Ancestry of Sheila Altenbernd A trip into the past.....(Akers, Altenbernd, Atkinson, Braun, Dudley, Elert, Herrell, Martin, Miller, Reeder, Reidy, Shannahan, Stoerker)

Marie L. Otto¹

F, #121, b. 2 May 1899, d. 21 March 1988

Charts: Peter Jacob Braun Descendands
John Elert Descendants
Jost. Fried. Stoerker Descendants

Marie Stoerker

Marie was born in Indiana, USA, on 2 May 1899.^2,3,4,5 Other sources show Marie L. Otto was born on 2 May 1898 Newburgh, Indiana, USA.⁶
Adolph Stoerker married Marie L. Otto, in Dayton, Montgomery County, Ohio, USA, on 6 July 1923.^7,6

Adolph and Marie Stoerker on their wedding day

Story of Elopement
Told by Marie Stoerker
July 5, 1987

Marie, as Adolph Stoerker's wife, resided with him 4715 Main Ave, at Norwood, Hamilton County, Ohio, USA, in May 1924.³

Photo of Marie Stoerker. Original photo in the possession of Sue Myers (#130.)

Marie Stoerker

They resided at Flat 2, 4715 Montgomery Avenue, Norwood, Hamilton County, Ohio, USA, in 1928.⁸
Marie L. Stoerker was mentioned in a lettter sent by Adolph Stoerker residing at Gary, Indiana, USA, to Flora Altenbernd and William John Altenbernd on 10 February 1935.

FIRST EVANGELICAL CHURCH
464 ROOSEVELT STREET
GARY, INDIANA

February 10, 1935.

Dear Flora and Bill:-

You will perhaps be much surprised to get a letter from me. It has been so long in the making that I'll be greatly surprised myself if I finally succeed in getting it written. Many times since my delightful days with you last summer have I wished myself back again. And often have my intentions been to write you how much I really enjoyed being with you and thank you again for the many kindnesses shown. But when one gets back to work and the fall and winter work needs to be planned - for two places and there's not much to plan with - then there are always many things that I neglect. Writing is one of them - and so I beg to be excused for this long silence.

Have often wondered how the turnips came out and whether the rye Bill was going to plant made some feed for the stock? - The Indiana farmers around here had very late pastures and so did not have to start feeding until late in fall. And then there were lots of soy beans everywhere and also corn fodder. So they fared much better this winter. Nearly every farmer has a dairy herd and gets a milk check every two weeks. Butter is 44 cents a pound and eggs 40 cents a dozen. Milk 12 cents a quart. Bacon 30 cents per pound. -- So prices are double what they were 18 months ago. But wages in the Steel mills here are not quite half what they were 3 or 4 years ago. And that gives most people a bare existence. So you can figure out for yourself why people here have no money to spare even tho they may be working full time. --- I have an opportunity here to watch both the industrial workers and farmers - and in a year or two I believe the farmers of this community will be far ahead of those who work in the city. And its about time that the farmers get fair play. Their products keep the nation alive.

Well, I guess Fred is in his glory now. I haven't heard a word from him but heard from mother that they had moved to St. Joseph. That's the biggest and most prosperous church in the West Missouri District. I don't ever hope to be in line for that size job. A smaller group appeals to me better. And I'm not such a great preacher anyhow. So if there is to be any greatness on my part I'll have to find it in being of service.

J. J. Braun is going to be here Thursday this week to study the Gary mission with me. I have surveyed the community and sent in my report. In response they're coming here to investigate my findings. That's what I have been hoping for some time. There is not much hope for a future church here since the population is so transient. There is a Reformed Church 9 blocks away farther towards the city. And since the bottom has dropped out of the finances here with little hopes of a substantial increase for some years I feel that an adjustment of some kind will be made offer the Mission Board gets thru checking on Thursday.

Joanne and I were home over New Year's. Mother was surprised to see us. As usual glad to have us come. She seems to be doing quite well. I sometimes wish I were closer home but guess I'll have to be satisfied where I am and with what I've got.

The box you had Santa Claus deliver here at Christmas time was much enjoyed by all. The cookies were a treat. Why do somebody else's cookies always taste better?!!! Sonny liked his pencil. You know he was 9 years of age the 24th of last month. And he's reading, writing, drawing etc. So the pencil was just the thing. And Joanne with her handkerchiefs --- was she proud? She's just like her mother. Hasn't ever got enough things to wear or should I say too many things to wear. Thanks a lot for everything!

