Johann Gerhard Janning, 1899 Biography

JANNING, PULZ, ROTH SCHENKELBERG, AUGUSTIN

Posted By: David Reineke (email)
Date: 2/28/2006 at 23:39:06

I translated the following biography from Der Carroll Demokrat, a German-language newspaper published in Carroll, Iowa, between about 1874 and 1920. It was originally published in a special 25th Anniversary Edition of the paper on Friday, 20 September 1899. Information in brackets and notes at the end are my own explanations. It reads as follows:

Joh. Ger. Janning [Johann Gerhard Janning]

This man is also an old pioneer of Kniest Township and has lived and owned land there now for 29 years. Mr. Joh. G. Janning was born on 1 February 1831 in Bramsche, District of Lingen, Province of Hanover. In the spring of 1861, he came to America and made his way first to Grant County, Wisconsin, where he worked on farms for five years and farmed for himself on a rented farm for four years. In September of 1866, he married Miss Anna Pulz, but his wife died just the following year. On 28 April 1868, he married Miss Barbara Roth, and in 1870 the young couple moved to Kniest Township, Carroll County, Iowa, where they purchased an 80-acre parcel of land. From time to time, the hard-working and industrious landowner expanded his real estate, so that today he owns a farm of 280 acres of the finest land. Ten children were the fruits of this happy marriage: Anna Maria, Mrs. Wm. Schenkelberg; Johann Anton, married to Miss Louise Augustin; George; Franz; Bernhard; Heinrich; Barbara; Katharina; Elisabeth; and Anna.