Schaffner Clan History

The Schaffner Clan as I remember it. Maybe by mind is getting hazy as my body gets wobbly, but I did the best I could I am 87 years old-

Charlotte August Forbes Schaffner

PS. If some one adds to this account, I wonder what will be said about Aunt Daisy. I can remember some pretty petty disagreeable quirks in my disposition.

Transcribed by Vann Schaffner from photocopy of handwritten notes, a work in progress

July 25, 1965

Sixty two years ago today, I married Daniel Cornelius Schaffner at Kenneybunk Maine, where I was staying with my dear friend Inez Whitcomb and her husband. We were married in the beautiful old (maybe 200 year old) Unitarian Church. Afterward Dan and I drove to the beach at Kenneybunkport (we usually walked) and he swam in the cold ocean and got a chill. Regular shore dinner [?]. Just Inez and a girlfriend of hers were at the wedding. My sister Elizabeth came later in the day from Springfield Mass. Slow train service.

Ivan Roenigk is responsible for this account. I am the last of the older generation and have lived to be 87 last March.

We went to Boston for a couple of days. I bought a wash-dress and ordered it sent to Charlotte Forbes, to Dan’s amusement. We went to Portland Maine, by boat, by train to Bradford Vt. to visit my uncle Pling [?] Crafts and Aunt Annette. We arrived in Topeka, a scorching hot day in August, the like of which I had never seen. We rode the Rock Island to Morganville, arriving at midnight. Jim Purvis, the renter who occupied part of the house, met us and drove us to the farm, four miles. Believe we were the last ones over the bridge as the river went around or washed it out before moving. The only person to get out of bed was Anna, who embraced me. I was afraid to meet her, with her brains.

Meet the family-Next day was Sunday, Hot! We slept (?) upstairs in low ceiling front room, with one small window. Had to shut the door to be modest. Everybody had to go to church; I had to dress up in a suit. Being an Episcopalian I have never seen people visit in church, so after the service (2 p.m.) I just walked out. People thought that was uppity and Dan had to apologize for me and tell me the way it was done in the country. .

The whole clan came “home” to look me over. Lizzie, Richard, Daniel Julius and Anna Marie; Barbara and Fred Gerber with Annetta, a babe-in-arms. Staying at the farm Pa and Ma Schaffner, Anna, John and Mable, Dan and “Daisy” as my husband called me because I went into ecstasy over a field of those weeds. What I remember best of the swarm of near relatives is two black-eyed little boys hanging on white picket gate and staring. Had on red shirts with white polka dots. What a crowd to feed.

Daniel Schaffner senior was born in Effingen Canton Aargon, June 11, 1833 [1802, according to ancestry.com entry, which makes more sense with Daniel Jr. born in 1833]. Died on the Schaffner farm 1884 and is buried in the family plot. Has slender pyramid for a marker. His wife died in Switzerland in 1846, Barbara Weible. Left 5 children. Widower migrated to Ohio-Tennessee-Kansas. He owned the 130A kitty corner to the home place. [according to Margaret (aka Pete) Schaffner Idhe made their way by singing on boats, Ohio, Tennesee, Kansas][according to note on back of pic, emigrated in 1848 with three boys]

Daniel [Schaffner] Jr.-Really died at Roenigks.

The Schaffner’s started the Presbyterian Church, and it kept going as long as Lizzie was there to nurse it. She was [illegible p 4] from the church. Now no parsonage, no church, cemetary stays put. My husband attended the Methodist Church in Morganville and said most of the congregation was made up of Presbyterians who had moved to town. Like Richard Roenigks-

The Swiss are marvelous people, keen brains, aptitude for languages.

The Schaffners endured prairie fires, grasshopper plague, too much rain, too little rain and, cold and heat.

Pa was set in his ways, but Anna said “If I have a year, I can get Pa to do anything.”

