Kieffer, John P. 1850-1912

KIEFFER, GLODEN, LLOYD, BROTHERTON, HUGHES

Posted By: Linda Mohning (email)
Date: 3/21/2012 at 11:51:33

DEATH BY HIS OWN HAND. J.P. KIEFFER, PUBLISHER OF REMSEN BELL, SHOOTS SELF. GAVE WAY TO FIT OF DESPONDENCY. His Body Was Found in a Room Above His Printing Office on Sunday Morning by Herman Koch, One of His Employees.
J. P. Kieffer, editor and publisher of the Remsen Bell-Enterprise, committed suicide on Saturday night by shooting himself through the head.
The act was surrounded by dramatic circumstances in keeping with the character of the man.
The community in which he lived so long and was so well known was startled and shocked by the news which was noised abroad on Sunday.
Fully clothed with cap, overshoes and overcoat, seated at a table in an upstairs room over his printing establishment his body was found cold and lifeless about half past eight on Sunday morning by one of his employees, Herman Koch, who came round to the office to attend to the fire. Koch noticed the blood which had dripped through the floor and ceiling to the office beneath.
The weapon with which Kieffer killed himself was a 32 calibre revolver, the bullet entering the right eye and coming out at the top of his head. The bullet was subsequently found in the ceiling of the room. On the table where he destroyed himself were found some letters and notes which show on perusal that they had been written by a person suffering from a great mental strain. Letters were found addressed to his son, George Kieffer, of Soldier, Iowa; his son-in-law, Clarence Brotherton, a lumber man in Remsen and one to his old time friend, John Beely. The last letter is as follows:
Remsen, Iowa, Mar. 2, 1912.
John Beely: I feel that you are here on this sad mission. Tell them to put me into a cheap coffin and to bury me very soon. I know you are a Christian. If you can find a minister of the church to say a prayer at my coffin, please let him do it. The Divine Saviour on the cross pardoned the repenting sinner at his side, is there such charity on earth now?
You may wonder why that flag is with me. I love it, yes, I do love it. But I have betrayed it. I have it here to feel its touch which gives me courage in my work. It makes me remember the command of the great general who said: “If anyone tears down that flag, shoot him on the spot.” I must be shot. Farewell, God help me!
A number of notes were found which evidently showed the unfortunate man’s mind was deranged. Some of them were torn. One note was written at ten o’clock in which he spoke of nerving himself to the dread act. Another note said, “I must have courage at 11 o’clock,” and still another at 11:30 which said the roller rink across the street bothered him.
It was between half past eleven and twelve as near as can be ascertained that the fatal shot was fired.
Mr. Kieffer was around on Saturday as usual attending to his business and seemed apparently in his usual cheerful frame of mind. In the evening he was visiting around town with friends and was at one of the billiard halls and played a game of cards with his friend, M. Kennedy, who left him about ten o’clock. The room in which he died was occupied by Leo Ruck, of this city, who works in the Bell-Enterprise office. Mr. Ruck came over to Le Mars on Saturday to visit relatives over Sunday.
That the act was committed while Mr. Kieffer was suffering from mental derangement is the conclusion arrived at by those who knew and understood best the dead man.
Though always of a sanguine temperament, it is learned that recently he complained to his wife and friends of having a pain in his head and of not having any appetite.
As far as known his financial circumstances were good. He had a comfortable business, which netted him a good income and his domestic relations were most happy. That something, although what is not known, was preying on his mind, in the light of after events, is apparent to those with whom he was in closer touch. This had been noticed for the past four weeks. That he had brooded over the momentous act is thought by some. The Saturday previous to the Saturday on which he shot h8imself he remained alone all night in the room in which he died. On leaving a friend that night it is reported that he said, “Well, good bye, this the last time you will see me.” His friend took it as a joke and on seeing Kieffer the following Monday joked about it. Kieffer answered, “The gun failed to work.”
In one of his pockets after his death was found a bottle strychaine which he purchased a week before his death.
County Coroner John Beely and Nis Wiltgen, of this city, were summoned to Remsen on Sunday. The coroner in view of the fact that it was a self confessed suicide, did not hold any inquest. The relatives living away were immediately notified of the sad affair.
John P. Kieffer was a native of the grand duchy of Luxemburg in Europe, where he was born at Senningen in 1850. He received a good education at a Jesuit seminary in his native land and acquired the grounding which stood him in stead and put him in the way of acquiring a fund of general information which proved useful in after life. When a youth in his teens he came to America to seek his fortune. He lived in Dubuque and later at Bellevue. At the latter place he engaged in the newspaper business, which became his life work. After being in this country a short time he went back to Luxemburg, where he was united in marriage with Miss Gloden, who has been his faithful helpmate for forty years.
Mr. Kieffer established “Der Herold”, a German newspaper, in Le Mars in 1882, and published it for two years. In 1884 Mat Wurth, of this city, organized and was head of the Globe Publishing company, which published the Globe, and “Der Herold” was published by the same company, Kieffer taking a share in the company and being editor of the German publication.
In 1887 Mr. Kieffer went to Remsen and started a newspaper, “Die Glocke,” which later became the Bell and was edited in English. In the latter nineties he sold the Bell to Ferd Reichman, now of Dallas, South Dakota, and went to Rock Island and Chicago, where he embarked in the newspaper business in both these places, but his ventures were not successful, and he returned to Remsen and took up his first love, buying back the Remsen Bell with which had been amalgamated in the meantime another newspaper, the Remsen Enterprise, which was published for a short time.
In his newspaper work Mr. Kieffer was preeminently successful along certain lines. He was a power in the eastern half of the county and a bulwark of the Democratic party, which he championed at all seasons with tongue and pen. He was a ready and incisive writer. Strong in his personal predilections he was wont at times to pen harsh things in the moil and toil of a heated political campaign, but his generous soul oft regretted and recalled expressions written on the spur of the moment. He was a royal booster for any cause he espoused and his name will endure in Remsen for to his ready and facile pen, his executive ability, unswerving loyalty to home institutions and persistent plea for better conditions is due in a great measure the fair fame in which the town of Remsen now stands among her sister cities.
His home life was supremely happy, he was a devoted husband and father, and his first and best thoughts were always for those nearest and dearest. He was of a cheerful and sunny disposition, loud voiced and cheery, with a hearty greeting for everybody. Apparently he took life as it came in a philosophic vein, and if he had troubles kept them to himself. He had his enemies and faults in common with other men, and in the course of his work and in political campaigns was embroiled in bitter quarrels. He was always willing to cast the mantle of charity over the sins and shortcomings of his fellow men and for himself asked no more, no less. He will be greatly missed in the community where he has been a central figure so long, and his friends trust that his dying prayer, written in the throes of black depression, maybe answered.
The deceased man leaves a widow and a grown up family of sons and daughters, who are Mrs. Ed Lloyd, Mrs. Clarence Brotherton, of Remsen; Mrs. P. Hughes, of Remsen township; Miss Annie Kieffer, principal of the Hinton schools; George Kieffer, banker of Soldier, Iowa, and Eugene Kieffer, who is studying journalism at Marquette Uinversity, Milwaukee.
The funeral will be held today at the home in Remsen at two o’clock.
The publication of the Remsen Bell and the conduct of the business will be continued by the sons and his daughter, Mrs. Lloyd. – Le Mars Semi-Weekly Sentinel, March 5, 1912, page 1.