Next Sunday the Elmhurst Girls' Sextette will present a musical program at the vesper service at the Gary Christian Church. Mr. Hille will play several organ selections. Rev. Schuster and I are jointly arranging this. We expect to have the group here for lunch after the service. So Marie has started to get the house in order for the occasion. And also for the visit of honorable J.J. Braun.

Received Bill's card from St. Charles last fall. Glad he got the cigars in good shape. They sure put them out by the boxes at the Fair last summer. And say - if I had been at home when you were there Bill would have had company at the World's Series games.

How's that big boy of yours? Keeping you going no doubt. You'll have a better chance raising him there than in the city. This town of Gary isn't very desirable for raising children. The Gary school system may be famous but that doesn't tell the story.

Now I've about had my say. I'm not a very good typist so you will have to make some allowance. Perhaps I will do better next time.
Let us hear from you again when you feel that you can take time.
With kindest regards to all of you,
Sincerely
Adolph & co,

P.S. Sonny and Joanne send special greetings to John and invite him over to play!⁹

Photo of Adolph, Marie, Marian, and JoAnne Stoerker. Original photo in the possession of Sue Myers (#130.)

Adolph, Marie, Marian, and JoAnne Stoerker

Marie L. Stoerker was mentioned in a lettter sent by Adolph Stoerker residing at Aurora, Kane County, Illinois, USA, to Flora Altenbernd on 23 November 1948.

November 23, 1948

Dear Flora:-
Let me again thank you for being so very good to Sonny and. myself during our short stay with you. I was uneasy and restless while I was away because I left in the thick of work. However I did not want to see Sonny disappointed entirely to have someone come to Denver to meet him halfway. So I went. And now I feel that I might have been led to make the trip. For I had a good visit with you, got to see Alma before her departure, saw Theo and Frieda, and proved to be instrumental in sending help to all of you in getting Josie to go to Blue Springs. I had made up my mind that she or Marie had to go. But I am glad that Josie went because I feel that she can do a better job since Alma feels closer to her. I was so glad when she said that she would go.

Sorry that you were out when I called you Friday night. I just wanted you to know that help was coming.

Here is the address which I promised to send: Eden Cemetery Association, 9851 Irving Park Boulevard, Shiller Park, Illinois. Rev. Paul Stoerker, Secretary. Please write to him again. He needs some reminders so that he will meet some of his long neglected obligations.

You can be proud of John. He is a fine young gentleman and will make a very promising preacher.

Wishing you both blessings for health and strength!

Sincerely, your brother
Adolph.¹⁰

Marie L. Stoerker witnessed the of Adolph Stoerker and Flora Altenbernd on 2 August 1953.¹¹

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

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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.)¹²

Photo of Julia, Theo, Frieda, Adolph, and Marie Stoerker on 21 August 1957 in St James, Missouri, USA. Original photo in the possession of Sheila Altenbernd (#172.)¹³

Julia, Theo, Frieda, Adolph, and Marie Stoerker -- August 21, 1957 -- St James, Missouri

The following item appeared in September 1962

BEST WISHES TO THE STOERKERS
Pastor and Mrs. Adolph Stoerker came to us in the middle of July, 1959. Since that time the Stoerkers have endeared themselves to all of us. Pastor Stoerker took a trip to the Holy Land, which seemd to enrich his ministry. He has preached both sermons one Sunday each month, on all Sundays when Pastor Rest was on vacation, the children's sermon when he wasn't delivering the regular sermon, made innumerable calls on the sick and shut-in members and friends, given pastoral leadership to committees and organizations in which he was pastoral advisor, and served as an Associate Pastor in an all-around way. He was very well liked among us. Or regret in seeing him leave is softened a bit by the knowledge that he will be very close to us -- in Henderson Ky. Mabe he will be able to supply the pulpit here occasionally, or lead in the German Services in the chapel; maybe we can take car loads of people over there for a brotherhood or women 's guild joint meeting of one kind or another. We will be looking toward Henderson with confidence. Their future should be brighter because of his coming. His first Sunday in their pulpit will be Sept. 16th. His final sermon here as Associate Pastor will be on Sept 9.
A farewell covered dish dinner and program is being planned before his departure on Sept. 9, in the evening starting at 6 p.m. Bring a covered dish. The evening should be a memorable evening in the life of St Paul's Church.¹⁴

They resided in Henderson, Henderson County, Kentucky, USA, on 16 September 1962.¹⁴
(an unknown value) in 1979.¹⁵

