Then following information is from a book (the most recent entry in the book was from 1962) noting four generations of the Conrad Wenger (Gottlieb Hohulin’s father in law) family.
A century of progress is herein recorded in the history and descendants of Conrad and Magdalena Wenger, who with their family of four girls and two boys, Augustina, Barbara, Conrad Jr. Anna, Charles and Wilhelmina, decided to leave all and go west in search of a new and better way of life.
In Lorrach, Baden, Germany, Grandfather was a shoemaker. He labored long, hard hours making shoes for a living. Actually, they weren’t really shoes but boots which everyone wore at that time. Instead of the metal shoe tacks we see today, he used wooden nails which were hammered into the sole and then filed off to prevent them from sticking into the foot. One could hardly imagine that they could do a very good job but evidently they held very well. They didn’t have steel needles in those days. Instead, he used a certain type hog bristle which would be split and thread rolled back and forth in the split until it was tightly twisted together. The thread was then waxed. A wooden shoe last was then put into the boot and the nails were pushed into it before being filed off. Really, these boots seemed to never wear out. Earnings were very small and one had to put in many hours to earn even a meager wage.
At last the time came when they decided that, surely somewhere, somehow there must be an easier way to make a living. They probably thought that even though it may take years to find anything better, their children would eventually benefit by the move. At any rate, they set out in a sailboat on a journey that would take them, they know not where. For fourty days they sailed, raising and lowering the sails as the wind changed course. Surely, their hopes must have almost ended many times when they looked day after day and saw no land. At times, the boat would go so slow, the men would go down and swim awhile. One time, the Captain came along and ordered them back into the boat. Scarcely had they gotten in when a school of shark came by. With the meager equipment they probably, had they might have been killed.
Just what port they drifted into no one knows but they finally made their way by train to Morton, Ill, in the spring, they moved to Congerville, Ill. on a farm. Ten years later, they moved to Fairbury, Ill. where he still retained his shoemaking practice. In 1877, they went to live with their son, Conrad, southeast of Fairbury. Here, He died in 1888. Grandmother then lived with her daughter, Anna at Cropsey, Ill. until she died in 1893. Both are at rest in South Apostolic Christian Cemetery. Though they never could enjoy many comforts or conveniences, they spent their lives in an effort to settle their children in a nation where they could progress.