The Circle of Life Around Amelia

The Findlay Republican-Courier, March 16, 1965, carried the obituary of Theodore Drewes, the intended husband of Amelia when young and the father of Alvin.  
It depicted a lonely life. 














Alvin Spoering was born January 21, 1921, in Henry County.  His obituary was located on the site for the funeral home that served the family.  He died in Traverse City, Michigan on June 13, 2010.

ALVIN SPOERING.  
TRAVERSE CITY.
Alvin H. "Al" Spoering, C.P.A., passed aw"ay peacefully Sunday, June 13, 2010, in the presene of family members at Munson Medical Center, at the age of 89.  Al was born Jan. 21, 1921, in Napoleon, Ohio.  After high school, Al moved with his family from Napoleon to Traverse City.  There he met Elinore Lyle; they were married in 1942.

Al served honorably in the U.S. Army in Europe during World War II.  After the war, he attended Michigan State University where he received a degree in accounting.  Later, Al earned certification as a Certified Public Accountant.
He worked in the pipeline industry in Michigan and Ohio for over 20 years before retiring as the Treasurer of Mid-America/Welded Construction in 1983.

In retirement, Al and Elinore moved back to Traverse City.  He was an avid golfer and achieved two holes in one.  He also enjoyed playing bridge, walking through Old Mission Peninsula, and working in his beautiful backyard gardens.  For the last year of his life, Al  was a resident of Orchard Creek Assisted Living. 

Al is survived by  his wife, Elinore of Traverse City, sons, Charlie (Kathy) of Cadillac, John (Hilda) of Holland, Mich., and Tom (Jane Anne) of Calgary, Canada.  He leaves six grandchildren..., and six great-grandchildren.In addition, Al is survived by a step-brother, Julian Schlagel of Williamsburg; a half-brother, LeRoy Schlagel of Traverse City, and numerous nieces and nephews.  He was preceded in death by a step-brother, Jerry Schlagel.

His wife, Elinore Charlote (Lyle) Spoering passed away peacefully on July 6, 2019 at the age of 94.  She and Alvin were married for 68 years.  In 2016, she moved into assisted living.  She was also a golfer and a bridge player, as well as a traveler.  She loved her Boston Terriers. " 


As mentioned in the previous blog, Amelia cared for two stepsons, Julian and Jerry Schlagel.  Jerry Jacob Schlagel, born on November 21, 1925, married Elizabeth Jane Rokes in 1948. Julian Henry, born October 15, 1923, married Loree Stevens on July 31, 1948.  

An obituary could not be found for Jerry at this time, but Julian's appeared in the Traverse City Record-Eagle on July 19, 2012.

A side note on the mother of Julian and Jerry - Christine Hogrefe Schlagel Onyon:
Her obituary:  "Napoleon - Mrs. Christine Onyon, 60, 332 Front St., died Sunday in her home of an apparent heart attack.  A lifelong area resident, she was born in Henry County to Henry and Minnie (Marksch) Hogrefe and married Clifford Onyon.  He died in 1948.  She had been employed as a domestic for a number of years.
Surviving are two sons, Eugene Onyon, Napoleon, and Julian Schlagel, Traverse City, Mich.; a brother, Henry Hogrefe, Napoleon, and a sister, Miss Doris Hogrefe, Los Angeles, Calif....Burial will be in Forest Home Cemetery.

 
Amelia and Henry's son, LeRoy
served in the military, as did all of his
brothers.  













  Sidetracking...
 

 We will go down a path away from the family now to reveal a story concerning Henry Schlagel's first wife, Hulda Kaiser Spoering, and her second husband.  Henry and Hulda had no children and divorced rather quickly.  The divorce was final on April 19, 1921, and on May 4, 1921, Hulda married Arthur L. Scott who was 17 years her senior.  Arthur had also been married once before, although he did not mention that on the marriage registration.  They were soon divorced, and Arthur would go on to marry three more times, all short-lived relationships...five wives in total.  Hulda would marry once more to William Hazen and they lived in Indiana, where she died in 1986.  She was buried in Wauseon Cemetery.

But the story here lies with Arthur L. Scott who called himself an interior decorator on the censuses, but he was also an inventor and all around entrepreneur.  The invention that made the papers in Detroit involved a water walking suit.  Once, while working on a cruise ship, he noticed that some birds seemed to be able to walk on the water.  He reasoned that man should have the ability to do that in case of an accident on the water. ( Arthur could not swim himself.)   He came up with a suit that he felt would keep him above water.  It was equipped with a flashlight in the shoulder and various pockets for food and water.  


On July 4, 1941, he tested his invention on the Detroit River.  He promised that the suit would not leak any water and that he would be perfectly dry when he finished his walk to Belle Isle.  The press was invited, of course.

Was he successful?  










Read on...

Arthur died soon after this experiment, on November 20, 1947.  The Traverse City Record-Eagle reported:

"Arthur L. Scott died this morning at the Boardman Valley Hospital.  He was 61 years old. Mr. Scott was born at Marion, January 18, 1883, and for the past two years has resided at 853 East Eighth Street.  He served in World War I with Detachment of Patients in General Hospital No. 43 and, after his discharge from the army, made his home in Detroit.
Mr. Scott was a member of the Veterans of Foreign Wars in Detroit.  The body was taken to the Sampson Funeral Home where services will be held Saturday afternoon at two thirty.  Burial will be in Oakwood Cemetery."

