The Herrmanns were of Prussian birth, children of John and Katharina (Altes) Herrmann, and came to the United States in 1852, working at the wagon maker's trade in various cities of Ohio before locating in Cincinnati. From thence they removed to Tell City, of which John Herrmann became the first postmaster, when the post office was established in 1858 by Postmaster-General Aaron V. Brown, of Tennessee, whose official successor as holder of that portfolio in Buchanan's cabinet was Joseph Holt, of Kentucky, born directly opposite Perry County, at "Holt Place", Breckinridge County. A year later the Herrmann brothers entered upon the wagon making business, building up what became one of the largest in Sourther Indiana. After some year the manufacturing of hames was developed, remaining in the control of the Herrmann family, who are still locally prominent, until 1906, when their plant was absorbed by the United State Hame Manufacturing Company, who made Tell City one of their principal depots in the Middle West.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

In the following spring (1859) a loan of $4,000 was made to the Tell City Furniture Factory. It was organized by twenty-five men, at whose head was John C. Harrer, born June 14, 1822, in Bavaria, the eldest son of George and Christina (Long) Harrer. After learning the cabinet maker's trade and following it through various parts of Germany, he came in 1846 to America, first to Pittsburg, thence to Cincinnati and finally to Perry County. Married twice - in 1847 to Eleanor Rohe and in 1864 to Susan Hannekrath - his Tell City descendants in this generation are many.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

The first store of any consequence was opened as early as April, 1858, by Charles W. Reif, Sr., one of those who had come down the river the previous year to select a town site and who was active among the town's (Tell City) founders. He had come with his wife, Barbara Graf, in 1848 to America from Baden, where he was born January 17, 1817.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

John Jacob Meyer, a native of Canton Zurich, Switzerland, September 24, 1828, one of nine children born to John Jacob and Barbara (Staubli) Meyer, was a pioneer in the hardware business and tinner's trade in which he had served a four years' apprenticeship at home before coming in 1854 to the United States.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

One year earlier (1853) as an immigrant had come Herman Stalder, also a Switzer, from Canton Aargau, born November 26, 1833, his parents, Ludwig and Clara (Herzog) Stalder having brought fourteen children into the world. All three of these men (Reif and Meyer included) were very early merchants who in time became veterans in the commercial circles of Tell City.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

In May, 1858, the original wharfboat was floated down the river from Cincinnati and rented to Frederick Steiner, a native of Canton St. Gall, August 10, 1830, who remained in control for many years, becoming a notable river man, familiar in steamboat circles everywhere and personally conspicuous from his immense size, which made him a striking figure up to his death, October 30, 1882. Facing the wharf he erected the three-story brick hotel which has long been a landmark to river travelers and attained a wide reputation, first as the Steiner House and afterward the Hotel Moraweck.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

Anton Moraweck, for many years its (Steiner House) it manager and later its owner (Hotel Moraweck), was born August 15, 1828, in Bohemia, the youngest child of Joseph and Josepha (Philipp) Moraweck, and had been only two years in America when the impetus of the Swiss Colonization Society brought him in 1858 from Davenport, Iowa, to Perry County. By his marriage, May 13, 1856, to Claudine Kroboth, three children were born of whom the eldest became a physician of international reputation. Dr. Ernest Moraweck was a specialist whose authority carried weight in the clinics of Vienna and Berlin no less than the United States, and it was while returning from one of his frequent voyages across the Atlantic that he lost his life in the tragic sinking of the Titanic, April 15, 1912. His wife, Amelia Basler of Tell City, had died several years earlier, no offspring resulting from the marriage.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

The initial number of the Anzeiger, however, appearing September 1, 1866, was the beginning of a permanent periodical, first owned by M. Schmidt and F. J. Widmer, with an editorial committee of twelve citizens. Within a few years the controlling interest was purchased by George F. Bott, and in his family the establishment remains, thought the Anzeiger was discontinued April 27, 1912, an English paper, the Tell City Journal, having been established in the same office February 18, 1891. For some time its editorial chair was filled by the Francis Anson Evans, one of Perry County's few verse-writers, whose contributions in rime drew special attention to the Journal and were widely copied in Indiana and elsewhere. He was a native Hoosier, and wrote with pleasing and wholly unaffected simplicity of style.

