George Nicklaus and Elizabeth Tiedeken, wed 3 May 1899
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|---------Balthasar NICLAUS (1793, Germany - 1854, Germany)
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|------Balthasar NICLAUS (1831, Germany - 1900, Iowa)
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| |---------Maria Anna BÖHNER (1796, Germany - 1862, Germany)
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George NICKLAUS (1866, IL - 1936, Iowa)
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| |--------Lukas SCHMITT (1776, Germany - )
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| |---------Gregor SCHMITT (1805, Germany - )
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| | |--------Barbara ROTTMÄANNIN ( - )
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|------Margaretha SCHMITT (1838, Germany - 1872, Illinois)
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| |--------
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|---------Margaretha NEUGEBAUER ( - )
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\image{pics/dad/nicktdkn-wed.ps}{George Nicklaus and Elizabeth Tiedeken, wed 3 May 1899}{nicktd-pic}{3in} %>
George took over his father's farm in Monroe Township of Butler County. After Balthazar and Maria died, George and his full brothers and sister bought out Maria's children.
Many details about George's life were written by his son Fred for the Nicklaus Family Cookbook project. Here is some of what Fred had to say:
I was born in 1908, the year my father and family moved from the farm to
town. Dad had been a big farmer and had many interests in business in the
now gone town of Eleanor. He farmed a half section of land, raised
many cattle and hogs. He would ship train-car loads of cattle and
hogs to Chicago and was known by the then buyers in Chicago. He
was the director of the school, of the creamery that then existed
just north of Eleanor, had an interest in the grain elevator, and
store. He loved to dance and was one of the best square dance
callers in this area. Ma did not care to dance.
He often said that the hired man trouble is what made him
stop farming. He could not get farming out of his life. He bought
seven acres of land where the city swimming pool is now and running
up to now highway where the Standard oil station is located. He
loved to raise hogs and always had two or more cows. In winter he
would take the cows home where he had a barn. When the family
moved to Parkersburg, they moved to a house on the southwest corner
of 6th and Buswell. I don't think we lived there very many years
until he bought a house, the second house west on the north side
of the street from 6th St. and Buswell. We lived there for many
years, and then bought the big Merlin house on the corner of
Buswell and 6th. Dad said he bought the big house for the large
barn that was located on it.
We were living in the second house when Dad bought a store
building (there used to be three buildings, I think, where the Post
office is now). He moved this building to our home to use as a
garage and storage building. I remember the first car he bought.
It was an Overland with side curtains. The next car was a
Chalmers.
For many years after Dad moved to town, he was manager of
elevators (grain, coal and feed). I remember he would buy small
fields of corn in fall and I would go with him to pick the corn and
haul it to town. We had a friend who had a team of horses and we
could use them. He and I would drive the team of horses to a farm
he owned on West Fork River, seven miles north and east to cut wood
for burning - cut by hand and hauled home. Also, many falls he
would pick corn for a farmer named Dick Escher. So on Saturdays
I got to go with him. I couldn't pick much corn but I think he
liked the company. Many times I would get so cold he would stop
and build a fire to warm up. We took a gallon pail of coffee along
and sandwiches.
Dad was a good
baseball player, boxer and most any kind of sport, yet he never
encouraged me to go out for a sport.
I remember at home Fred Prussia and his partner, Don Bean,
were there and they kept kidding Dad to Jig, so after awhile he
said he would jig if they would play a certain piece for him later.
He was quite a jigger. He could jump up and kick his heels
together three times. I remember when Dad worked at the elevator,
they would have dances and Ann would go with Dad as a partner.
I worked in the elevator for around three years and it was
sold. Dad had owned several farms and during the Depression he
started to lose them. He traded one farm and got the local hotel
in the trade, so he said I would have to run it. Well, there was
no business at that time. I had a bond and sold it to buy a train
car of coal. Dad had hoped he could trade the hotel or sell it
soon, but nothing was moving. We finally had to give it back to
the former owner. We only had a $3000 mortgage we had to give when
we traded, but couldn't borrow anything on the hotel. In the final
settlement, I got a small house and lot in town. I later sold this
and bought a car.
George's daughter Marie wrote the following story:
Dad had a hobby of raising bees for honey. He would explain how bees lived and how they made the honey in the little boxes he prepared. All the kids were interested and listened to Dad. The fun was when the bees were going to swarm. The word went out to all the kids and they came each with a metal pan and spoon. We would sit on the terrace on the north side of the house and beat on the pans with the spoons. The noise seemed to settle the bees and Dad could get them down from the tree and get them into a hive prepared for them. After that was over, Mom would have us come in for Kool-Aid and cookies.
