SMULL: Henry Smull of Brush Valley

I'm just now getting around to sorting through photos from my big trip to Pennsylvania, to hunt the trail of the Brothers Smull. My first post on my trip is here. I had such a great time with Evonne Henninger who runs the Facebook page Penns Valley Past and Present. Four Smull brothers arrived in Brush Valley to build the Lutheran church in Rebersburg: Jacob, Peter, Henry, and Jesse. Once building was complete, Jesse returned to the family while the three, Jacob, Peter and Henry, remained to build lives in the beautiful newly settled countryside on the other side of the Ridge and Valley Provice of the Appalachian Mountains, sitting between Nittany Mountain to the north and Brush Mountain/Shriner Mountain to the south. Peter was my third great grandfather. Jacob died relatively young but his home still stands on the main street in Rebersburg. Henry and his large family from his two wives, became part of the fabric of the area.

Henry's first wife was Elizabeth Royer, daughter of Johannes Christopher Royer and Magdalene Gross. The couple had seven children. Elizabeth died in 1834 at the age of 37, two weeks after she gave birth to their last child, Thomas Jefferson Smull. Henry then married the daughter of one of the prominent farmers Daniel Kreamer and Anna Kern) in the region, widow Catherine Kreamer Hosterman. They had an additional five children to add to the four children she had during her marriage to George Hosterman. George had died the same year Elizabeth Royer Smull died.  

I had not seen a photo of any of the Brothers Smull until I made my trip to Brush Valley. This is a photo of Henry, born in the 18th century, and his second wife, Catherine. This alone made the trip worthwhile.

Henry Smull and Catherine Kreamer Hosterman Smull c. 1860

Genealogy Trail: Brush Valley - Home of the Brothers Smull

Last week I made the long-awaited trip to Brush Valley in Pennsylvania. This includes towns like Centre Hall, Rebersburg, Aaronsburg, Smullton, and other villages within Centre County at its east end. I had the immense pleasure of having a tour guide, Evonne Henninger, who is the greatest historian of the area for whom I could wish. We spent the morning traveling around the valley and spent a bit more time in Rebersburg, the place my family had settled. I learned more in two days there than in years of studying from afar.

As a refresher, Johann Peter Schmoll and Julianna Sarah Mueller lived in Montgomery County,
Pennsylvania. They had ten children. Four of these went to Centre County to help build the Union Church in Rebersburg. Jacob, the oldest of the four, Peter, Henry, and the much younger Jesse. Jesse later returned to Montgomery County, but the others did not. The church was used from 1823-1876  by the Lutheran and Reformed denominations. According to Evonne, the bricks for the church were made along Elk Creek in Smullton (formerly Kreamersville) in the area of the Raymond Bair farm. Evonne drove me past this location. They razed this church after a Lutheran and a Reformed Church were built next to each other in 1876. The Amish recently purchased one of these, but neither is being used as a church at this time.

Jacob Smull's 1825
Georgian Style Home

After the building of the church, Jacob, Peter and Henry (1799) stayed on and became a big part of the community. Jacob ended up a building a German-influenced Georgian style house on E Main St in 1825 which still stands. He ended up dying in 1830. The two daughters of his marriage who survived to adulthood moved on to Lock Haven in adult life.

Peter, who is extensively written about here on the blog, left in 1847 for Stephenson County, Illinois. His entire family eventually joined him in that area.

That left Henry. Henry farmed and did whatever else he could to make a living. His first wife, daughter of one of the town's earliest residents, Elizabeth Royer, had seven kids. She died in 1834. Henry married immediately the former Catherine Kreamer, who was the widow of George Hosterman, who also died in 1834.  They combined their families and continued with life in Rebersburg. The couple had an additional five children.

One of the cool things he did was operate a toll house on Rockville Rd near Hwy 192. Toll houses existed on many roads in Pennsylvania. The tolls paid for maintenance and operation of the road since the government was not then involved. Henry Smull, in addition to his farm, had a toll house in Rebersburg. The toll house is on the right. Operators of such toll houses could earn a chunk of change each month as well. Tolls at one toll house were:

Henry Smull's Toll House on Right

Toll Gate Charges –

A score of sheep – 4¢ (score = 20)

A score of hogs – 6¢

A horse with his rider – 3¢

A score of cattle – 12¢

A sulkey with 1 horse and 2 wheels – 6¢

2 wheels & 2 horses – 9¢

4 wheels & 2 horses – 12¢

4 wheels & 4 horses – 20¢

Henry also had an opportunity to go to other parts of Pennsylvania and picked up ideas along the way. He

remodeled his toll house with unique diagonal design. During his time in Rebersburg, he also farmed. We went to the farm he ran between what was originally Kreamerville and Rebersburg. Today, the farm is in the hands of the Amish and a new homestead has been built.