George F. Bott, while not one of the very earliest settlers, came nevertheless to Tell City soon enough (1860) to be classed among the pioneer residents, and lived long enough to see realized many of its promises of substantial development. He was born July 23, 1842, in Ravensburg, Germany, the home of his parents, George and Marie (Bauer) Bott. Coming with them to Perry County, he soon afterward entered upon a printer's apprenticeship at Dubuque, Iowa, and in 1861 enlisted in Company D, First Nebraska Infantry (later Cavalry). His regiment was under Grant at Fort Donelson and Corinth, also participating in many other well-known battles, under Lew Wallace, and he was promoted to sergeant's rank in Company B. Coming back to Tell City after peace was declared, he married Babette Loeb and to their union seven children were born. From 1869 to 1885 he held the office of postmaster, and continued active in journalism up to his death, July 31, 1896.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

The name of Ferdinand Becker is linked with that of the Colonization Society from its beginning, as he was a full-blooded Switzer, born June 22, 1827, in Canton Glarus, the eldest son of Frederick and Elizabeth (Grubermann) Becker. His collegiate education in both French and German was exceptionally thorough, and it was as a cultured young man that he came to America in 1854. Following mercantile pursuits in Cincinnati and Davenport, he left Iowa in 1858 to identify himself with the new colony of his nation in Indiana, and attained in Perry County a degree of prominence for which his abilities well fitted him. From his marriage in 1861 with Mary Gnau, of Cincinnati, sprang a family of descendants who respect his name by honourably maintaining it.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

Michael Bettinger came as a "Forty-eighter" to the United States from Wurttemburg, where he was born September 29, 1824, the son of Martin and Juliane (Grisser) Bettinger. For two and a half years after attaining his majority he wore the uniform of military service, which he was glad to exchange for civilian garb by emigrating to Cincinnati. There he was married in 1849 to Elizabeth Angst, also of Wurttemburg, and together they came to Tell City ten years later. Like many others among the pioneers, he made several changes of occupation before settling down into the woolen manufacture. Of his five children three remained in Tell City, one son making a home in Cincinnati, where his activity found wider scope, especially in advancing the natural river interests of the entire Ohio Valley, a truly colossal work with which the name of Albert Bettinger will always be honourably connected.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

Likewise a native Switzer was John Baumgaertner, born May 1, 1843, in Canton Graubuenden, the second child of Simon and Anna (Fluetsch) Baumgaertner. Educated in the excellent common schools and also at a normal training school in his home town, he taught there until a year after his majority. He came then to America and in December, 1865, settled in Tell City, where he taught German for seven consecutive years. Afterward figuring in politics for two terms as town marshal, he then engaged in the wharfboat business, until his removal in 1879 to Rockport. There he conducted the Verandah Hotel until his death, and his children are of socal and professional prominence in Spencer County.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

Another whose introduction to Tell City was also in the school room, but whose distinction was attained in the realm of finance, was Gustave Huthsteiner, who taught in the new brick shortly after Jacob Bollinger.

He was born April 17, 1844, in Prussia, the eldest son of Edward and Caroline (Aschenbach) Huthsteiner, who came with so many other Germans in 1848 to America, locating in Cincinnati. Here the younger children were born and all received an excellent education through the liberality of their father, a successful merchant of the Queen City. After teaching there for two years, Gustave Huthsteiner came at the age of twenty to Tell City, first clerking in a drug store for a short time before again becoming a teacher.

This experience, added to three months of military service in Company K, Fifth Ohio Cavalry, taught him to read human nature well and developed those traits of logical self-control which made him in maturer years Tell City's leading financier and a strong figure in Perry County politics, serving two consecutive terms as County Treasurer and being elected in 1878 as Representative to the Legislature. Twice married - first to Pauline, daughter of John and Pauline (Stadlin) Weber, who died December 25, 1883; and some years later to Louise Ludwig, also of Tell City - he left at his death, February 1, 1902, a considerable family, of whom some still live in their native town and devote themselves to her well-being, as a privilege no less than an hereditary obligation to the name of Huthsteiner.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

