I’m not the type to take a lot of pride (or shame) in what my distant relatives have done. I this sheds light onto one of my only “beliefs”: that we’re born into the families we’re born into simply by chance. As such we shouldn’t take too much pride out of what our ancestors did, but instead forge our own way in life. We could have just as likely been born into a family with very few recorded accomplishments. But I am fascinated by family history and where I come from. This month I learned a lot about where I came from – and the fact that I’m only 3rd generation “American born” in at least in one vein of my family.

Back in March I received an email from JoAnn Plenge. She was responding to a journal entry I wrote back in 2003 where I mused about my possible relationship to an Elizabeth Krumbach from Nebraska who passed away in 1926. I learned that there was a whole Nebraska family of Krumbachs – one of whom was in the Nebraska state legislature, a Charles Krumbach. JoAnn is Charles’ great granddaughter. How cool is that?

JoAnn was kind enough to send a whole email detailing some of the family history so I could have a better chance at actually getting to the bottom of whether we were related. Here’s the information she gave me:

Joann’s branch of Krumbachs came as three brothers Nebraska from Eitorf, Germany in July of 1873, leaving behind their parents Erasmus and Helena Krumbach and eleven siblings (yep, fourteen children in all!). The brothers were Erasmus, John, and Charles, aged 30, 21 and 18, who came to the US to start their lives as homesteaders. When their life out there began they lived together in a sod house dug out of the side of a hill.

Her great grandfather Charles married Ida Ingalls and they had five children – JoAnn’s mother was one of them. Charles started as a farmer but later owned a hardware store in Shelby, Nebraska and even later became director of a local bank, served on the school board and became the treasurer of an insurance company. He ran for Senator and spent two terms there from 1902-1914.

John married Elizabeth Schumacher and Erasmus married Marie Benda.

JoAnn as able to visit her relatives in Eitorf, Germany and had this to say:

“My husband and I visited my third cousins, who still live in Eitorf (a charming little town east of Bonn) in 2001. The original Krumbach home with its many out buildings including stables, a meat curing building, chicken coop, blacksmith shop, etc. is still being lived in by my third cousin Detlef and his wife. According to my third cousins, the brothers left Germany to seek better economic opportunites in the U.S. and to avoid what was then mandatory military service in the Prussian army. The German Krumbach family were devout Catholics, but my great grandfather eventually converted to the Protestant Methodist faith (probably when he got married).

Wow!

I don’t know much about family history, so I dropped a line to my Aunt Elaine to see if any of her information could be matched up with this. She replied with a great email that started out saying that there doesn’t seem to be a close connection, but it’s possible. The email continued to give some very interesting information I didn’t know about.

Before coming to the United States, my family of Krumbachs were living in Cervinka, Yugoslavia, having emigrated there from the Bavarian part of Germany sometime around the mid 1800s when the Franz Joseph canal was being built. They were a middle class family that was relatively well-to-do. I had a great great uncle (or something? He was my great grandfather’s uncle) Vilmush Krumbach owned a machine shop where my great grandfather Adam Krumbach learned the machinist’s trade and became a journeyman by age 16.

“Prior to WWI my great grandfather was conscripted into the Austrian Army, but around 1913 he left Yugoslavia when he learned that although his conscription was up, they were planning on keeping everyone in the army anyway.” He came to the United States on a boat with first class travel, had papers to get into the country and so was able to avoid Ellis Island.

Adam went to work for The Jacob Ruppert Brewery in Manhattan where he practiced his machinist trade (which my Aunt Elaine tells me was much like an engineering position by today’s standards). He married my great grandmother in 1915, she had also come from Cervinka, Yugoslavia. My grandfather was born in a nice area on the east side of Manhattan in 1919.

My great grandfather had a brother who died when he was young. He had a step-sister who never married but came to the United States as a ladies maid for a wealthy woman (this was a very good life for her). My aunt believes that most of the other Krumbachs remained in Cervinka until the WWII era when they were evicted from their homes and businesses and forced to walk back to Germany, leaving everything behind. Wow, that’s sad. What a mess of things WWII was.

But wait, back up a second to happy things, my great grandfather was an engineer in a brewery? That is the coolest thing I’ve ever heard! I just had to learn more about this brewery. I discovered The Good Old Days of Beer in New York at beernexus.com, which talks all about the brewery.

Records online are a bit confusing, but as far as I can tell the first Ruppert family brewery in the US was started by Franz Ruppert who was an immigrant from Bavaria, and his son Jacob Ruppert Sr. created his own brewery in his father’s footsteps and his son Jacob Ruppert Jr. eventually took over the brewery’s business. At one time the brewery was the third largest in the United States, coming behind Busch (which was churning out 1 million barrels a year) and NYC competitor Ehret, who was pushing 600,000 barrels a year. The brewery was known for high quality beer and the ambition Jacob Ruppert showed with it came to salesmanship and making connections with “every German organization he could find.”

In 1913 the brewery made their final expansion, the timing is right for my great grandfather to have started working there as soon as he came to the United States. My great grandfather got to know Jacob Ruppert Jr. quite well, and by then Ruppert had spent time in Congress, served as a Colonel in the National Guard and in 1914 he became the owner of the New York Yankees (as such, most of the info online is about his ownership of the Yankees rather than the brewery).

Alas, the 18th Amendment came along and introduced Prohibition. The Jacob Ruppert brewery went out of business. Stupid 18th Amendment. EDIT: Not true! See this post for info from the great great grandson of Jacob Ruppert, he set me straight.

I might not take pride in accomplishments of others (even family), but it’s neat to be able to say I have solid family roots in the golden age of NYC Brewing!