Aunt Tillie

This is the last autograph in little Lester Harms' album.


(Click on images to enlarge)
Images courtesy of Eldon Harms.

Aunt Tillie was Lester's father's half-sister, born Mathilda Harms, having become, in 1904, Tillie Niksch.

Here she is quoting an anonymous poem. She quotes the poem closely, her spelling is perfect, her handwriting is controlled.

I have been told by a couple of people who knew her that Aunt Tillie was a formidable woman who held strong opinions and did not shrink from expressing them.


After that, we come to the back cover of the autograph album, with a pig sticker.

Aunt Louise, Whoever She Was

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Image courtesy of Eldon Harms.

Once again I don't know exactly who this aunt was. My best guess is that she was Louise Sapper Schavey, married in 1908 to Edward Schavey and thus sister-in-law of Sophia Schavey Harms (Lester's mother).

Cousin Caroline

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Image courtesy of Eldon Harms.

We met Caroline Sapper earlier when she signed Lena Busse's autograph album.

I'm not sure exactly how Caroline was Lester Harms' cousin, but I think it might have something to do with the Springman connection.

Till We Shall Meet Above

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Image courtesy of Eldon Harms.

Lester Harms would have many years of remembering his Aunt Mollie (Schavey) Ahrens before their meeting above, as she died before her time.

Aunt Clara Is Optimistic

Well intended but unreliable advice to little Lester Harms from his Aunt Clara.


(Click on image to enlarge)
Image courtesy of Eldon Harms.

I am not 100% sure of Aunt Clara's identity, but I believe she was born Clara Shumacher and married Fred Schavey in October 1892 (Indiana Marriage Collection) — so she was a sister-in-law to Lester's mother, Sophia Schavey Harms. And I think Clara was a sister of Hattie Schumacher, who married Fred Schavey's brother, William.

I can't actually place Clara and Hattie together in one census. Alas, that missing 1890 census! The 1880 Census shows Clara, 11 years old, in the home of Fredrick and Salma Shoemaker, who farmed in Hobart Township. Clara has four younger siblings (Edward, Annie, George, and Amelia) ranging in age from 9 years to 2 months. Twenty years later, the 1900 Census shows Fred and Selma Schumacher farming in Ross Township, with two children: Hattie (born shortly after the 1880 census), and Frank, 13 years old. Selma reports that she has given birth to eight children, of whom seven survive. The children listed in the two censuses add up to seven.

At the moment I have to rely on those circumstances as evidence that Clara and Hattie were sisters. Neither Fred nor Selma Schumacher's obituary named their children.


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Hobart Gazette 14 Dec. 1906.


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"Mortuary Record." Hobart Gazette 8 May 1908.

Cousin Mabel

Mabel Schavey was about 14 or 15 when she wrote a page in the autograph album of her little cousin, Lester Harms.


(Click on image to enlarge)
Image courtesy of Eldon Harms.

We've seen that poem before.

Mabel was still a farm girl at this time, living just over the Porter County line.

Aunt Minnie Berndt

Minnie Harms Berndt had been married for less than two years and did not yet have any children of her own when she wrote this variation on an old classic in her nephew Lester's autograph album.


(Click on image to enlarge)
Image courtesy of Eldon Harms.

Your Aunt Mayme

Advice from Aunt Mayme Harney to little Lester Harms via his autograph album.


(Click on image to enlarge)
Image courtesy of Eldon Harms.

Cousin Flora

The next autograph in little Lester's book was written on New Year's Day, 1911, by a 12-year-old cousin.


(Click on image to enlarge)
Image courtesy of Eldon Harms.

I believe Flora's mother was Sophia Springman, sister to Anna Springman Harms (Lester's step-grandmother). Sophia had married Julius Wagener in 1889. The Wagener family lived in Chicago. After her marriage to Clarence Howell in 1917, Flora became a Hobart resident.*

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*I am borrowing this information from a family tree on Ancestry.com.

Little Lester's Autograph Album

Among the Lester Harms collection was a little autograph album, probably given to him as a gift at Christmas 1910. Lester was only six years old, so it's not surprising that all the autographs were supplied by female relatives.

His grandmother, Anna Harms, was the first.


(Click on images to enlarge)
Images courtesy of Eldon Harms.

Technically, she was his step-grandmother, but somehow I don't think either of them cared about that distinction.


Here is the cover of the album:



(Doesn't that look like a boom box he's carrying?)

Inside the cover, an inscription not made by a six-year-old:



And the title page:



(More to come.)