In Anderson Township Captain Andrew P. Batson had reorganized the "Hickory Rangers" and some of those enrolled for the war. A native of Sweden, October 16, 1824, and one of the very few of such nationality in Perry County, Captain Batson came of seafaring parentage (Andrews and Magdalene (Dalsta) Batson) and in his boyhood had encountered many of a sailor's perils. He used to relate how upon the second of several voyages to Rio de Janeiro he was cruelly flogged with the cat-o'-nine tails for his inability to discover the captain's spectacles, which that officer later found over his own forehead. But a life on the rolling deep was not without its pleasure and romance, for at the age of twenty-two, when a second officer on the ship "Ondickee" of Philadelphia, after sailing for two years from New Orleans under the Stars and Stripes, he met as a passenger from Sweden, Prudence Nixson, to whom he was married December 15, 1846. They arrived in Perry County on Christmas Eve of that year, and in 1847 located on the farm in Anderson Township where twelve children were born to them and where the remainder of their lives was spent.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

An industry which for a time during the sixties promised much to Cannelton, and whose failure in fulfilment came about through outside rather than local causes, was the ship-yard undertaken in the spring of 1863 by Samuel King, who removed at that time from Jeffersonville to Perry County. Although born in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania (October 16, 1821), he came of seafaring stock, his father, John W. King, having commanded a sailing vessel in the West Indies trade for many years, and his mother, Nancy Shaw, was also of a New England coast family.

Purchasing from Dow Talbot the saw-mill at the extreme upper edge of Cannelton which had been originally owned by the pioneer, Israel Lake, he entered upon the independent trade of boat building which he had followed through twenty-five years of work for others.

His first and most successful contract was with Captain John W. Carroll, of New Albany, for whom he built the hull of a fine side wheeler whose model proved notably fast, 255 feet long, 43 feet beam, 8-1/2 feet hold. At 4 p.m. Monday, November 2, 1863, the launching took place in presence of a very large crowd, the commander's handsome daughter christening the vessel with her own name, Pauline Carroll. The hull was then taken to New Albany where the cabin and upper works were added.

In February following, work was begun on a floating dock of enormous size, 250 by 110 feet, 30 feet high at the sides and 10 feet at the ends. For its construction 2,500 oak logs were sawed into nearly a million feet of lumber, a cost approximating $27,000. May 21, 1864, the large Ben Stickney was launched for the Southern trade, and some smaller craft, including Captain John Crammond's recess-wheel ferry boat Transit, were built complete at the Cannelton ship-yard, but the unwieldy dock proved a veritable white elephant upon King's hands.

It was eventually sold a great sacrifice, to be towed to New Orleans, and, as the wane of steamboating had already set it, King never fully recouped his fallen fortunes. He continued, however, to operate the saw-mill until 1884, when he sold out to Anton Zellers and Sons, locating for the remainder of his life on a farm in the fertile bottom land of Union Township, between Derby and Dexter. By his marriage, October 16, 1867, to Rachel Indiana, daughter of Nicholas and Ann (Ewing) Vaughan, he had one son, whose son now resides on a portion of the inherited acres.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

Another contemporary enterprise, of longer duration though now also defunct, was the pottery and tile works begun in 1862 by the Clark Brothers who then came to Cannelton from Summit County, Ohio, and for forty years were a prominent clan in local matters, being men of marked activity, interesting themselves in everything appertaining to the home of their adoption.

They were the offspring of Roan and Margaret (DeHaven ) Clark, representing Pennsylvania ancestry, and the children were: 1. Roan, m. Lucinda Carson; 2. Abraham DeHaven, m. Emma Gest; 3. William, m. Alice Johnson; 4. James, m. Rebecca Thompson; 5. Elijah Curtis m. Hester (Cotton) Clark; 6. Martha, M. Cyrus Clark, also of Ohio, but not a relative, although a nephew to Dr. Harmon S. Clark, of Cannelton.

The respective six households of "The Clarks" formed a numerous and happy family connection, given to cordial hospitality and figuring no less in the social life than in business and politics of their day. Notwithstanding the originally large relationship, but few descendants of Clark name still reside in Cannelton, the third generation having widely scattered into other localities, and a pottery started many years afterward by Clark Brothers represents altogether a different family, despite close similarity of names.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

Charles Schmuck soon became associated with his brother (Gabriel) and continued to operate the mill (Superior Mills) until 1880, when it was sold to the brothers, Philip R. and Leonard May. They were natives of Prussia, born respectively December 1, 1840 and May 23, 1842, the elder sons of Charles and Elizabeth (Jacoby) May, and at an early age were brought to Indiana by their parents, who made their home on a farm near Rome, until in 1864 Charles May was elected Sheriff of Perry County. The sons, Philip and Leonard, had enlisted in 1861 in Company B, Third Kentucky Cavalry, so on their return from the war it was to reside in Cannelton, where with other branches the May family has ever since been represented. After some twenty years of varying but usually indifferent success, in which the mill changed hands more than once, it finally suspended, peculiar ill-luck appearing to attend that quarter of town in which these industries of the sixties were located.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

