Reaching across the sea -- finding a cousin?

In recent weeks, we've had the good fortune to make contact with a lady in Reutlingen, Germany, who may very well be a "cousin" to our Miller clan from western Nebraska.

Lydia Leis, who works as a translator, writes us that her family emigrated from Kazakhstan to Germany in 1991.  Her great-grandparents were Johan Friedrich and Elizabeth (Steinbrecher) Miller.  Both were born in our ancestral village of Unterdorf on the "bergseite" of the Volga in 1869.

While there is no picture of Elizabeth, we were delighted that Lydia forwarded us this undated photograph of her great-grandfather, Johann Friedrich Miller.  Johan's father was Philip Miller, but there is no additional information about him.

Lydia's charts show that Johan and Elizabeth Miller had six children: Eva, born in Unterdorf in 1895; Peter, born in Unterdorf in 1897; Alexander, born in 1902; David, born in 1904; Heinrich, born in Unterdorf in 1906; and Friedrich, also born in Unterdorf, but with no listed date of death.  David was Lydia's grandfather.  He married Rosalia Stenger, who was born in Baku, Aberbajan, located on the west side of the Caspian Sea.   Both David and Rosalia Miller died in 1980 -- her place of death is listed as Zelinograd, Kazakhstan.

David and Rosalia had two children:  Leo, born in Unterdorf, and a daughter whom they named Rosalia.  She was born in Kazakhstan, so the family may well have been displaced there during or prior to World War Two, but we can't be certain.  Perhaps Lydia will share this information with us if and when it is available.

Lydia Leis was also kind enough to send us a photograph of her grandfather, David Miller.  His older sister, Eva (Miller) Bornhoef, is with him in the photo, and we've posted it in our Miller Gallery.  Eva died in Germany in 1977.

We are hopeful that further examination of family records and photographs might allow us to learn more about the Miller families of Unterdorf.  There were several, and we suspect that most of them were related.  Only time -- with avid research, and a bit of luck -- will tell.

Remembering "Uncle Hank"

Henry Miller was born August 31, 1913, while the Miller family lived in Chicago. Before he was old enough to enter school, the family moved to Watertown, South Dakota, where Hank probably began school. However, it’s likely that his most formative years were growing up in the Scottsbluff area.

Pete and Dora lived at several location in “the valley,” and that’s where they lived as son Hank became a teenager. Although we don’t know, he may well have endured the kind of anxiety that many youngsters have when they’re uprooted from family and friends. Although the distance from the Scottsbluff to Whitney is not that far – in the late 1920s it was a formidable distance. Too, there were numerous aunts, uncles and cousins in Scottsbluff. Most likely, this was not a move that pleased Hank

By the time Pete and Dora settled north of Whitney, Hank was about 14 years old. By all accounts, he was a gregarious and fun-loving youngster. His brother Fred – who was about 10 years younger than Hank – remembers a time when a group of Whitney fellows were having a card party at Claude Stewart’s house, next to where the old Post Office was at the main intersection in Whitney. Among the group were Ralph Grant, Claude Stewart, Al Schmechel and his father-in-law, as well as Hank. It seems the group ran out of beer and “…they elected Hank to run to Crawford to get a case of beer.” On the trip back, so the story goes, Hank swerved to miss a mule by the road, and his car tipped over onto its side. Not injured, Hank sent word on to Whitney with a passing motorist. When the fellows arrived to help, Hank was sitting on top of the car drinking the beer.

Hank didn’t date girls much, according to his brother Fred. However, at some poinet in the early 1930s, he and Clarence Connell became acquainted with the three Field sisters, whose father was a railroad section foreman at Horn, north of Crawford. Clarence ended up marrying Mary Field, and – much to the surprise of many – Hank began dating Leora Field. Brother Fred recalls that Hank and Leora were planning to get married, when a horrible accident changed everything.

It was one day in about 1936 when Leonard “Red” Schmell approached Hank and asked him if he’d tighten the rods in Schmell's old Chevrolet. Hank agreed, and they headed to the grain elevator, where there was a hoist.

This was an air hoist that was used to help off-load wheat from trucks. The vehicles would drive in and the front wheels would set up on a platform, and a little air compressor would raise the truck and dump the wheat.. They put Schmell’s car on the hoist so Hank could get under the car and complete the work.

“He was just about done with it, and he crawled down under there, and that hoist came down on him – broke his back,” remembers Fred Miller.

Hank Miller would never walk again. He was 22 years old. He called off the wedding.