Here is Henry's toll house with its unique design:

And here is the Henry Smull barn (later the C H Smull barn and now an Amish barn). This is an example of a L-shaped Pennsylvania barn.

There was so much more to learn about Henry and his kids on this trip. What I loved most is that I could feel the place and see the mountains and see how the villages connected to the mountains. It allowed me to gain perspective that no book or Internet record could provide. And, having a tour guide like Evonne was priceless. More to come.

B&W photos courtesy of Evonne Henninger of Penn's Valley, Past & Present

Jacob Smull Family: Uncle Billy Klise & Anna Elizabeth Bechtol

JACOB SMULL > REBECCA SMULL m Solomon Bechtol > Anna Elizabeth Bechtol m William

Uncle Billy Klise

Klise

Jacob Smull, Rebecca's father, was one of the original four Brothers Smull of Brush Valley. Rebecca Smull was born in 1827 in Rebersburg, Centre County, Pennsylvania. She married Solomon Bechtol and they eventually relocated to the Lock Haven area when Anna Elizabeth was a young girl. Anna was born 18 Oct 1863 in Rebersburg.

The family belonged to St John's Lutheran Church. Anna would be the church organist when she grew up and hold that job for 50 years. On 21 Oct 1880, she married William "Uncle Billy" Klise in Bellefonte, Centre County. The couple resided for many years in the 300 block of E Bald St. Klise later lived over his tailor shop at 231 E Main St in Lock Haven.

Uncle Billy was a tailor in Lock Haven and stayed in business for over 60 years. Billy was born in Northumberland County on 04 Feb 1854 and came to Lock Haven when he was one year old. His father was one of about 100 men who came to Lock Haven to work in the burgeoning lumber business.

Klise recalled  the early days of the town. When the town began, there were relatively few businesses in town and most of the town was concentrated between Mill and Henderson Streets. The business section was along Water St. The building next to what is now his tailor shop, the Irvin Hotel, was originally built by William Morehead, for a courthouse, but the founder of Lock Haven, Jerry Church, donated three lots in the First Ward for the courthouse. Morehead turned his building into the Manslon House hotel in about 1838. It wasn't until the Civil War that the business district shifted from Water Street to Main Street. This was due in large part to a great fire that burned all the buildings on Grove St between Main and Water and all of those on Water between Grove and the Canal.

Irvin Hotel, Lock Haven

Billy learned the tailoring business through an apprenticeship  starting once he had had enough of school. In 1869, he established himself in the business. When he started in the business, there were only 31 stars on the flag. His first shop was in the Opera House building which later housed the YMCA, Mason's drug store, and several other businesses.He was also one of the first in the city to get a telephone.

Billy formed the "Klise Klub" - made up of friends and comrades who enjoyed friendship over sweet cider while hanging about in the barn behind the tailor shop.

The couple had no children. Anna died after a long illness at age 64 on 15 Oct 1926.

Main St Lock Haven, Looking West

The days of ready to wear would eventually lead to the demise of many tailor shops, but Billy Klise was able to maintain his business with only custom made suits for its entire life. He finally retired at the age of 78.He made his rounds each day of his retirement, which almost always included a visit to the Western Union Telegraph Office and the "lobby Senate" at the Irvin Hotel.  Every day, after lunch, he went to Sam Brickley's ice cream shop for a scoop of ice cream. Then, he'd return to his shop to visit with those who had stopped by.

On the event of Billy's 90th birthday, the Lock Haven Express gave Billy a lifetime free subscription for his loyalty in reading the paper every days since the paper's inception in 1882. He also asserted, "I'd like to go through it all again. I had a grand life." His nephew and wife resided with him and cared for him at the end of his life in his apartment over the shop.

Billy continued to his active retirement until he injured his hand in a fall the summer of 1945 which eventually got gangrenous. The infection killed him 21 Nov 1945. As his wife had, Billy died in Lock Haven.