Now one of Perry County's largest industrial establishments (Chair-Makers' Union), its leading owners are Albert P. Fenn, one of Tell City's "native sons," and his brother-in-law, Jacob Zoercher. They are respectively, a son-in-law and a son of Chrisitan Zoercher, Sr., born September 5, 1832, in Bavaria, who came in 1851 to America and in 1868 to Tell City, where he identified himself with the woodworking interests. While not strictly a pioneer, he lived there so long as to win for himself a place among the old and highly esteemed citizens, and through his marriage, in 1859, with Mary Christ, of Cincinnati, numerous descendants maintain the family name.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

Schoetlin and Zuenkler, in 1865, started the Tell City Planing Mill, at an investment of $3,000, selling out two years afterward to a partnership of six men, whose interests were bought out, in turn, by Magnus Kreisle. He had learned the cabinet maker's trade in Germany, where he was born September 9, 1824, coming in 1844 to Cincinnati. Here he was married to Christine Eckhardt, and they moved in 1856 to Indianapolis where their eldest son John M. Kreisle, was born June 28, 1857. Locating in Tell City four years later, Magnus Kreisle made it his home until his death, March 18, 1885, at which time he was in complete control of the planning mill business that is yet a family possession.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

The Krogman distillery, established 1863 by Phillippe and Krogman at a cost of $5,000, is another industry still oeprated by the family of its founder. August Krogman was born December 28, 1821, in Holstein, Germany, where his parents, Johann and Margrethe Krogman passed their lives. He learned the distilling business in his native land and came in 1855 to the United States, working in a brewery in Davenport, Iowa, until 1858, when the tide of German-Swiss immigration brought him in its wake to Perry County.

Here he found employment for a few years in the coal mines at Cannelton, but settled in 1862 at Tell City, with his wife, Dora Schubert, whom he had married in 1856. He lived until October 5, 1905, and of the three children born to him the only son, William Krogman, carries on the inherited business.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

Frederick Voelke, Jr., who founded the Tell City Brewery in 1861, might have been termed a braumeister by inheritance, being the eldest son of a skilled brewer in Hesse-Cassel, Germany, where he was born August 30, 1832. His parents, Frederick and Christine (Gerhardt) Voelke, left Germany along with thousands of others in 1848, coming first to Pittsburgh, but in 1850 to Troy, where the father at once engaged in his regular trade, which he carried on for six years.

The son and namesake, who had received an exceptionally fine musical education in Prussia, spent several years traveling with and playing for theatrical companies in the Middle West and South, but on August 12, 1856, married Nancy, daughter of Green B. Taylor, one of Troy's pioneer merchants. Here he settled and conducted the Troy Brewery until removing, in 1861, to Tell City, where he lived until July 26, 1911.

Ten children were born to his marriage and the mansion which he built is still one of Tell City's handsomest residences, on a site of commanding elevation in Eighth (Main) street, and is one of the very few homesteads in the town still occupied by the third generation of the original family. The brewing business had been discontinued before his death and the buildings were demolished when the property passed into the hands of Mr. and Mrs. William Krogman (Claudine Voelke). An artistically terraced lawn now beautifies their former site, and from the City Park gives to the stately old home a picturesque approach, as well as an appropriate settling for its Italian villa style of architecture.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

August Menninger, born November 21, 1826, at Frankfurt-am-Main, a son of Andreas and Barbara (Pauly) Menninger, engaged in 1860 in the sawmill industry at Tell City, building up an important business which he long managed with great success. He had been well educated in the Fatherland, and gave close attention to the public school system in his adopted home, that its every advantage might be gained by his children, of whom nine were born to him through his marriage in 1850 with Katharina Schmidberger, likewise a native of Germany.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

August Schreiber, a son of Heinrich and Wilhelmine (Colshorn) Schreiber, born December 6, 1837, in Prussia, located at Tell City in the year 1855, twelve years after coming to America. His education in ancient and modern languages, as well as science, had fitted him thoroughly for the druggist's profession upon which he entered, making it a life work so that he attained the highest rank among pharmacists of Perry County during his long years of uninterrupted residence.