For some years, Hank was able to get around a bit on crutches, but he essentially spent the rest of his life in bed or in a wheel chair. For 20 years after the accident, Hank lived with his parents. With their passing, he lived for some time with his brother John and family in Chadron, before moving to the nursing home in Chadron. That is where he lived for the final years of his life.

Surely there were moments of anguish and despair, but Hank didn’t wear those emotions on his sleeve. He would often get out and about to family picnics and other gatherings and displayed a quiet but wry sense of humor.

Hank also found a place as a “fix-it” handyman at the nursing home. Since his days as a teenager, he had been interested in radios. His friendship with Bob Galloway, another Whitney resident who was an amateur radio operator, would lead to a life-long interest in shortwave radio listening.

Hank Miller died in Chadron, Nebraska on March 12, 1984. Like both his mother and father, he was 71 years old when he died.

Here's the scoop: Miller family reunion planned

From California and Texas to Washington and the Dakotas, Miller Family members will be congregating next year for the first family reunion we've had since the 1980s......and you're invited!  Of course, we're also hoping to see cousins from Alaska, Kentucky, Michigan, and elsewhere.

Mark your calendars for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, June 24-25-26 of 2011.  Tentatively, we've planned for the reunion to focus on Wilson Park in Chadron, although we can easily shift the site to either Fort Robinson State Park or Chadron State Park.  Both are within 30 minutes of Wilson Park.  And it's just a stone's throw away from the village of Whitney, Nebraska, long-time home to Pete and Dora Miller, our German-Russian ancestors who were directly responsible for most of us being here!

It was mostly our moms and dads and a few cousins that gathered in Chadron, Nebraska for the last reunion at Wilson Park in Chadron more than two decades ago -- so we're due!

This will be a wonderful chance for "cousins" to get together to meet and get reacquainted with relatives not seen for many years. Sharing photos, memories and stories will be punctuated with lots of fun things to do for the entire family in the beautiful "Pine Ridge" region of northwest Nebraska.

While details are not yet in place, we ask that you mark JUNE 24-25-26, 2011 on your calendars, and start making plans now to join in this celebration of family.

Importantly, if you can offer ideas and suggestions for this reunion, please let us hear from you. Just e-mail us with comments, questions, etc.  We're in the process of gathering names, addresses, phone numbers, and e-mail addresses of all our Miller relatives.  Please send your information (and that of any others who might be interested in the reunion) to cousin Pete Miller  in Metaline Falls, Washington or cousin Larry Miller in Spearfish, South Dakota.



We'll soon be posting information about camping and lodging facilities in the Chadron/Whitney/Fort Robinson area, along with phone numbers and web sites where you can get further details.

We'll post more reunion information on this site in the weeks and months to come, so please check back from time to time!

"Cousins" reunited in 1979

While we’re tempted to say this was a gathering of German-Russian “cousins” – and a couple of them are – there’s really a mixture of relationships reflected in this August 1979 photograph.

It was taken at the home of Katie (Steinbrecher) Behm in Scottsbluff, Nebraska. Shown left-to-right are: Pauline (Behm) Greenhalgh, Marie (Behm) Hergenrader, Marie (Miller) Derrick, and Katie (Steinbrecher) Behm. Click on the photo to see a slightly larger image, or visit our Miller Gallery.

Pauline and Marie – both born in Unterdorf, Russia – were the daughters of Pete and Eva (Miller) Behm. Marie (Miller) Derrick was a cousin to Pauline and Marie. She was born in Longmont, Colorado to Pete and Dora (Eckerdt) Miller. Pete Miller and Eva (Miller) Behm were siblings. At right is Katherine “Katie” (Steinbrecher) Behm, who was married to Alex Behm, an older brother to Pauline and Marie – shown on the left here. So…..Katie was a sister-in-law to Pauline and Marie (Behm), and a wife of the first cousin to Marie (Miller) Behm.

Confused? So were we for a while, but it’s finally beginning to make sense after all these years!

Sisters Pauline and Marie Behm were both born in Unterdorf, Russia. Marie was born in October 1901, some five years before the family chose to emigrate to the United States. By late 1906, the family was settled in Longmont, Colorado, where sister Eva (Behm) Lei was born in March of 1908. But within two years, Pete and Eva Behm pulled up stakes and returned to Unterdorf, and that’s where their daughter Pauline was born. By late 1911, they chose to return once more to the United States.

Such migration was surely a formidable task, even in the best of times. But we believe that Behm’s were not a well-to-do family, which makes their adventures all the more remarkable.