Well, I have some news on the family tree – I was able to get a hold of, what looks like, a distant relative in Germany – I won’t tell his name, only that it appears that when my Great-Great-Grandfather immigrated to the U.S., at which point he changed his last name from Schoffelmann to Schoffelman.
So i took a stab in the dark – I started searching some of my internet channels for the last name Schoffelmann and came across one who lives in Germany. He confirmed that He remembered his Dad telling him that he had a few distant relatives that immigrated to the U.S.
The neat thing about is, from old records I found a few years ago, I knew our family came from a specific region in Germany. When I asked Mr. Schoffelmann from Germany where his family was from, he listed that same area as a part of his origin.
Now, there’s more information to it, but for the sake of reserving the privacy of my family, i won’t divulge anymore information – unless of course – you are family. In which case, just get a hold of me.
~tj
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Ok, so I guess it’s been around a year, maybe more since my grand-father passed away & as our family has gone through my grandparents belongings, they’ve come across an old Lutheran Hymn book w/ our last name spelled “Schoffelmann”. First name I can’t quite make out, mainly b/c it’s type is some funky lettering & there’s a little bit of wear and tear on it. But it got me thinking again about my family history.
On the research I’ve done so far, I’ve found out that my great-grandfathers name was John and his dad’s name John as well. He first came to the United States back in the late 1800’s.
Then I started thinking about that old Hymn book, with our last name being spelled with two N’s instead of one – so I Googled it – and wow, most of the results were in the German language. I’ve done many searches on “Schoffelman”, only for most of them to show a limited number of results – but this site seemed to open the door a little bit more – http://www.sdhistory.org/arc/naturalizationarchives/firstpaperslist.asp?start=83981
This site and my many other searches still hasn’t gotten me into contact with any one from my family tree back in Germany, but my hope is that some day I’ll that lead I’ve been looking for. So if there’s anyone in the family out there that’s had better luck than I have, please feel free to email me or comment.
~tj
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