Note by Phyllis Brown:  This information was typed by Margaret Klein Rose as dictated by Fred Klein, in the year 1971 when he was approximately 79 years of age.  Photos are from Ron Klein.  Additional information I have – George Klein’s parents were Jacob and Christina Klein.  George and Caroline were married October 25, 1881, in Tabor, Iowa.

Family History of George and Caroline Jungbluth Klein

George Klein was born December 27, 1850, in Darmstadt, Germany, and grew up there.  As a young man he worked in Frankfurt, not far away.  In his family there was an older brother, Henry, a sister and a younger brother, Andrew.  George’s father had a brother who had come to America, and who lived in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  In 1869 George’s father, who was a cabinetmaker, brought his family to the United States, aboard a sailing vessel.  About two weeks out at sea, they encountered a bad storm which lasted from 24 to 48 hours.  When calm was restored, the captain told those on board they had been blown back to where they were a week before.   The crossing took 24 days.

George was 18 years of age when he came to America and had completed school.  Had he remained in Germany, he would have had to go into the army.  His father could not find enough work in cabinet making so he and his older son, Henry, were carpenters, settling near Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  George went to the area of Boscobel, Fenimore and Lancaster, Wisconsin, where he met and married Caroline Jungbluth, probably in 1880.  George Klein’s father made a bureau as a wedding present for George and Caroline, which is in the possession of Fred Klein.

The parents of Caroline Jungbluth also came from Germany to the United States, but she was born in Boscobel, Wisconsin, October 11, 1859.  She had brothers named Fred, Pete and Henry, and another brother and sister who died in childhood.  Her father was killed when a horse kicked him.

George worked in a sawmill after his marriage.  While substituting for his boss in “offbearing” the planks, which required walking on a plank, he slipped and threw out his hand, cutting off all four fingers of his left hand in the saw.  After this accident he worked on a farm for a family  named Huenefeld.  When the Huenefelds moved to Nebraska he moved with them.  There were three Huenefeld brothers, two of whom were married and he worked for all three.  Two or three years after moving to Nebraska George had a chance to buy a relinquishment of a homestead three or four miles from the Huenefelds.  This homestead was located in Custer County, Stoptable Community, near Callaway, Nebraska (12 or 13 miles southwest of Callaway).  There they built a sod home.

George and Caroline’s two oldest children were born before they left Wisconsin.  Louis was born May 9, 1883, and Anne was born July 12, 1885.  The first child born in the sod house in Nebraska was Elle, born December 22, 1887.  The other children born to George and Caroline at this location were Edith, March 18, 1890; Frederick, September 17, 1892; George Arthur and Carl Henry (twins), October 14, 1894; Clara, December 18, 1899; and Lawrence, March 2, 1902.  Carl Henry, one of the twins died at 9 months of age of “summer complaint”.  The original sod house had three rooms, but another was added later.  About 1910 a frame house was built.  The youngest son Lawrence became ill with polio as a child, which caused him to be crippled all his life.

Louis, the oldest son was ten years older than Fred, the second son in the family.  When he was old enough, Louis worked out for other people, then married.  Since their father had lost the fingers of one hand, Fred was left to help at home with the farming.  He attended the Stoptable school through about the 5th grade.  In January 1912, Fred went to Tabor, Iowa to attend the Faith Home School.  He continued until entering the service on September 22, 1917, after World War I began.  He was 25 when he was drafted.

Fred’s service began at Camp Dodge, Des Moines, Iowa.  In 1918 he asked for a transfer to the quartermaster corps.  There was no opening in the machine shops where he hoped to be able to learn a trade, but he was assigned to the kitchen washing dishes.  The head cook gave him the opportunity to learn to be a cook and he was a cook until his discharge.

After getting out of the army Fred returned to Tabor.  His parents had moved to Tabor to educate Lawrence and Clara in the fall of 1914.  Fred resumed his studies in the fall of 1920 and graduated from the Faith Home School in the spring of 1921 at the age of 28.  (Clara also graduated from the Faith Home School and taught there for awhile after graduating.  Lawrence finished high school at Hamburg, Iowa.)

Fred met Fannie Yates at a camp meeting in Bellevue, Nebraska, although she was from rural Hamburg in Iowa.  They were married at the home of her parents on August 2, 1922.

Anna Klein married Joe Kasper.  She is now a widow and lives in Lancaster, Wisconsin, in the same area where she and her mother were born.

Elle Klein married Edward Black and had one daughter, Elva.

Edith Klein Ritchey lives in Fairmont Nebraska.  Her husband, Frank, died in 1970.  By her first husband Edith had a daughter, Lucille.  By Frank, she had the following children:  Arthur who lives at Geneva, Nebraska; Mildred who lives in California; Helen who lives near York, Nebraska; Myrna and Merlin, who is the youngest.  Another daughter, Vivian (Mrs. Rex Brown), was killed in an auto accident in May 1968 while she and her family were on furlough from the mission field.

George Klein, Jr., lives in Lexington, Nebraska.  His wife’s name was Minnie, but she is no longer living.  They had at least five children.

Clara Klein was married first to Harry Loomis.  After he died she married Clyde Powell.  They live in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.  Clara had no children.

Lawrence Klein was married to Billie Haun of Hamburg, Iowa.  She died of tuberculosis in 1941.  They had no children.

George Klein died September 23, 1924, at the age of 73 at Tabor, Iowa, where he is buried.  Caroline Jungbluth Klein died on June 26, 1943, in Hamburg, at the age of 83 and is also buried at Tabor.