Daniel Schaffner Jr. 10/11/1833-2/9/1915

He was always “Junior”, although his father had been dead for years. A small, rather slight build, white short beard. An extremely keen mind. He interposed Deuch [sic] words with English. He and ma often spoke German to each other. His blessing at the table was always “Komm Herr Jesu, sei unser gast und segne uns und was du [illegible] beschert hast.” (Was also Fred Gerber’s grace.) He had been born in Effingen canton Aargau Switzerland, in a house built in 1722 and still standing. I think farming was of second interest to him. He loved to read, whispering the English words, absolutely lost to the world. Once he was reading and neighbor Furrer [?] came to ask to borrow the jump-seat to meet relatives who were coming by train, as their buggy was one seated. He spoke loud and clearly and Pa came to the surface to say Ya, Ya, and went on reading and later knew nothing of the request nor his answer.

My first encounter with Pa was when I came down the stairs which ended in a room where Pa was dressing for church. He was starting to pull up his pants. “Never mind, no harm done.”

After sundown the day of Ma’s funeral, he wanted John and Dan and me to Bloom Cemetery to stand by the flower covered grave. With a sob in his voice he said in German, “The best part of her has gone up there.” No moping or outward grief.

He love history, read and remembered it. He was surprised that is sons had been to college and did not remember some event that was as plain to him as if he had lived it. He was proud of his children. Who wouldn’t be. At a church picnic, he carried my Daniel around, proud as huffy [sic]. Lizzie “what’s the matter with you? You have six other grandchildren.” “Ya, Ya but Dan-i-el (3 syllables, [umlaut]) is a Schaffner [umlaut]. Char is not worth raising, nothing but a girl. Martha is too cute [?] to be a girl.” After repeated statements I said “Then we will call her Pete”. He got a bad cough in the coal mines in Ohio. Black cough. Stopped smoking and come to pure air of [illegible]. He had occasional attacks of asthma. In the summer of July 25 (+/-) 1914 he had a stroke and fell behind the smokehouse (his outhouse). John was there, but we had taken a picnic supper to river for our wedding anniversary. Pa declared he got sick from “Swartz ice cream Daisy fed him”. He had an aversion to all black food.

D.S [Daniel Schaffner]

He had dumped a 2 qt. jar of spiced peaches, because there were swartz specks in it.

Mother Schaffner told me once that she had given birth to twins, while all alone. Both died. Seems to me it was not the first babies, but may have been.

A.S. [Anna Miller (Mueller) Schaffner]

My second summer on the farm Ma got sick and died. In August she went to Topeka to attend the funeral of her sister Libby Tamblyu. John, Mabel, Anna were home, but they let Ma go alone. Daniel was 1 year old and I was left to keep house for the gang, plus a hired man (a C. of E. boy). Ma was gone 3 days and in that time her bowels did not move. She took a cathartic, which worked too well, she became very week, went into a coma and died after a couple of days. She dreaded dying alone. She had all her family there. Nice lady.

Anna Miller (Mueller) [Schaffner] September 12, 1830-August 22, 1905 (74) [Wife of Daniel Schaffner Jr. ]

A sweet quiet lady, light brown hair parted in the middle, bun at the neck. I liked her at once, and she told me the summer of 1905, “We could get along just fine,” so I was complimented. I felt very green, had never seen a fried chicken, but after she died I cooked 2 every day. Grandpa (Pa) was a help, he dressed the frier and picked the vegetables. Stonebacks [?] put in our garden several years, while Pa stayed at Merriden [?] with Barbara and family. We went as soon as college was “out”, he a little sooner.

Ma was as meek as Moses, but she told me how indignant she was when Pa supervised at the store how she spent her money for some calico, money that was her own, from her own chickens and eggs. She said she liked to have Mabel come to Kansas, but she wished she’d stay in Topeka. After John and Mabel had left bed-bugs upstairs. A mess and no good way to get rid of them. Burning sulphur?

Richard Roenigk was a keen observer and said what he thought, without reservation.
D. C. and I were delighted to have him say “Good-bye, come again. “. I don’t know only why he did not care for John Schaffner, but he told me that he said to John “If I ever want you and your family to visit us, I will invite you. But I never did.”

