Ralph Jarvis married Chleo Webb. Chleo was born in 1900 on a farm south of Larned, Kansas.
Chleo’s mother was Anna Buhrer.
Anna Mary Buhrer (2G) was born Saturday, October 19, 1867, in Archbold, Fulton County, Ohio. Her parents were John Jacob Buhrer and Catherine Theobald Buhrer (3G).
Jacob Buhrer had come to Ohio in 1851 at age 34 from Bibern Valley, Scheffhausen, Switzerland in 1850. He settled near Archbold, Ohio, in Fulton County.
Michael Theobald and Philipena Scheer Theobald (4G) came to Seneca County, Ohio, in 1835, and then moved to Fulton County in 1847. Their daughter Catherine was the second of eight children. She was born July 19, 1832. The Theobald’s had a farm one mile southeast of Archbold.
Jacob Buhrer and Catherine Theobald were married in 1853. He was age 36 and she was 21.
Jacob and Catherine bought a farm in 1853 three miles west of the Theobald farm. There they farmed and raised their family.
Anna Mary Buhrer was the 8th of 11 children. Philipena, the oldest, was born in 1854. Anna was born in 1867, and Valentine, the youngest in 1874. All the children were born in Archbold, in Fulton County, Ohio. Three of the children, John, Catherine, and Elizabeth died in infancy or childhood. The remaining eight children all lived into the mid-twentieth century.
Jacob and Catherine and family lived in Fulton County for 25 years. Here’s their house in Ohio.
From Ohio to Kansas
When Anna was eleven years old, in 1878, the Buhrer family sold out in Ohio and moved to Kansas.
Why pull up stakes after 25 years? I don’t know. It must have been a significant reason or change in circumstances. Jacob was age 61, Catherine 46.
Whereas Ohio in 1878 was modern and populated, southwest Kansas was still on the frontier’s edge.
The Atchison, Topeka, and Santa Fe Railroad had reached Larned and the western border of Kansas in 1872. So the Buhrer’s 1878 trip from Ohio to Kansas was made by railroad.
Larned, Pawnee County, Kansas
We’re lucky to have Anna’s recollection of their journey from Ohio to Kansas. She wrote some memories of her early days in Pawnee County that were published in the Larned Chronoscope newspaper in August of 1947.
Father and our family arrived in Larned in the spring of 1878, late in the night. The remainder of the night we sat in chairs in the Larned hotel.
In the morning brother Mike and Adolph White came in on the freight train with our two horses, furniture, and our little black dog. Also the Cleek furniture. The Cleek family came on the passenger train with us.
During the morning John Richards and his father came and took us to their home until the men could unload the cars in to a two room house southwest of Larned.
Anna Buhrer Webb – Larned Chronoscope – August 21, 1947
Now the work begins…
The Buhrers were in Larned. Now they must build a place to live and a way to subsist. We’ll see how they go about that in the next story.
Sources
- Family tree – Jacob and Catherine Buhrer – Ancestry.com
- Photo – Buhrer Ohio house – Jarvis Family Documents – Chleo Webb Jarvis collection
- Map composite – Ohio – New Railroad Map of Ohio – Frank Arnold Gray – 1872
- Map – composite – Ohio and Fulton County – Historical Atlas of the World – Fulton County, Ohio – H H Hardesty – 1875 – https://www.ohiohistory.org/OHC/media/OHC-Media/Documents/SHPO/Atlas/Hardesty-s_Atlas_of_Fulton_County_1875.pdf
- Quotation – Anna Buhrer Webb recollection of move to Larned – The Larned Chronoscope – August 21, 1947 – Jarvis Family Documents – Chleo Webb Jarvis collection
- Railroad maps – A geographically correct county map of the states traversed by the Atchison Topeka and the Santa Fé Railroad and its connections. – 1880 – Library of Congress – https://www.loc.gov/item/98688578/
- Image – railroad watch and brochure – Kansas State Historical Society – https://www.kshs.org/kansapedia/railroads-in-kansas/15120
- Image – Main Street, Larned, Kansas – 1876 – Panorama of Progress – Tiller and Toiler – 1972
- Image – Passenger train of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, around 1895 – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:ATSF_1890s_passenger_train.jpg
- Image – Immigrants unloading at the railroad yards in Larned, Pawnee County, Kansas – 1880-1890 – Kansas Memory – https://www.kansasmemory.org/item/315296/page/1
- Image – An unidentified girl standing in a corn field and a team of horses pulling a plow in Sherman County, Kansas. (Neg. no.1) – Veselik-Gannon photograph collection –Kansas Memory – https://www.kansasmemory.org/item/214491/page/2
Family Nibbles 
