KEYS

"Of our greatest acts we are ignorant – " (Emily Dickinson Letter 330, June 1869)

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What Happened to Herman Hallen?

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What Happened to Herman Hallen? Herman Hallen was born in 1844 in Spellen, Westfalen, Germany. He was the youngest child of Hermann Hallen and Elisabetha Wink. Hermann and Elisabeth had five other children: Joanna, Theodore, Christina, Godfrey, and Anna. Immigration records show that they all traveled from Spellen to Waterford, Racine, Wisconsin, in 1856. They all show up on the 1860 United States Census. Herman was sixteen years old at the time of the census. The 1860 census is the last record of Herman. In the 1870 census, his name is missing. The names of his parents and siblings appear in the 1870 census. They show up in various church books and civic records thereafter for marriages, christenings, and deaths. The other Hallen relatives have gravestones with dates in the cemeteries of Waterford, Burlington, Lyons, Phillips, or Marinette. Although stoic German parents would refrain from verbal expressions of grief, Herman’s death would certainly ha...
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Ralph Waldo Emerson

"In different hours, a man represents each of several of his ancestors, as if there were seven or eight of us rolled up in each man’s skin — seven or eight ancestors at least — and they constitute the variety of notes for that new piece of music which his life is." (Ralph Waldo Emerson)
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SERVICE TO FAMILY MEMBERS

(Rebecca M. Taylor and Vaughn J. Featherstone, “Friend to Friend,” The Friend (Liahona), Aug. 1995, 12). When I was young, my father was often away from home because of a serious alcohol problem. My mother had to work full-time to support us, and I began to do many of the household chores for her. Mother taught me how to scrub floors and how to wash clothes in an old washer. . . . When I was about 11 years old, many of Mother’s relatives came from out of town to have dinner with us one Saturday night. Such visits were rare, so she spent the whole day getting the dinner ready. She prepared a pot roast and all the vegetables to go with it, mashed potatoes and gravy, salads, hot rolls, and dessert. She cooked all day, and soon the dirty dishes started stacking up. After dinner, everyone brought the leftover food to the kitchen, then went into the living room and began to visit. I remember going back to the kitchen, thinking, Mother works all week long, and now she’ll have to do the...
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