Jacob Smull Family: Jacob & Elizabeth Smull Burkert

UNK SMULL > JACOB SMULL > ELIZABETH SMULL m Jacob Burkert

Elizabeth was one of the older children of Jacob Smull, one of the four Brothers Smull of Brush
Valley. Jacob is the biggest question mark of the four brothers so far in my research. So far, I've located five children of the marriage of Jacob Smull and Margareth Brodt.

Elizabeth was born in 1822 in Miles, Centre County, Pennsylvania. At some point, she married Jacob Burkert, a native of Montgomery County. He was born 27 Jul 1816.

Jacob was a cabinetmaker by trade. He lived in Berks County prior to coming to Centre County. Jacob was an orderly sergeant for the Brush Valley Guards, which organized in 1838 and remained active until the beginning of the Civl War. It "was the first volunteer company in the valley that was composed chiefly of her own citizens." After disbanding, many of the members joined the Army during the War of the Rebellion. Citizens typically served seven years. Jacob served during the 1840s. He also later served as a justice of the peace for ten years.

The Burkerts had 11 children: George (died in the Civil War in 1861; served as a musician; died at camp with the Bellefonte Invincibles at Carlisle, PA), Rev Cyrus J., Effinger, Cephas Milton, John Clark, Emma Jane, Dr. Edwin F, Charles, and Clayton Smull Burkert (two died as infants),  I'll talk about a couple of the kids here:

Rev Cyrus Jacob Burkert was born in Rebersburg, 07 Jul 1842 and died in Dayton, Ohio, 12 Nov 1905. He attended school in Rebersburg (German instruction), read under a Lutheran minister, and later followed his uncle Rev CJ Burkert, a member of the Allegheny Conference, and he accompanied him on his pastoral administrations and assisted in Sabbath services. Later, he spent a little time at a Lutheran Theological Seminary at Selings Grove, Pa. That ended when he followed his uncle to Indiana. He then came to Ohio where he planned to enter the Union Biblical Seminary, but the needs of the elders caused that opportunity to slip away.In 1862, he was teaching school in East Germantown, Indiana and entered Hartsville University, operated by the United Brethren, but had to leave to serve in the military on 90-day basis. He joined the 54th Indiana Volunteers at Cambridge City on June 3, 1862 and was mustered in as a Sergeant June 4, 1862. and was mustered out in the fall.

In 1867, he married Anna Boughner and they had two sons: George and William. He died at the age of  62 in Ohio, never a highly educated master of religion, but one devout and successful in the eyes of his parishioners.

Dayton State Hospital

Dr. Edwin F Burkert, MD was born 27 Feb 1856, in Centre County. He attended local school and
then the Normal School. He taught two terms in Pennsylvania, then moved to Germantown, Ohio, where he attended Twin Valley College and Southwestern Ohio Normal. He taught for six years. During the last three years at school, he studied medicine and eventually attended Ohio Medical College of Cincinnati, where he graduated with the Class of 1884. He first practiced in Trenton, Ohio, then moved on to Collinville for three years. Then, he came to Dayton in 1887, and established his practice there.

He married Anna M Carney, daughter of AD Carney, a citizen of Sunbury, Delaware County, Ohio. The couple had three children. Members of the United Brethren Curch, Edwin died 21 Sep 1910 of acute delusional insanity at the age of 53 at the Dayton State Hospital. Anna died 16 Mar 1937 in Jefferson County, Ohio.

MysteryMuddle: More on the Brothers Smull

I'm trying to untangle the mess of the Brothers Smull, who descended on Brush Valley in Centre County, Pennsylvania sometime in the early years of the 1800s. Read about the mystery of Jacob Smull.

Only one person had any insight in to his story and none of his sources were cited, but I did run across the 1820 Census with his name on it and it supports at least part of the story, but added even more questions to the growing list of mysteries.

According to that family tree, Jacob Smull was born in 1795 and died in 1830. This person had identified five children and a wife, Margarethe Brodt, daughter of Friederich Brodt and Maria Magdalena Seipel.

One of Jacob's purported daughters, Rebecca Smull, was married to Solomon Bechtol. Their history and that of their children was very limited in successful searching.

Elizabeth Smull, married  Jacob Burkert, and was blessedly easy to track.

No references were made to Jacob or his children in any documents outside of Ancestry records that I've been able to find. Margarethe and her parents are also a mystery at this point.

Now, my questions are as follow:

• What happened to Rebecca's children Anna, Mary, John David, Harry, and Emma J?
• What happened to Jacob purported children: Juliana, Johannes, and Jacob? 
• What happened to Margarethe after Jacob's death?