No family?
 
Sometimes a story just demands telling.  Excuse my digression.

Ida Anna Emilia Spoering

Ida Anna Emelia, known as Amelia/Emelia, born on January 19, 1897, was the youngest daughter of Henry and Catherine (Floke) Spoering.  As a child, Amelia lived first in Monroe Township and then Richfield Township, Henry County.  

In the 1920 census, she lived with her widowed mother, 64, and her younger brother, George, 20, a farmer.  Mela, as the family called Amelia, was 22 and single.






In a previous post, her relationship with Theodore Drewes was discussed and the birth of her son, Alvin, in 1921.  
 https://attheriverbend.blogspot.com/2016/09/amelia-spoering-strong-woman-for-her-day.html

Her mother died in 1925, so it may have been that Amelia and her son, Alvin, stayed with her younger brother, George, on the farm until May 28, 1929, when she married Henry Jacob Schlagel, son of Jacob and Marie Elisabeth (Mueller/Miller) Schlagel.  The Schlagels were immigrants from Gololobowka, Russia, and German was their language. Gololobowka (Doendorf) was a German settlement created when the Russians opened up land in Russia for settlement by Germans. (Read about the Volga Germans here.)

 Their marriage certificate indicated that Henry had been married once before, but in truth, it may have been twice before.  A marriage record from September 15, 1919, proved a marriage between Henry and Hulda Kaiser in Wauseon, Ohio.

T

his was a short-lived marriage that ended in divorce on April 19, 1921. Hulda filed on November 5, 1920, accusing Henry of extreme cruelty.  In the 1920 census, Henry Schlagel, married, was living with a couple in their apartment in Detroit.  He worked as a finisher in an auto tire place. So they were separated at that time; they had no children.

On January 11, 1923, in Napoleon, Ohio, Henry J. Schlagel, 26, married the 18 year old Christine Hogrefe, daughter of Henry and Minnie (Marks/Marksch) Hogrefe.

Julian Schlagel

Christine and Henry had two sons, Julian Henry, born October 15, 1923, and Jerry Jacob, born November 21, 1925.  Sometime between Jerry's birth and 1930, the couple divorced.  Christine went on to marry Clifford W. Onyon on October 18, 1930.  Earlier that year, the 1930 census showed Christine Schlagel living in Napoleon on Leonard Street, in a rented house, with her two sons, and Clifford Onyon, 34, a lodger who was a hoop cutter in the hoop factory.
                                                 
    

Jerry Schlagel

In 1930, Henry and Amelia (married in 1929) lived at 403 East Main Street, Napoleon.  He worked at a furniture store. They had only Amelia's son, Alvin Spoering, 9, at home with them.

 (Cousins, do you recognize the 403 East Main address?  That was where Grandparents Albert and Ida Elling lived when I was very small. Did Amelia sell the home to them when they moved to Michigan?)

Henry and Amelia moved to 518 Fifth Street, Traverse City, Michigan, after 1935. Henry Schlagel, Head, 44, was enumerated there in the 1940 census.  He worked in a hardware store for a salary of $1080 yearly.  
Amelia and Henry had a son, Leroy David on Sepember 12, 1934, so he was counted there along with his step-brothers, Julian, 16, and Jerry, 14.  Alvin could not be found on a search of the census.  He would have been about 19 at the time and probably had moved out.

 

Amelia (L) and Lydia Spoering Loudon  (photo in Jason Snow collection)

Henry Schlagel died in Traverse City on January 12, 1985, at the age of 88.  His son, Jerry Jacob, preceded him in death when 39 on May 29, 1965.

Both were buried at 
Memorial Gardens Cemetery
in Traverse City, Michigan, along with other members of the family.

AAAA   AAA  Amelia lived just two years more, until December 4, 1987, dying at 90 years old.  Her obituary from a Traverse City newspaper:

"Amelia Schlagel, 90, a homemaker, died Friday at Grand Traverse Medical Care Facility.  She had lived in Traverse City since 1939.  She was a member of Trinity Lutheran Church and of the church's Altar Guild and Ladies Aid.

Born in Henry County, Ohio, on January 19, 1897, she was the daughter of Henry and Maria (Flocke) Spoering.  On April 18, 1929, in Napoleon, Ohio, she married Henry J. Schlagel, who died in 1985.
Also preceding her in death were a son, Jerry, two grandchildren, a great grandchild, seven sisters and three brothers.  
Surviving are three sons, Alvin H. Schlagel of Perrysburg, Ohio; Julian H. Schlagel of Williamsburg, and Leroy D. Schlagel of Traverse City, 13 grandchilren and 14 great-grandchildren.

Funeral services will be held at 2 p.m. Monday at Trinity Lutheran church, the Rev. Charles Gieschen will officiate.  Burial will be in Grand Traverse Memorial Gardens.  Friends may call at the Traverse City Chapel of Covell Funeral Homes from 7-9 tonight and from 2-4 and 7-9 Sunday.  Memorials made to the Trinity Lutheran Church Altar Guild."