I had already accepted the dual pastorate of St. John's and Bethany Churches in Berger, Missouri, so I knew where I was going. July 11 would be my first Sunday there. I had been serving there as student supply during the last few months at Eden, so I had some knowledge of the place and of the people. And although it was a farming community, as was the Kaw Valley of Kansas, it was a vastly different world. Around Lawrence and Eudora things and people were as much urban as rural, not at all the usual stereotype of country people. Berger, particularly around Bethany Church, was very definitely and exclusively rural. I wasn't at all sure I would like Berger, but I had to start somewhere. So this too was on my mind that day.
June 27 was a Sunday. The Ordination service would be that evening at St. Paul's Church in Eudora. Uncle Adolph Stoerker and Aunt Marie, with their daughter Joanne (now Kleuter), were there at the farm house from Aurora, Illinois, where he was pastor. Uncle Adolph was on vacation, and they were visiting my mother. Also there was Rev. Myron Ross, a friend from Eden (black) who had been ordained a year earlier. He was not yet married.
Uncle Fred Stoerker, pastor of Zion Church in St. Joseph, Missouri, and Aunt Hilda would come in that afternoon. He was to

Page 610

be the ordaining pastor. They would be bringing with them his student assistant for the summer, Lorenz ("Ike") Eichenlaub, another old friend from Eden who would be ordained two years later.
Rev. Karl Baur and his wife, Betty, would come from Kansas City in time for the service. Karl Baur had been pastor at Eudora during my teen years, and I had dated his daughter, Joan, who was now married and would not be with them.
Dr. Harold Barr, Dean of the School of Religion at Kansas University, was to be the preacher at the service. He only had to come from Lawrence so he would go directly to the church.
Rev. James McAllister, my roommate my Senior year at Eden, was also scheduled to be there but couldn't make it. He was a Methodist, and he was transferred to Roodhouse, Illinois, from Payson, Illinois, that week. So he was busy moving.
All the ministers mentioned above would participate in the Ordination service, along with Rev. Joseph Polster who was pastor in Eudora at the time. Rev. Polster was a half-educated, boorish, obnoxious man for whom I had little use, but as pastor of the church he could not simply be left out and ignored.
We went to church that morning as usual. It wasn't long before it became obvious that this was going to be a very hot day - and it would remain hot into the evening.
There was a lot of picture taking that afternoon. St. Paul's Church had given me a pulpit robe (Not the one I now have. That one long since wore out), and there was a lot of posing in it for the benefit of other people's cameras, I would wear the robe that evening at the service.
My mother continued with preparations for a reception at the house after the service that evening. With a large front porch and a large lawn on a summer evening, space was no problem.
The service was splendid. Dr. Barr was at his preaching best. Rev. Polster behaved himself. I was afraid he might decide to say "a. few words" somewhere along the line (something he could do with embarrassing frequency, and when he did so it usually was a display of ignorance).
When the time came for my formal Ordination, Uncle Fred called me forth and I stood before him. Uncle Fred was flanked by Uncle Adolph, Rev. Baur, Rev. Ross, Rev. Barr, and Rev. Polster. Uncle Fred asked me, and I accepted, the vows of service to God and to the Church. I then knelt for the laying


Page 611


on of hands. Uncle Fred's hand was on my head, and the hands of the others were on top of his. Uncle Fred then pronounced the words of Ordination.
I then rose and accepted the hand of fellowship and collegiality from each of the ordained pastors before me. I was one of them now. I said a few words of appreciation to them and to the assembled congregation, pronounced the benediction (my first official act as an ordained pastor), and the service ended.
     I was very moved by it all, a highlight of my life.
The church was nearly full. St. Paul's congregation had turned out in force for me, only the second son of the congregation ever to be ordained. (Rev. Carl Schmidt was the other one a good many years earlier.) Other friends and relatives were there too. Among them was a surprise - Rev. Theodore Hauck from Higginsville, Missouri, who had baptized me years before when he was pastor of St. Paul's. He had arrived a little late, and we didn't know he was there or we would have asked him to participate in the Ordination.
A good many of them were at the house afterward for the reception, including Uncle Carl Altenbernd and Aunt Mattie, cousins of mine - Homer and Charlotte Altenbernd, Herb and Peggy Altenbernd, Helen and Al Wichman, Irene and John Vogel, and Frieda and Arthur Heck. There was also my father's hired hand when I was a boy, Oscar Russell. He was an old man by then, and I hadn't seen him in years.
     I wished my father had lived long enough to have been there.
There was only one negative note in the whole thing. Connie Peters had said she would drive down for the Ordination. I was expecting her. But she neither showed nor called. That hurt a bit.


* * * * * * * * * * *

I was the second son of St. Paul's Church to enter the ministry. Carl Schmidt, brother of Ralph Schmidt, had been ordained in 1930.


( at St Paul's Church, Eudora, Douglas County, Kansas, USA, on 27 June 1955.)5
     Herbert William Altenbernd, an unknown person 's child, resided with an unknown person Route 2, at Lawrence, Douglas County, Kansas, USA, in November 1991.
     Herbert died on 20 March 1999 in Lawrence, Douglas County, Kansas, USA, at age 83.2,3 He was buried after 20 March 1999 Pleasant Hill Cemetery, Pleasant Grove, Douglas County, Kansas, USA, at.6
Helen and Herb Altenbernd Headstone
Pleasant Hill Cemetry
Pleasant Grove, Kansas
Herb Altenbernd Headstone
Pleasant Hill Cemetry
Pleasant Grove, Kansas
Last Edited=4 September 2023

Family: Herbert William Altenbernd and Helen Marie Daniels

Citations

  1. [S13] Kerry Deane Altenbernd unknown date.
  2. [S14] SSDI, unknown file number, Social Security Death Index, unknown series (www.ancestry.com: Ancestry, 1995) . Hereinafter cited as Social Security Death Index.
  3. [S223] Penny Lynn Altenbernd, "Mahon (#166), Penny - Guest Book Entry," e-mail message (1900 W. 73rd. St. Prairie Village, Ks 66208) to Sheila Sue Altenbernd, 06-29-2004. Hereinafter cited as "Mahon (#166), Penny - Guest Book Entry".
  4. [S25] John Stoerker Altenbernd unknown date.
  5. [S1410] John Stoerker Altenbernd,"Ordination Day" in ME; Page(s) 609-611; Published:.
  6. [S1765] Unknown repository address, Herb Altenbernd (#100) Cemetery Marker, Pleasant Hill Cemetery, Pleasant Grove, Kansas;. (DOCUMENT SOURCE NUMBER: 00100-1999-00-00-01).