We do not want to let Uncle John out of this family. Uncle John was the third child in the family. He was 8 years old when he came to this country with his parents and two brothers and one sister. Uncle John was never married. He loved to raise horses and had a big threshing machine that was fired with coal. He went around the neighborhood and did their threshing and after he got all the threshing done they met some evening to have ice cream. Grandma and us would feed and water the stallion horse in the barn when Uncle John did the threshing. He loved horses. He raised lots of them but he did not sell many. He was a farmer and lived alone.
When grandma got sick she lived at our folks place, Henry and Mary Rempel place. So one Sunday he went to see grandma. He drove the car in the shed. It was a roadster car and had a mother-in law seat. He always went to the barn first but this time he went to the house in the summer kitchen. His saw lots of knives and edge razors. He had picked up a bum one day. He did the cooking. So the man put a rope in the place in the barn where Uncle John had to get feed. He put hay over the rope. He was going to get Uncle John in the rope. He was going to get Uncle John and tie him up and put him in the car but Uncle John saw the things on the table. He got in the car and went to the police. So the man saw what happened and we was walking away. So Uncle John was afraid he would be back after he was out of jail, but he never came back.
Uncle John. was working in the field. The horses ran away and ran over him, so Uncle Peter took him home. He promised not to go out to feed the horses but he broke the promise, went, and got two five gallon buckets of oats and when he got in the feed lots there he could not walk good and he fell. We had much rain and he fell and could not get up. So he was dead when Jake Koslowsky and the Regier boys found him in the morning. I think that way he wanted to go with his horses.
Uncle John loved children. He was a member of Florence Methodist Church. He was good to all of us that can remember him. We miss him.
He passed away Feb. 18, 1948. He had faith in the good Lord and was put away Feb. 22, 1948 at the Ebenfeld graveyard.
My sisters and brother want me to speak for our mothers side today as we are gathered to celebrate 100 years for Grandpa and Grandma Koslowsky and the children: John 8(?) years, Martin 11 years, Peter 4(?) years, Maria (Mary) 2(?) years, came to the United States of America from Russia to Florence, Kansas on June 19, 1883.
They first moved on a place south of Aulne, Kansas then bought a 160 acre land place, then built a granary and lived in it until they saved enough money to build a house with 2 bedrooms upstairs and 3 rooms and summer kitchen rooms downstairs. As long as I can remember they did not have screens on the windows but had a screen on the door.
Grandma planted a lilac bush south of the house and on Sunday afternoon grandma would go there and cry. She was homesick for her family in Russia.
In later years grandpa went back to Russia. He brought some slippers for the boys. When grandpa was on the ship a lady teller wanted to tell grandpas fortune so she got all his money. So there was good people on the ship who gave grandpa food.
The house was sold after grandma passed away. It was moved onto Vine Street in Peabody. Why it is so good to me is because Lena and I (Agnes) were born there.
Our folks Henry and Mary Rempel lived with grandparent until March 1908. Grandpa farmed the place until his age was against him so Uncle John farmed it. Grandma was a good stacker. She stacked wheat and oats better then any man. She was a midwife. She loved patches and knitted stockings and loved to plant garden. Lena, Mary and I would help grandma plant garden. When we got through we turned the windmill on to get fresh water. Then grandma would put vinegar in glasses and we drank it. It was good. Then we filled crock jars with water. We cut the wood in the house. If grandma had to do it she had a dish pan and pulled it with a rope.
She did cooking on a topper stove. Grandma could make the best pancakes that were so thin. She put sugar on them and rolled them up. On Saturday grandma made (kleen) dumpling. She was a good cook.
One day a bum was at the house. Grandpa was coming home from town and he saw a man coming through the pasture. He asked our mother Mary Rempel what he wanted. She told him something to eat. Grandpa got in the buggy and got back and gave him a meal. That was when mother was young.
The grandparents went to the Steinrich church on Sunday. The women. and girls sat, on the south side the men and boys on the north side. The service was in High German and we talked Low German (Plautdietsch), so it was hard for us to understand the service.
We had an organ. Some played it. Grandma's favorite song was page 100. It was God is Love.
Grandma would read a daily chapel every night and before she went to bed she knelt by the bed and prayed. She thought she prayed silent but we all woke up. Bless her.
We sat on the step in the evening with grandma and could see the cars on the road. She had good eyesight. She would tell us there was a bird flying in the sky. She said it was a Bible. I guess it was an airplane.
Grandpa and grandma were 27 years old when they got married. If grandpa lived until Sept. they would be married 50 years but grandpa passed away Dec. 5, 1914 and left grandma a widow nearly 21 years.
Grandma was 96 years, 10 months and 16 days when she passed away at our folks Henry and Mary Rempel place Sept. 12, 1934. She kept her faith in Jesus whom she knew as her personal Savior and she desired to depart and be with him.