Anna thought all good life was to be found in “Chicaga” and she said to Richard if she had to live in Morganville, she would go crazy. When he told me he remarked “She has not far to go..” That was the year Gov. Landon ran against F.D.R. and she was sent here to campaign. She ranted against Landon, day after day while she stayed with us, practicing her speeches. I tried to calm her down. Landon was not the devil, and he grew liberal with age-

[Children of Daniel Schaffner Jr and Anna Miller/Mueller Schaffner: Mary Elizabeth, Barbara Louise, John Henry, Margaret Anna, Daniel Cornelius]
Lizzie (Mary Elizabeth) Roenigk 10/22/1860-11/20/42

Lizzie was the oldest child and sort of looked after the others. She treated me like a younger sister (18 yr. younger) but she always called me “Aunt Daisy”. We loved to visit her. William was 4 mo. older than our Daniel. She always beamed when we came. Such good food, quantities of it, so many different foods piled on the table. Each member of the family had his particular piece of chicken.

Richard and Lizzie had the first car in the family. That is, Richard had it. Our house was in the middle of 160 A, and we could ride with them to town if we met them on the road that ran by the farm. They brought Jean Sample to their home from Topeka, but were doubtful of the car being able to pull her suit case. Decide it would be all right if she carried the suit case in her lap. Lizzie was not like her mother, she always spoke her mind, sputtered. Never heard an unkind word about anyone except one man, a no-good drunkard. She made friends easily, and the fall before she died tried to call on every family in Morganville.

Barbara was the swiftest most efficient worker I ever saw. When she counted eggs she would pick up 3 in each hand at once, do it twice and she had a dozen. She died of abdominal cancer. Poor Barbara.

11/30/1862-5/3/1922
Barbara Louise [Schaffner] Gerber.

A wide-awake pleasant lady with dark eyes-striking looking. Competent. Married to Fred Gerber, a smart Switzer, who could holler louder than anyone else I ever heard. Apparently she had an even temperament. I never heard her raise her voice in anger, she just put up with the antics of her two sons, John and Ernest whom she called “the little stinkers.” (Shocked me)

She and Fred made dried beef, like Pa’s and cheese, the most delicious I ever tasted.

Three bright good-looking children. Fred sent “S. Johnny” after the cows and the little stinkers saw some bugs going across the path, watched them, forgot all about the cows. That was at their farm in Meriden.

Johnny and Ernest were little boys when they walk from this farm in Clay Co. [?] to visit the Roenigk cousins. “That was a wide walk,” commented Ernest. Parents spoke mostly German at home.

Barbara and Lizzie taught school and worked to help younger three go to college. D.C. told me after we were married that he owed $1000. If I’d know that before, I’d not have married him.

John Henry Schaffner
July 7, 1866-January 27, 1939

This is the member of the family known among botanists all over the world for his work in cytology and genes and heredity. He was a born teacher, and once when he and D.C. were talking over my head, John said “Sit down Daisy and I will show you.” With pencil and paper he made a chart and explained in plain English; and all was plain. He was beloved by my children for he could make toys and do tricks and recite jingles. He practically built the house on his farm, the farm that belonged to his grandfather and is how owned by his son Jim. His brother Dan farmed it then,-just wheat. John used to get to the farm by July 7, his birthday and wanted (and had) an elderberry pie, probably because he remembered the days before the farm produced apples, peaches, berries. He must have been idolized by his students for one graduate student says he is the most Christlike man she ever knew. She was with him just before class one day when he had a heart attack, from which he soon recovered consciousness, and never mentioned it at home.

He had three wives, Mabel, Mary and Cordelia.

[in the margin]Grandfather homesteaded one farm, Po [?] the other.
J.H.S

Mabel was rather small, big brown eyes, whom he must have married soon after graduation from Baker U. She was barely married when she heard son in-law say that John’s career was ruined, he would never be able to go on encumbered by a family. She resolved to help, not hinder. And she did, nobly, even to buying his clothes and checking baggage fro the trip home. And she was invaluable in the lab. She helped with the experiments and made exquisite drawings to illustrate his papers. the list of his published papers takes 10 pages of close print, big pages. Mabel died of a uterine hemorrhage in May 1906 (?). John was absolutely bereft that summer, almost sick.