Here are a few more memories of George contributed by Fred and Rue Nicklaus (told to Brenda (Nicklaus) Swailes July 1997):
Fred's parents moved in to town from the farm the year that
Fred was born - 1908. His dad then rented out the farm. He says his
dad had too much of a soft spot to be a good businessman. If the
tenants couldn't pay the rent, he'd always make an arrangement. At
one time, he owned seven or eight different farms and was renting them
out. Fred remembers the bank calling his dad and telling him that a
toy factory was trying to start up in town, and asked him to put up
some money for it. George said he didn't have any extra cash, so the
bank offered to loan him some (a couple thousand dollars), and he said
o.k., so he had to pay on this loan. Fred says other things like this
often came along and his dad always wanted to help out. He mortgaged
most of the farms to get in on such ventures or help pay off the
loans, but his wife, Elizabeth would not allow him to mortgage the big
Victorian house, that was their home and she wanted to always be able
to live there. They also owned the seven acres that the swimming pool
in Parkersburg is now on. The lot of the Victorian house was the
entire East half of the block it sits on , and the tent shows used to
set up on the property, so they would get free tickets to go to the
tent show.
George was quite a dancer, but his mother didn't care for
dancing. George could dance a jig, and jump up and kick his heels
together three times before he landed. Fred remembers his sister Ann
would sometimes go to dances with their dad because Elizabeth didn't
want to go. George was also apparently in demand as a square dance
caller, as he could go all day and all night without ever repeating
the same call twice.
George was also a boxer in his younger days. They would have
matches at the livery stable in town, the city boys against the
country boys. George was apparently very good, but he also had a
tender nose and didn't like getting hit hard in the face. One time
the city boys had set up someone to fight him. George said o.k., but
just a sparring match, no hard hitting. So they sparred for a while
and then the other guy hit George right in the nose and knocked him
over. George got up and said that was enough, take off your gloves.
The other guy said they still had a fight to finish, but George said
no, we said no hard hitting, that's the end. Come to find out, the
city boys had set him up. This guy was a fighter they had brought in
from Chicago. So George went home and trained harder, and at some
later point, this same guy came back again, and they made the same
deal - no hard hitting. This time, after sparring for a while, George
knocked the other guy out. The other guy asked what the deal was - he
thought there wasn't supposed to be any hard hitting. George said
``That's right, no hard hitting - just like last time''. The Chicago
guy decided he'd had enough, and never came back around. I guess that
country boy got the best of the city boys.
George basically died without owning much, despite
all that he had owned at one time, because he was too soft. Fred
thinks that if they wouldn't have moved to town, his dad could have
made a lot of money on the farm. The Northwestern railroad track ran
through Eleanor, and near the farm, and George would sell carloads of
livestock and send them to Chicago. Fred has a letter
from some of the buyers in Chicago to his father. It seems his father
had been to Chicago selling a load of stock and hadn't been in to see
this particular person, and the letter said something like - ``Why the
heck didn't you stop in and see us?''. From the letter, Fred says it's
clear that his dad was on pretty friendly terms with a lot of the
Chicago people. Apparently the depression also took a great chunk out
of George's pocketbook.
Fred remembers James Spain running for mayor. He was a
Catholic also, and at the time, they were very much a minority, and
looked down upon. Fred helped go from door to door in the poor
working people's section of town (north side of downtown) to get them
out to vote for Jim Spain (a democrat). Somehow they always got him
reelected, as he took care of the working men. This was much to the
dismay of the other folks in town.
Fred recalls that his parents never let anyone go hungry. If
there was a transient in town, they would have them chop some wood for
the woodburning stove, or have them do some other chore in exchange
for a meal.
Along the same lines, when Fred worked at the hotel and Jim
Spain was mayor, they had an arrangement that if someone didn't have a
place to sleep, Fred would put them up in the hotel and the city would
pay for it, and also pay for a meal at a restaurant down the street in
the morning.
The people who bought the Victorian house after George and
Elizabeth died spent a great deal of money fixing it up. They raised
it up and took out the old stone foundation and put in a cement block
foundation. Fred thinks they spent about $40,000 on that alone.
Sources for this individual: @S6@ @S4@ @S5@ @S342@
