The Hyphen Family Lineage

[Obituary for Carl Stargard, from the Oconomowoc Enterprise, 18 Jun 1920.]

The death of Carl Stargard occurred on June 9, at his home in the town of Oconomowoc after a long illness. He was 46 years of age and is survived by one brother and four sisters: Julius Stargard of Oconomowoc; Mrs. Amelia Weber with whom he made his home; Mrs. Sennhenn and Mrs. Fred Brede of Columbus, and Mrs. Henry Kitzrow of Milwaukee.

Funeral services were held on Saturday afternoon at the Rock River Lutheran church, Rev. H. Karow officiating.

Note: Carl F. Stargard

Carl F., son of Carl L. and Augusta (Schoen) Stargard, is presumed to be named for his father, though I have not confirmed he bears the same name in entirety and so haven't designated him "Jr." He is the youngest of Carl and Augusta's children by over a decade, appears to have lived with his parents at their home on the farm for most of his life, and never married nor had children. He died less than a decade after his mother, and is buried in the same cemetery as his parents.

There is some indication that his physical health, at the least, was not the best - he died in his mid-forties after "a long illness," according to his obituary. He appears to have lived most of his life on his parents' farm in Ixonia, Jefferson Cty, Wisconsin, until after his father's death in 1903. The 1905 Wisconsin State Census finds the younger Carl and his mother Augusta living in Oconomowoc, Waukesha Cty, Wisconsin, though by the time of Augusta's death in 1913, they had moved back to Ixonia (along with Carl's older sister Amelia, the widow of Carl Weber). Carl appears to have moved back to Oconomowoc prior to his death in 1920, with his sister Amelia coming to live with him again in late 1919 or early 1920, with his death coming several months later.

While no strong evidence has been found to confirm, there is at some possibility that Carl was not entirely functional as an adult; he was born several years after the next youngest in the family (sister Wilhelmina) when his mother was in her late thirties. He appears to have never lived on his own outside of his immediate family, and if he did it was briefly. The move to Oconomowoc after his father's death suggested that he was not able to continue running and working the family farm in Ixonia, and Amelia's presence in the household in those later years suggests he may not have been capable of caring for the home and their aging mother, either. His siblings were all active in the Lutheran churches in the area, while he seems to have been mostly absent - likely attending services and possibly even being a member, but not apparently playing any visible role in the church. His employment seems to have been primarily farm labor and similar work when it is noted in the records.

None of that is obviously conclusive, but it does paint something of a possible picture of the younger Carl as cognitively handicapped in some manner. Of his nieces and nephews who could have known him (primarily the children of Julius), the youngest was his nephew Herbert Stargard, who would have been a teenager at the time of Carl's death; Herbert died more than twenty years before my research on the Stargard line began, so Carl's nature will remain an unresolved question.