Marie Stoerker Playing For Sonny
Comments Up To Moving Day
July1979
Side 1

Marie Stoerker Playing For Sonny
Comments Up To Moving Day
July1979
Side 2

She resided in Port Charlotte, Charlotte County, Florida, USA, on 21 March 1988.⁵
Marie died on 21 March 1988 at St Joseph Hospital, Port Charlotte, Charlotte County, Florida, USA, at age 88.^16,2,4,5 Other sources indicate Marie died in 1987.¹⁷ She was buried on 25 March 1988 St John's Cemetery, St Charles, St Charles County, Missouri, USA, at. Marie is buried in lot number 186B.^16,18

Other sources indicate Marie L. Otto was buried in 1987.¹⁷
The following item appeared in the St Charles Post, St Charles, St Charles County, Missouri, USA, on 23 March 1988

Marie L. Stoerker Of Port Charlotte, Fla.
A private service for Marie L. Stoerker, 88, of Port Charlotte, Fla., and formerly of St. Charles, will be held Friday at Baue Funeral Home, 620 Jefferson Street, St. Charles. Burial will follow in St. John United Church of Christ Cemetery, Fifth and Jackson streets, St. Charles.
Mrs. Stoerker died Monday at St. Joseph Hospital in Port Charlotte.
Surviving are a son, Marion Stoerker of Bristol, Ill; a daughter, Joanne Klueter of Highland, Ill; a brother, Oscar Otto of Englewood, Fla; three grandchildren; and one great grandchild.
Memorials may be made to Parkside Meadows Nursing Home in care of Baue Funeral Home.

Last Edited=17 December 2023

Child of Marie L. Otto and Adolph Stoerker

Earl Conrad Stoerker³ b. 13 May 1924, d. 14 May 1924

Citations

[S7] SSDI, unknown file number, Social Security Death Index (SSDI), unknown series (n.p.: Ancestry) . Hereinafter cited as SSDI.
[S189] Arthur Theodore Tiedemann unknown date.
[S649] Earl Conrad Stoerker (#1998), Death Certificate file no. 76 registration no. 28815 (May 15, 1924), unknown repository, unknown repository address . Hereinafter cited as Death Registration.
[S245] St Charles, Missouri, USA, in, Adolph STOERKER (65) and Marie Stoerker (121) Cemetery Marker, Stoerker, Adolph (#65) -- Cemetery Marker; READ BY Sheila Sue Altenbernd, ON September 1993.
[S1246] Marie Stoerker (#121), 262-41-1177, Ancestry SSDI, U.S., Social Security Death Index, 1935-2014 (Provo, Utah, USA: Ancestry, May 15, 2016) (Document Source Number: 00121-1988-03-21-01). Hereinafter cited as SSDI.
[S1645] John Klueter (#193) May 23, 2022 (Document Source Number: 00193-2022-05-23-01).
[S75] Marion Adolph Stoerker unknown date.
[S515] Norwood, Ohio City Directory (n.p.: n.pub., 1928), Page 432. Viewed at www.ancestry.com. Hereinafter cited as City Directory.
[S1640] Letter from Adolph Stoerker (#65) (Gary, Indiana) to Flora Altenbernd (#63) February 10, 1935. (1935). (Document Source Number: 00065-1935-02-10-01).
[S1638] Letter from Adolph Stoerker (#65) (301 Fifth Street, Aurora, Illinois) to Flora Altenbernd (#63) November 23, 1948. (1948). (Document Source Number: 00065-1948-11-23-01).
[S1643] Letter from Adolph Stoerker (#65)to Flora Altenbernd (#63) August 2, 1953. (1953). (Document Source Number: 00065-1953-08-02-01).
[S1410] John Stoerker Altenbernd,"Ordination Day" in ME; Page(s) 609-611; Published:.
[S88] Flora Stoerker unknown date.
[S1637] Adolph Stoerker (#65) BEST WISHES TO THE STOERKERS, unknown newspaper title, unknown location, September 1962 (Document Source Number: 00065-1962-09-00-01).
[S1864] Jean Zay 2023 (Document Source Number: 00194-2023-00-00-01).
[S177] Unknown name of person Obituary, St. Charles Post, St Charles, Missouri, March 23, 1988 . Hereinafter cited as St. Charles Post.
[S142] Letter from Caretaker at St. John's Cemetery (unknown author address) to Sheila Altenbernd (#172) (unknown recipient address); unknown repository (unknown repository address).
[S830] Letter from Wilber Staggemeier (St Charles, Missouri) to Sheila Altenbernd (#172) July 27, 1992.