I joined the list to help my mom do some research on SCHINDELDECKER
(sometimes spelled SHINDELDECKER or SHINGLEDECKER). There were
Schindeldeckers in Franklin County from the late 1830s until 1851 that we
know of.
My wife and I took my parents down to Franklin County last week to do some
looking, and we had an enjoyable time. We didn't come up with much new
information, but had a chance to see the area for the first time, including
the 40-acres where our Schindeldecker ancestors lived. It was not at all
what we had expected. We had thought Indiana=flat country. Even though I
knew it was different along the Ohio River, I hadn't expected Franklin
county to have all those hills and hollows.
It's a very pretty place. At first sight of the area we were asking
ourselves what could have provoked the Schindeldeckers to leave it for
Minnesota (the state where my parents now live). But the 40 acres were
along Blue Creek, now inaccessible by road. When we visited the place
(thanks to a landowner who let us hike to it despite all his "Keep Out"
signs) and saw how little of it was flat enough to have been farmed, we
could imagine that it would have been hard to make a living there. We're
trying to learn more about this--it appears from some courthouse records
(which we haven't seen firsthand) that George Schindeldecker also did some
other business besides farming.
We also wonder if there is more information about these people in church
records. The Schindeldeckers were almost certainly Lutheran. Is there any
knowledge of what happened to the Lutheran church that was on Blue Creek
west of St. Peter's? (We did visit the little cemetery there.) Did it
fold and join with the one by Klemmes Corners? (I knew I had seen that name
before.) I did get a chance to read some of the information on how the two
churches at that location had originally been one.
John Gorentz
jgorentz(a)iserv.net
Battle Creek, MI