Then he met Mary Morton Semple at church and became engaged. He went to Europe to study, found the German botanists did not know what he was doing in botany so he went on to Zurich, where he was able to give talks in German. He did not get his Ph.D, never did. Came home to take over as head of department and to marry Mary. She had a daughter Jean; had buried here husband after a tragic illness-syphilis. Mary was a lovely character, but not subservient.[sic] The first evening on the farm John wanted to go on a twilight walk. “Not until I help Daisy with the dishes,” John “I did not bring you out here to work!” The next morning John’s egg was not boiled to suit him (he knew exactly how it was to be done, but would not demonstrate). “Eat it anyway; It will be good for you. He did. He soon took her to the cemetery where Mabel was buried. Soon he took her to visit Lizzie and got a book of poems he had written to Mabel, and read them to her. He never adjusted to Jean and she grew to loathe him. Mary had supported herself and Jean by serving as a dressmaker, and she had saved $1000. John planned to build the house a 174 E 12th at Columbus, and he wanted Mary to put the $1000 into the house. She planned that Jean should have the money, but after arguments repeated over and over at the farm, she gave in and let him have the money, provided he repay it to Jean. He never did. She lived with him after Mary’s death, while she was in college. She married early and left; an attractive capable woman: I believe an architect. Her husband was a long time invalid. One son was killed in auto accident. She just vanished. I lost track of her. Last in Clearwater Florida. ...

[In the margin “I read old letters and decided Mary’s husband Sample, did not die before she met John. Divorced, I suppose.

Mary and Jean returned to Columbus early in 1914 to attend a wedding. John stayed on, and stayed with Pa mornings. Dan stayed afternoons. I had my hands full, 2 hired men (C. of E.) and 4 children, 2 youngest with whooping cough. Martha, the baby, had to be raised up every hour, so she could cough and not choke. Mary died of a stroke in Sept 1914. Buried in Washington Pa.

Then came Cordelia and 3 children, oldest born when John was 50. When they visited us in Emporia, he was nurse-maid. Cordelia settled in the library and read a book. John may not have had much control over his children. Boys appeared normal, but when Gracie was old enough to got to the swimming pool, she lay on the floor and kicked and screamed because she wanted a new swim suit. She got it. I gave the old one to a “deprived” little girl and the next I saw it diving at the pool.

Where John is now, I feel he is not perturbed to have a grandson studying for the priesthood and nobody could help loving Suzanne, the French girl that his son John married.

Margaret Anna Schaffner 1/1/1869
Last seen alive 12/30/1944
Found 1/2/45

A.B. College of Emporia
M.A. University of Michigan
Ph.D University of Wisconsin
Cl.B. Northwestern Law
Fellow Economics University of Wisconsin
Instructor in Economics University of Iowa

No wonder I felt qualms about my new sister-in-law. But! They soon vanished.

Held numerous jobs legal and with publications. On and On. Legal expert to supervise bill in Wisconsin legislature. Wise idea to see if laws would be constitutional. With all that education, Anna had left her doctor’s thesis on the Rock Island train, just like an excited girl going home for a vacation. She had it returned presently. All I remember of those first days is the heat. And it took 4 others to drive to Clay [?] (an all day trip) to buy me a hat. I saw one I like and said so. No! I had to try on a dozen others, and go to another store for the same ordeal. As it was my money and my head, I declared I’d go buy the first hat I had tried on. Ever after, I shopped alone. Anna was an addict to the idea she must clean and arrange. She was alone once, “had work to do,” after she got the rest of us out of the house, Pa was mad as a hornet when he found all the furniture in his bedroom rearranged. “Would break his neck in the dark”. He and Dan soon had it put in place. Barbara etc. were “home” on Sunday after afternoon church, and Anna said we (J and M, D and Daisy, and she) would come for noon dinner on Wed (?). It would be all right if we’d all help, as she had extra men. We went. I was not much help, but I did what I could. Anna proceed to clean the cupboard and when it was time to set the table, it was piled high w. dishes etc. Barbara said nothing but whisked everything back in place.

The Best Schaffner Tale

Anna had long since made any pretense of helping with the housework, when she saw me scalding a batch of tomatoes to make jam. “That is the way I skin peaches, only the water is hotter.” “This water was boiling”. “I let the water get hotter. I let it boil for 15 or 20 minutes.” She had 4 college degrees! Please pass the story down. It is unique.

