Biographies

 Johann Christian Heckenbach 1804-1885

Johann, the firstborn in his family, was born in Brohl in 1804. This was during the French occupation of the Rhineland. At the age of 12, he started to work at the papermill in Brohl. Starting in 1839, new machines were installed and he rose to the position of foreman. At his retirement in 1866, he was given a silver cup acknowledging his 50 years' service. The cup still exists in the family. The factory was then known as J. Merzbach and Co. Founded in 1785, it still operates today under the name of Brohl Wellpappe, with 510 employees, producing cardboard, pasteboard, and boxes.

Johann had five daughters, three of whom had died by 1845. A fourth died in 1874 at the age of 24. His two sons lived and emigrated to America and were the forbears of the Heckenbachs in this country, leaving some 1000 descendants. From Johann's four brothers, only a handful of descendants remain to this day in Germany. Some never married, many more died, and others have moved away from Brohl. His brother Phillip also had three daughters who came to the US and settled in St Louis.

  Doctor Johann Adam Heckenbach 1831-1913

Johann Christian's older son was Johann Anton. He attended the University of Bonn and also worked as a schoolteacher. In 1865, at the age of 34, he married Franciska Fisher from Koblenz. A year later they moved to America. An infant son died in Chicago. They settled in Williamstown, a community in Dodge County, Wisconsin, near Mayville, where Johann Anton worked as a carpenter. The area was composed almost entirely of Prussian immigrants at that time, and was experiencing a building boom.

He lived for a time in St. Louis and became a choir director and organist. We recently learned that he had cousins living there; see below. He later performed the same function at St. Alphonsius Church while living in Chicago.  

Back in Mayville again, he invented an improved metronome for music students and patented the design on March 4 1873. He was still in Mayville at the time of Franciska's death in1878. Soon after that he came to Chicago to stay, becoming a doctor of medicine. He graduated from the University of Illinois, and his certification from the State Board of Health dated Mar 29 1882 is still in the family. As a physician, he had a 100% success rate in diptheria cases.

According to old Chicago City Directories, Doctor Heckenbach's address in 1902 and 1903 was 1605 N Leavitt (note: Chicago addresses numbers changed in 1909). He also gave violin lessons, repaired old violins (some of which are still in the family) and composed some waltzes.

He used the name "John Adam." 

He remarried, to Johanna Droge, and adopted her children, but was widowed again. Although he was able to afford trips back to Germany, he ended up poor and living with his daughter Molly. They lived at 3939 N Hermitage. He died Dec 9 1913 in Chicago IL

We now have a picture of John Adam with his family; click here.

  Christian Heckenbach 1841-1920

Johann Christian's second son was Christian, born 1841. In 1866, he married Sophia Spicker from Willheiss, near Essen in the industrial Ruhr Valley. They lived in Essen before sailing to New York in 1867. They joined his brother living near Fond du Lac, Wisconsin and worked a farm in Williamstown, near Mayville.

By 1873, two years after the Chicago Fire, the growing family had moved to Chicago. Christian worked as a decorator and sign painter. Later they had owned a truck farm and greenhouses, on the property where Senn High School is now situated. Here they raised celery for seed, among other crops.

Later they moved to another farm at 7548 N. Clark St., at the northern edge of Chicago. Although the Chicago and Northwestern Railroad had laid tracks through to Milwaukee and beyond by 1855, there is a land record showing Christian sold a strip of land to the railroad in 1903. Also in 1903 he sold some land to the City of Chicago so that Howard Street could be widened to the west. He also subdivided the part of the farm west of the tracks, and his son Frank owned a house there.

In those years Christian and Sophia operated an ice cream parlor and lunchroom at the corner of Clark and Howard Streets. Sophia died in 1915 and in November of that year Christian closed the business and sold the land between Clark and the railroad for the sum of $23,500 to Traugott Weber. Thereafter Christian stayed alternately with his sons Joseph and John Adam.

He was remembered as a kindly man. He belonged to the Catholic Order of Foresters. At the 1911 Old Settlers' Picnic, Christian won the gold medal for having the largest family. At the 1917 family reunion at the spacious home of Martin Wiltgen, Christian had 72 of his 75 descendents there to honor him. Annual family picnics were held long after Christian's death on Jan 30 1920, and many of his 57 grandchildren kept in touch all their lives.

click here for pictures of Christian Heckenbach and his family

Update on their Arrival in America:

John Adam: According to a family story about him, John Adam "actively avoided" service in both the American Civil War, and the strife that led to the Franco-Prussian War, a conflict which erupted when Bismarck provoked Napoleon III into attacking Prussia in 1870. How could he have been a "draft dodger" in both wars? The following information has come to light recently.

Johann Anton made his first voyage to the U.S on the ship Bavaria, which sailed from Hamburg to New York, arriving June 19, 1862. The manifest listed a 31-year-old passenger named A. Heckenbach, apparently single, identified as a "merchant," although Johann Anton was not quite 31 on that date. He returned to Prussia and waited for the American Civil War to end in 1865, then returned with his wife and baby, as things were starting to heat up back in Prussia.

Update Nov 2008: We just found a ship's record for the Bosphorus arriving July 5, 1866 in Boston ,arriving from Liverpool. His age is off, but the other details are a good match:

The baby died shortly afterward. By 1867 Johann Adam and Sophia had another child, and in 1870 they were living in Williamstown, Dodge County, WI.

Christian: Meanwhile, on the passenger list of the ship America, which arrived in New York on June 14, 1867 from Bremen, are the following: entries:

We know that Christian, his wife Maria, and baby Kate were living in Essen before leaving Prussia. Kate was born there. The US Census of June 1870 places them in the town of Fond du Lac, WI.

 Their Cousins: Then on June 10, 1872, with 939 passengers, the ship SS Köln steamed into Baltimore from Bremen carrying

We have learned elsewhere that sisters Anna Josephine, Katrin, and Gretchen Heckenbach arrived in St Louis and that Katrin's real name was Catherine. "Kalchen" must have been Gretchen's nickname. It took a while to realize that "Jos" was Anna Josephine, and it turns out that all three sisters were cousins of Johann Anton and Christian Heckenbach, through their Uncle Phillip who had 6 daughters. They settled in St. Louis. Katrin married Georg Löloff and Josephine married William Dufs, both in St. Louis, both in 1874. Kalchen married Lou Kaugman.

Another relative?: Then on June 18, 1871, the ship Herman arrived in New York from Bremen carrying Margaret Heckenbach, age 27, of Prussia. We don't know who this person was. JA and Christian had a sister Margaret who was born in 1845, but who knows? Besides, the three Heckenbach sisters above had another sister Margaret who was born in 1844. It's possible that it's the same person and that she led the way for her sisters. This is pure speculation. The ship lists at that time did not require information about the person's destination.

The late 1860s and early 1870s were a time of massive German immigrations to the US, not only beacuse of political tensions, but also because of the opening of the western states to development, while Prussia was suffering economic hardships. In 1880 in Mayville, Dodge County WI, something like 80% of the grammar school students were of recent German descent.

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updated Nov 30, 2008