Introduction

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McCreary

Table of Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1
Photos
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Bremer & Brune

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Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 10
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Brueseke

Table of Contents
Introduction
Chapter 1
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Hecht

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Introduction
Chapter 1
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Torian

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Introduction
Chapter 1
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INTRODUCTION In the late 1970s, I watched my father, Edwin Brune, and mother, Ruth (Hecht) Brune, work on genealogy. My Dad had recently retired and pursued genealogy as a hobby. My Mom took his notes and began adding the data to charts that looked like family trees. A few years later, I married and became interested in gathering information on my new married name. Thus began the collection of data that led to this book. When I started in genealogy in the 1980s, the technique for finding information was so different from today. Most of the data that I have gathered on the Bremer and Brune families, I acquired from my father and from my own research in the 1990s and the past three years. Using a computer, the Internet, and email has enabled me to find many relatives that my Father did not know existed. In 2005 I finished writing the Hecht Family History, my mother’s father’s family. After that I decided to work on my mother’s mother’s family, and the Brueseke Family History was finished the end of 2006. ﷯Prior to retiring the end of 2005, I used much of my vacation time from work to research records at the probate court and recorder of deeds offices; plus cemeteries in St. Louis. Other research facilities have included the State Historical Society of Missouri, Columbia, Missouri; Missouri Archives, Jefferson City, Missouri; St. Louis County Library; Allen County Library, Fort Wayne, Indiana; Missouri Historical Society Library, St. Louis; St. Louis Public Library; St. Louis Genealogical Society; Zion United Church of Christ, Florissant, Missouri; St. John’s Cemetery, Bethlehem Cemetery, Family History Library microfilm and of course, any database I could find on the Internet. I have written many letters and emails to relatives and organizations to gather information. Through this effort I’ve identified nearly 700 Bremer and Brune descendants. I am blessed that my parents Ed and Ruth Brune were organized people. When my mom married into the family in 1939 she began keeping photo albums with nearly every picture labeled with names and dates, although most of them were from my mother’s family rather than my dad’s. Some of these photos went back to the 1890s. I have pestered relatives to write stories about their families, parents, and grandparents so I could add them to this book. I thank many of them for doing this and sharing copies of photos and other documents. It is these stories that make the people interesting and come to life and more than just “born, married, died” statistics. Several people have helped me extensively in gathering information for this book. Marie Brune had extensive wedding photos of the Bremer families; Sharon (Thrall) Becker borrowed many photos from Ed Boding and emailed them to me and had photos of her own family; Harriet (Bremer) Kotowski Schulz, Willie Bremer, Joe & Carol (Strothman) White, Alyce (Bremer) Zynda, Joyce (Bremer) Kelley, Georg Ständer, Irene (Oberkramer) Steward, and Roland Bauer’s family shared many photos and I thank them for their kindness. Many others including Sterling Hayden, Ray Crank Jr., and my father Edwin Brune wrote extensive stories and shared extensive photos and data. Others were gracious about proofing the chapters relating to their family. I’ve struggled with my lack of knowledge of the German language but a friend, Helga Lunsford translated letters and documents for me. Several years ago, I took a class on how to write your family history and that led me to start my first book. I needed technological help and I thank Karen Miller for her assistance in adding the scanned photos to the Microsoft Word chapters and Ann Fleming, CG, CGL, for her advice and willingness to review the entire book. Throughout the book, I have retained the original spelling I found in historical documents, even if it was incorrect. I have tried to list [sic] to designate the spelling is incorrect; however, the text contains the original spelling. Thus you will see a name spelled many ways.﷯ + A plus sign to the left of a name indicates this person is listed in detail later. ca Circa, this indicator means about, and is used when an exact date is unknown. [sic] This symbol is used when a document contains a misspelled word or another error. When citing original records, the information is transcribed as it appears in the document even though it is incorrect. A small italic number after a given name, Thomas2, is a generation number showing the number of generations from the first family member. The superscript numbers within or at the end of a sentence are the citation numbers. The endnotes provide the documentation where this information was located. Information written in italics indicates I did not write this material and it is from another source.
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I wanted to write about the Bremers and the Brunes who married each other but wondered, should they be separate books or combined. Neither family seemed to be large enough for a book by themselves so I decided to combine them. Although most people will be interested in one family more than the other, many, many chapters have references and photos showing the Bremers and Brunes being together for family gatherings. My approach has been to concentrate on the Bremer and Brune relatives. Of course, there are allied lines but most of the data is about the Bremers and Brunes. I included nearly everything I learned on the deceased family members. In order to protect the privacy of the living, I have only used names and year of birth, not complete dates, etc., unless the family member gave permission to include more. Years of birth were necessary to distinguish between people with the same name. Complete marriage dates are used since these are found in public records. One of the greatest joys in researching and writing this book has been in discovering new “cousins” and making new friends. I hope I have not offended anyone with what I have included. In spite of trying to have the thousands of details reviewed by a relative and numerous proofings of the data, I’m sure I’ve made some unfortunate errors. If I have, I apologize. If there are corrections or additions, I welcome knowing about them. Marian (Brune) McCreary

Herman Bremer blacksmith shop

Marie Bremer, ca. 1905

Sopie Hussman Brune at drygoods store, 1885-1890

© Marian McCreary 2015