The first summer after Ma died, Anna said she would get the dinners. Generous. The first day, at 11 o’clock she took Daniel and his little red wagon and went into the orchard. I pitched [in?] and got the chicken fried and dinner on the table when the men came in to wash. Then Anna appeared with her peaches. Said the noon meal took too much time from the book she was writing. She’d get supper. She forgot that and she did no more housework. During the mad rush between 11and 12, once she wanted me to make flour paste for her book. Once she wanted me to cut her nails. She “couldn’t do it.” I told her to file them. That made her nervous. I told her it made me nervous too. She must have lacked imagination. Her work was paramount[illegible] was natural and right. But men animals have to be fed on time, if you are going to live with them.

When Ma went into a coma, I was exhausted and got diarrhea from nervousness. Dr. got a dose of morphine in me and put me to bed. Afterward Anna said “You just went off and let Ma die.” As if any one could have helped her live. I was too stunned to reply.

Anna’s idea of showing grief was to go to bed. John hitched up the buggy and he and Mabel disappeared for the day. Afterward we learned that Mabel went to Clay Co. to borrow or rent black hats and veils for the funeral. Dan and I put in a day. We cleaned the house from top to bottom and did an enormous washing and I managed to bake too. The work helped get through a hard day. Pa was calm.

As the procession line up to go into the church, I was not up front, as I was an in-law. Lizzie came up and said “Go up front. You are a relative.” I was happy to be accepted as a Schaffner.

Anna loved babies and little children. Did not realize that adolescents simply have to be endured for several years. My children adored her. She said boxes for Christmas and they called her their Santa Claus Aunt Anna. How she could argue with brothers over politics. Just a noise. She could not nave fun with me. “I can’t argue with you. You are too logical.”

Anna drove a motor-core ambulance in New York during the war. Said she could take a motor apart and reassemble it. Wow! As smart as Johnny Gerber! Directly after her discharge she visited us, and D.C. and I took her to Morganville in a new college car. It may have been ours, anyway it was new and Anna asked D.C. if he had read the directions. He had not. On the trip we saw a dozen or so stopped cars, most of them changing or mending tires. Anna superciliously remarked “If they had read their directions they would not have all that trouble.”

She was always in high spirits, would not admit she was growing older. The kind who would not tell her age; fool themselves not others. At Lizzies funeral she looked haggard, eyes bad. Her only glasses came from dime store.

John Gerber feels sure she made a will, but she may have found out that Uncle Sam would take an awful lot, if she left everything to nephews and nieces. She left no bank deposits or other possessions as far as her cousin Anderson or any one else could find.
$3 +/- on her person. Money gave her no attraction. She was attorney to settle $1,000,000 estate and refused a fee because the diseased [sic] was a friend. She owned a farm (the old Minnick farm in Clay Co.) and lot in Madison Wisconsin.

Her death was tragic. She had lived in a room, with same landlord for seven years, but told nobody of her comings or goings. She was last seen in Friday the 30th of Dec. and the other tenants supposed she might be at Andersons. Her room was heated, and the smell of death alerted the owner and the locked door was forced. Anderson took over and gave most of her possessions to Salvation Army. John Gerber went to Davenport and took charge. D. C. had just returned from [illegible] with a bad case of the flu, and I had no way to go to funeral. Not well either.

Daniel Cornelius Schaffner
10/23/1872-6/09/1942

“Everybody is queer except thee and me and sometimes I think thee is a little queer.”
In one of the years not too long before his death, D.C. said to me “I have grown awfully queer, living with you all these years. I said “Maybe not so queer as if you had not.” He replied “Well, I guess that is so. “... We had a lot of happy times, many contented uneventful stretches, some tragic times, even occasions of pure exasperation. He forgave and forgot (he could forget, a wonderful quality) in that last year when he was confined to the house, and rarely saw another person, and relied on me for everything, his only contact with the outside world. His death left a horrid void, but never could I want him to be back as an invalid. He had been dressed everyday and cared for his personal wants. He could not cut his meat, buttons were too tiny to go in their button holes, he needed help with his bath. Games, news, plays on radio kept him interested. That 1951 flood came right after his stroke, and entertained him all day.

