Johann Vogedes 

Note:

a) Johann and Theresa and family came to US on the ship Weser from Bremen Germany leaving 5/18/1854 and arriving in Baltimore 7/17/1854. They were listed as being from Sandebeke (Sandeback) Germany. On the ship with them was a Krome family and Theresa Nolte.nnThe Arrival of the Pioneers at Marathon City, WInShortly before the year 1856, in and near the city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, a group of mill workers and other laborers saw no future for themselves nor their children in the jobs available in that city. They were mostly Catholic immigrants from Germany and Switzerland who had come to this country in the 1840's. They were now looking for a life in the country where they could live off the land.nThey learned that government land was available in Central and Northern Wisconsin at the cost of $110.00 for an eighty acre "farm". The PITTSBURGH GERMAN HOMESTEAD SOCIETY was organized the same year, and a delegation of three members was sent to Northern Wisconsin to seek and buy "farms".nBy means of train and stagecoach, they got as far as Stevens Point. There public transportation ended. But luckily they found out that the Federal Land Office for the area north to the Michigan line was at Stevens Point.nFrom maps at this government office, they chose about 1600 acres near the Big Rib River, about fifteen miles west of Big Bull Falls (now Wausau), and not much further from Little Bull Falls (now Mosinee). These two falls were on the Wisconsin River, and both places had mills, stores, churches, and doctors. So the area on the Big Rib River was chosen because it would be within driving distance. The lands purchased were mostly in the present towns of Marathon and Cassel, west and south of the Big Rib River.nOn their return to Pittsburgh, the Committee and the Society made tentative plans for the new settlement. From the map and plat sheet they had brought back of the land, they determined that the village would be on the south bank of the Big Rib River in the northwest corner of what is now Marathon City. Each member was to pay $116.00 for an eighty acre "farm:", a lot in the village, a lot in the cemetery, and a three acre out-lot north of the river.nIn the spring of 1857, the first group of "colonists" left Pittsburgh. Some were single, others married with or without children. They went by rail to New Berlin, just west of Milwaukee, then by horse drawn vehicles to Stevens Point. There they took the steamboat, which had just begun its first and only season of service to Mosinee. Thus far their venture looked promising. But on arriving at Mosinee, they were told that the only way to get to their destination in the "vast wilderness" was by going through the dense forest without a trail, or by what was recommended - paddling in canoes up the Wisconsin River to Big Bull Falls (Wausau) and then up the Big Rib River to their destination, Marathon City.nIt was their first unpleasant surprise, but there were more and greater ones in store for them. After consulting with Joseph Dessert, a lumberman at Mosinee, who owned land southwest of the present village of Marathon, they engaged a half-breed Indian and a few others with canoes. Paddling up the Wisconsin River nearly to the present site of Wausau, they entered the mouth of the Big Rib River and finally reached the place in the wilderness, which was to become their hometown, Marathon.nThis first group of pioneers was now on their own, miles from no-where, surrounded by vast time, with an occasional glimpse of a star, but with a fond faith and hope in a God beyond. They lost no time in making temporary shelters in which they could wait for help in finding their own eighty acre farm which each had drawn by lot.nThis first group included Robert Schilling, John Linder, Thomas Peternick, Joseph Haesle, Michael Bauer, Francis Tiggs and Anton Koester. It is difficult at this time to ascertain who was single, married or had children with them.nOther members of their society came later that year. They included George and Kunigunda Land with their family of five children, George Vetter, Herman and Ottilia Seliger with several children, and John and Theresa Bogedes (VOGEDES) with five children. John died this same year. Non-society members who also came in 1857 were Bernard Hilber and Mathias Halkawitz.nOthers of who we have no records arrived and finding themselves in such a remote wilderness without signs of civilization, and the farms being just an unmarked part of an endless wilderness, returned to their Eastern homes if they had the financial means. Otherwise they went to another part of this state to find employment.nAmong the pioneers listed, besides those mentioned above were: Karl Bechtold Sebastian Karl Frank Mitsch Ludwig Schmidt John Blume Fritz Klink Isadore Murr Joseph Urban Jacob Duerstein John Loy John Sauter Henry WitberlandnThe first settlers arriving in 1857 built two houses on the East Side of Main Street just south of the river in Marathon. These were used until their lands were located and log cabins or temporary shelters were put up on the various eighty-acre plots of forest.nThese pioneer farmers had their trials, their hardships, their sufferings, their privations and for many years the coarsest of food and garments. The worst days of anxiety and fear, amounting almost to desperation, were experiences when sickness laid its paralyzing hand on a member of the family or community, and there was no way to alleviate the pain. There was no physician wiothin miles, not even roads to reach one. Then when death came as an angel of mercy to the stricken one, and the wasted body was laid to rest in a rough pine box, what must have been the feeling of the father, mother, or children reared in a Christian heritage when the body was interred without the last consolation of religion. It was not until the end of 1859 that an itinerant Priest could visit them six times a year.nIt was a hard life, even for the strongest of them. The man of the cabin had to walk fifteen miles to get provisions. Then he had to carry them on his back through swamps and wilderness. Some went to work in mills in Wausau or Mosinee. Some went to logging camps further away to earn the means to buy axes and other equipment to clear their land of the vast supply of lumber. The trees had to be cut down and into pieces to be burned. There was little market and no means of transporting logs from this wilderness. Gradually, land was cleared to support the owners.