MysteryMuddle: Solving the Mystery of the Early Smulls

George Henry Smull, the first subject of
the Smull Commemorative
Biographical Sketches

Way back in the day (sometime around 1825-ish), three brothers arrived in the Brush Valley, in Centre County, Pennsylvania. The story is not told through records, but through the centennial commemorative publications popular throughout the United States that profile prominent citizens and told the history of the town. Their accuracy was only as good as the transcriber and the subject providing the information so these publications often offer only mixed results.

Those Centre County Smulls were Henry, Peter, and Jacob. Another brother, Jesse, lived in another part of Pennsylvania and the two daughters referenced below have not been identified.

The Smull story is muddled by these very bio sketches. George Henry Smull, son of Reuben Smull, grandson of one of the three Brush Valley Smulls who first arrived to the area, Henry, was profiled in the J. H. Beers & Co. Commemorative biographical record of central Pennsylvania, including the counties of Centre, Clinton, Union and Snyder Counties:

"The first of the line in America was _____ Smull, the great-grandfather of our subject (Henry, son of Reuben). He was a native of Ireland, whence he came to this country in the latter part of the

Centre & Clinton Counties, 1792

eighteenth century to locate in the eastern part of Pennsylvania. 

Six of his children lived to adult age - two daughters and four sons, the names of the latter being Henry, Jacob, Peter and Jesse. The Smull family in Brush Valley is descended from the first three sons, who were skilled masons, and all went at the same time to Rebersburg to build the wall for the Lutheran Reformed Church. They remained in the Valley, and, living in German settlements, they and their children adopted the language and customs of their neighbors. Of the brothers, Jacob, in later years, did an extensive business in cutting tombstones for the Rebersburg cemetery from native rock, and several of  these monuments are still standing. Jacob died at his home below Aaronsburg, and was buried at Rebersburg. Peter removed in later life to Stephenson county, Illinois, and died there." 

Just off the bat, this doesn't make sense. While there are some Smull's hailing from Scotland, the Schmoells, Schmulls, Smulls, Smalls, etc. hailed from Germany. The areas like Rebersburg were very German, speaking and conducting all of their business within their German communities in their language, educating their children in German, and maintaining their customs. It would not make sense for Irishmen to integrate into the German community. But who knows?  Intermarrying had already started.

Centre County Township Map, 1861

On that basis, I've since been looking for some other explanation and finally found one, which also may or may not be fully accurate. This taken from Portrait & Biographical Record of Macon County, Illinois, 1893 by Lake Publishing and the subject was Henry Smull (1842*), a heretofore unidentified child of Peter Smull and Mary Waggoner. There is one child of Peter and Mary whom I still have not identified, based on 1830 & 1840 census calculations. It tells a completely different tale about the same ancestor (the unidentified grandfather of both profile subjects):

"The latter (Peter) was of German descent. The paternal grandfather (unidentified) of our subject was a hero of the Revolution. He left the Old Country to avoid entering the army, and arrived in the United States just in time to aid the Colonists in their struggle for independence.

For seven years he (the unidentified grandfather) participated in the Revolution. The father (Peter) of our subject (Henry)was born February 27, 1796, and died in February, 1869, being buried in Rock Grove, Stephenson County, Ill. His wife, who was born February 4, 1801, died and was buried in the same place in September, 1878. Mr. Smull was always a supporter of the Democratic party. He was a mechanic, and always followed the occupation of farming. He came to Illinois when Henry was a lad of twelve years, and located upon a farm in Stephenson County, where he spent his remaining days."

I think this description may be more accurate, but may be bloated in the heroic description. Until it can be ascertained who the parents of the Brothers Smull were, it's all moot. I have yet to find one person who has a reasonable solution to the problem. What I know is that the family is not related, or is very distantly related to John Augustus Smull, the author of the Smull's Legislative Handbook. 

The big questions for me are:

• Did Jacob Smull have wife and children and if so, whom?
• Did Jacob Smull leave the Centre County area? No records of him exist, but the house which he built in Centre County is on the National Historic Register
• Who are the parents of Mary Waggoner, Peter Smull's wife? I have a case to put before the court of public opinion, but will share that later.
• And, finally, WHO ARE THE PARENTS OF THE BROTHERS SMULL?

*Henry Smull (1842) is the son of Peter Smull and Mary Waggoner and is listed with his birth year to differentiate him from Henry Smull, brother of Peter.