His whole life was centered in the College of Emporia, where he graduated in 1898. After three years graduate work he came back to teach science, all of it. He had gone to Ann Arbor to study law, but after 2 weeks switched to science. My big love was biology and we met in “Anatomy of the Cat”. There were about 12 or 15 in the advanced zoology, and we became a close knit bunch. Boys all amounted to a lot, especially Raymond Pearl.

The science dept. grew, and D.C. came to teach geology only. The collections grew from a shoe box full of rock to 2 rooms of specimens, some unique, the envy of K.U professors. Teaching of geology was discontinued while D.C. was incapacitated. That was hard to take, be missed the calamity. Sharpe (Pres) decided the Lewis Hall was unsafe. It was torn down; the precious geology collections loaded in a truck and dumped along 15 Ave. A little of it salvage by town geology club.

Different generations of students called him Dan; Prof, Schaffie, Doc, were other names. There were so many Daniels. My [grand]son Daniel Clark Schaffner was the seventh, or so John told us about records in church in Effingen. The first Christmas I sat at table and at one side of me were three Daniels (Pa, DC, and Daniel Roenigk) On other side were three Annas, Ma, Margaret Anna and Anna Marie Roenigk. 7 of us.

He was an inspiration to his students, who loved him. Scores wrote me after his death. He was coach of the track team and it won state contest on May 23, 1904. The day before Daniel was born. It was not held in Emporia. Ottoma, maybe, He went from the lab to the football field every afternoon, never missed a game. The years he traveled he always had clients to see in the town on the game day. The only thing left on campus now is “Schaffner Field” and a show case of geologic specimens. Boys flocked to his courses. Girls were tolerated; they were not athletes. He was disappointed that Daniel was not a star; he lost [?] front teeth wrestling, and injured a leg. D.C. himself as a student gloried in beating the old Normal,-the [illegible]. It was years after I came before the boys had uniforms or bleachers. We moved up and down the sidelines, with the situation of the teams. I was a little surprised at first, when he went trailing off the field with the team, entirely forgetful of me, after first game I attended.

One trait I never could understand, was the light way he treated promises, whether a spanking, or a gift. When Daniel was five, he wanted a pony. “Wait until you are ten, and you shall have one.”.. Thanks be, Daniel forgot, and on his 10th birthday went off to the [illegible] with Charles Coleman and a boat his dad (with his help) had made. Half in fun, I said before we were married, that I wanted to dance, have a canoe and a self wringing mop. I got the last 10 years after he died. No canoe, as I could not swim. Really sensible. Playing cards were of the devil. There were a dozen packs in the desk when I cleaned it out, when I was a widow. Most evenings after he retired, I had to play a couple of games (Liver pool rummy?) because “he could sleep better”. As for dancing, we were delegated to out-stay all the students at parties to they did not dance. This was hard for one to understand raised as an E-pis-ca-lop-i-an as he always pronounced it. But I soon conformed. Not that I was ever a Presbyterian.

We always entertained preachers when Synod or Presbytery met here, and I loved to have them. They were always polite; make their beds if they were to use them a second night. And the stories they told! Nobody more entertaining than a relaxed preacher. Often the same men year after year. One afternoon I came home and found someone in the bath-room. “Dearie, are you home?” A man with a lathered face stepped out “I am not Dearie, but I’m here.” He was an old C of E boy grown up, arrived for synod.

His grandpa was his idol, taught him the joy of hunting. His father was more interested in books, altho he used to set his pole in the bank of the river on the way to town, and possibly find a fish on the way home. The Republican river, (lower down the Kansas). He and Anna herded cattle on the ground where there was nary a fence. He is buried where the cows roamed. There was a pony, and Anna rode bare-back, even standing I believe. Oldest sister Lizzie had taken much care of him, “her baby brother”. Others said she spoiled him. I think she wondered if I was good enuf for him, a customary maternal attitude. He was born in the first part of the farm-house, just a rock wall, firm and solid built against a bank. Warm in winter, cool in summer. It became the cellar of the frame house.

Daniel and I lived a rough time at his birth. D.C. was sure he would grow up to be a great man; I said I’d be thankful if he grew up to be decent and kept out of jail.
He did! [transcription in progress]