In the 1960s, my husband, Gerry Lenzen, and I began working on our family history.
After a visit with the Minnesota and Wisconsin relatives one summer, Gerry's parents gave him a copy of the John Joseph Schumacher family book. It was compiled by a Comfrey, Minnesota cousin. It contained names and dates, and a few family stories.
Both Gerry and I were disturbed that little was said about Joseph's wife. Her name was given as Theresia Huiras, and the names of her parents were given, but nothing about who she was. We decided to do something about that.
Over the next twenty years, we researched the Huiras name and found that it seemed to be a rather uncommon one. In fact, each branch seemed to think they were the only ones left. After several on-site visits and correspondence and research, we began to accumulate a pile of materials. Gerry's parents visited even more relatives and brought home photos and vital information. It got to the point where we knew we had to do something with the material. So, we decided to write a book.
We started with Theresia (Huiras) Schumacher. She had nine children, and most of them had children (lots of them), and most of her grandchildren had children (lots of them). When we finished the Theresia book in 1986, we found it was 200 pages long. We then set out to write a book about each of Theresia's siblings - all seven of them. The final product was eight books, all published in hard bound covers, and all copyrighted.
It is now almost a generation later. People are still asking for copies of the books, but we sold out the Theresia book and the Catherine book. We have a few copies of the other books. Will we reprint the books? At this point, we aren't planning on doing it. If someone wants to continue the project, we will be glad to talk to them about sharing our information. (Just don't steal it - the books are under copyright.) For information about the books, click here.