My grandfather, Pete, was a farmer all his life, and lived in or near Fond du Lac County all his life (in Wisconsin's "Holyland" of German Catholic villages). He was born at the Konen farmstead on Banner Road. In 1911, he married 20-year-old Anna Marie Schmitz, with whom he had four children. Pete was affable, and for a while operated a still in the smokehouse on their farm ("I always wondered why we never had any smoked meat," his daughter, my mother Anna, once noted), until the local constables warned him to stop before he killed someone with the lethal moonshine.
Pete and Anna Marie moved to Plymouth in the 1940s, and then to Glenbeulah, until they finally settled back nearer their origins, just outside Mount Calvary, on County W, where Pete kept rabbits in the big back yard. He died very suddenly, of a heart attack, while visiting his next-door neighbor.
Memories of her parents, by Ann Konen Schneider (transcribed from a 1992 letter): My father was a very hard worker, but every now and then he liked to kick up his heels and let go. My two uncles (Max and Louie), and my Dad used to get together once in a while and they'd drink a little too much. Max and Louie were married to Pauline and Ida, my mother's sisters. Anyway ,some of the relatives used to call those three THe Three Musketeers. My mother always kept the home fire burning and never did indulge in booze or even beer. Maybe she should've, and had a little more fun. But she didn't believe in that. She just enjoyed visiting, having relatives or friends over, and just talking. She was comical at times, and did have a sense of humor-- I sure remember that."
OBITUARY, Fond du Lac Commonwealth Reporter, 10/21/1967:
Peter A. Konen, 78, Route 1, Calvary, died at St. Agnes Hospital Friday of an apparent heart attack.
Born 8 August 1889, near Dotyville in the Town of Forest, the son of German immigrants John and and Barbara Endries Konen. He married the former Anna Marie Schmitz on 29 November 1911 at Holy Cross Catholic Church in Mount Calvary.
Pete was a retired farmer and a member of Holy Cross Catholic Church and the Holy Name Society.
Survivors include his widow, Ann; two daughters, Estelle (Gust) Lueck of Plymouth and Ann (Leo) Schneider of Sheboygan; two sons, Ambrose (Virgilla "Jill") of New Holstein and David (Cora) of West Bend (formerly Barton); one sister, Tillie (John) Birmingham of Fond du Lac; one brother, John (Clara) of Fond du Lac; 24 grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.
Burial will be in the Holy Cross cemetery.
My grandfather, Pete, was a farmer all his life, and lived in or near Fond du Lac County all his life (in Wisconsin's "Holyland" of German Catholic villages). He was born at the Konen farmstead on Banner Road. In 1911, he married 20-year-old Anna Marie Schmitz, with whom he had four children. Pete was affable, and for a while operated a still in the smokehouse on their farm ("I always wondered why we never had any smoked meat," his daughter, my mother Anna, once noted), until the local constables warned him to stop before he killed someone with the lethal moonshine.
Pete and Anna Marie moved to Plymouth in the 1940s, and then to Glenbeulah, until they finally settled back nearer their origins, just outside Mount Calvary, on County W, where Pete kept rabbits in the big back yard. He died very suddenly, of a heart attack, while visiting his next-door neighbor.
Memories of her parents, by Ann Konen Schneider (transcribed from a 1992 letter): My father was a very hard worker, but every now and then he liked to kick up his heels and let go. My two uncles (Max and Louie), and my Dad used to get together once in a while and they'd drink a little too much. Max and Louie were married to Pauline and Ida, my mother's sisters. Anyway ,some of the relatives used to call those three THe Three Musketeers. My mother always kept the home fire burning and never did indulge in booze or even beer. Maybe she should've, and had a little more fun. But she didn't believe in that. She just enjoyed visiting, having relatives or friends over, and just talking. She was comical at times, and did have a sense of humor-- I sure remember that."
OBITUARY, Fond du Lac Commonwealth Reporter, 10/21/1967:
Peter A. Konen, 78, Route 1, Calvary, died at St. Agnes Hospital Friday of an apparent heart attack.
Born 8 August 1889, near Dotyville in the Town of Forest, the son of German immigrants John and and Barbara Endries Konen. He married the former Anna Marie Schmitz on 29 November 1911 at Holy Cross Catholic Church in Mount Calvary.
Pete was a retired farmer and a member of Holy Cross Catholic Church and the Holy Name Society.
Survivors include his widow, Ann; two daughters, Estelle (Gust) Lueck of Plymouth and Ann (Leo) Schneider of Sheboygan; two sons, Ambrose (Virgilla "Jill") of New Holstein and David (Cora) of West Bend (formerly Barton); one sister, Tillie (John) Birmingham of Fond du Lac; one brother, John (Clara) of Fond du Lac; 24 grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.
Burial will be in the Holy Cross cemetery.