Active in the fraternal orders he held positions of responsibility in each to which he belonged, and was the choice of his fellow-citizens as one of Tell City's early mayors. By his marriage, August 25, 1861, to Eva Schloth, a daughter and a son were born, of whom the latter follows in his father's professional footsteps and resides in the old home.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

In military circles Tell City's ranking officer stands as General Gustave Kemmerling, though his record of gallantry had been written on History's page, for his native land no less than for his adopted country, before he came into Perry County at the close of the War Between the States. The son of John and Katharina (Hueten) Kemmerling, born December 9, 1819, in Rhenish Prussia, he was a commandant of militia in his birthplace during the revolution of 1848, coming two years afterward to America.

In 1861, at Cincinnati, he was made Captain of Company F, Ninth Ohio Infantry, and his repeated promotions tell the story of his bravery, - major, lieutenant-colonel, colonel and brigadier-general, although on account of ill-health he declined this highest commission, tendered him after the battle of Chickamauga. Marrying in 1856, Gertrude, daughter of Benedict and Gertrude (Effinger) Steinauer, Tell City became his home in 1865. Of two children born to them only one survives, Captain Gustave Kemmerling, II, a graduate of the United State Naval Academy at Annapolis now government inspector of machinery and materials for the New York Ship-building Company, with headquarters at Camden, New Jersey.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

While his settling in Tell City was early in the decade of the seventies, it was also as a wounded soldier that John T. Patrick became a citizen of the community where for two-score years his was a familiar figure. A slight irregularity of step served as a daily reminder of the battle of Stone River where he was wounded and disabled for further service, with Company G, Eighty-first Indiana Infantry, in which he had enlisted when only twenty years of age.

Born April 6, 1842, in Crawford County, his parents were John D. and Mary (Powers) Patrick, both natives of Maryland, who came about 1840 to Indiana. John T. Patrick was a successful teacher in his young manhood, then served as Clerk of the Perry Circuit Court from 1876 to 1884. During this time he studied law and in May, 1884, was admitted to the bar, where he continued as an active practitioner until his death, June 19, 1915. He was twice married; in 1879 to Margaret Menninger, and in 1883 to Ann Menninger, both daughters of August and Katharina (Schmidberger) Menninger, and a numerous family of children survive their father, treasuring his precepts and his example.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

Andrew J. Adye, who was born January 15, 1831, in Chautauqua County, New York, was the fifth son of Andrew and Laura (Whicher) Adye, who removed in 1837 from the Empire State to the Hoosier State, finding a location in Clark Township where the father died in 1845. Andrew, Jr., when a youth, made numerous flatboat voyages out of Anderson River - then considered a "navigable" stream - down the Ohio and Mississippi. At the age of twenty-three, however, he settled down to mercantile pursuits near the home farm and December 13, 1857, was married to Barbara Ann, daughter of Jacob and Sarah (Miles) Kesner, four children being the offspring of the marriage.

He was practically the founder of Adyeville, entering its town plat in 1873 and serving nineteen years as postmaster. While almost self-educated, his own research made him a man of unusual attainments, especially in nature study and the allied sciences, and he discovered several medical remedies of vegetable compound, which earned prosperity for him in his later years. As township trustee and county commissioner he held elective offices, being an ardent exponent of the Jacksonian Democracy taught by "Old Hickory" whose name he bore.

The Adye family were vigorous Baptists, affiliating with the church of that belief organized in 1847, and were also connected with an early school of exceptional merit, conducted for several years at private expense in their neighbourhood.

Perry County
A History
by Thomas de la Hunt
The W.K. Stewart Company, Indianapolis
Published 1916

see information sent from researcher:
My name is Rod Lance Adye and I live near Dallas, Tx. I was born in Iowa, but moved to Illinois while still quite young. At the passing of my father, I inherited the Adye family bible, which drew by interest in our family heritage. While I was searching on the internet I found the website that you had created. I wanted to draw attention to the area of which you had writen concerning Andrew J. Adye. Stated in the article was that Andrew was the son of Andrew and Laura Whicher Adye. According to my bible which was purchased in London, England by John Adye, the actual name of Andrew's father was Aner Adye. Andrew"s mother was as listed, Laura (Whicher) Adye.

If you have any additional information of my ancestors I would greatly appreciate if you could fill me in with what you may have found in your research. I would be more than willing to send you anything pertaining to the Adye heritage that might interest you. Thank you,