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All these people lived in
Old Austria which is now Yugoslavia in the country of Stajersko near the
town of Sostanjn on the farms. Grandmother or Ma's mother's name
was Gertie, her maiden name is unknown. She married one Miklovzina,
his first name was John, in the late 1870s, and she was a housewife.
They lived in a flour mill
run by water. Her husband was a miller, he would grind grain into
flour. He could also grind such as Walnuts, Hazel nuts, Pumpkin seeds,
Sunflour seeds, Beachnut seeds, and make oil out of them, Pumpkin seed
oil was the best, and he was a farmer. His death is unknown.
To this union was born one
girl named Anna on July 26, 1880 and when the mill was sold, then Gertie
Miklovzina and Anna Miklovsina lived where ever they could get a place
to rent. At the age of about 13, Anna got a job babysitting, she
did this for two years then she went to learn dress making for about 2
or 3 years, then she was on her own as a dress maker as long as she lived
in Yugoslavia until 1920.
Grandmother, Gertrude Miklovzina,
was born in 1840 and died in 1917.
Grandpa John Golob, or dad's
father died in 1905 of cancer in the throat.
Grandmother on dad's side was
Antonia Stopar. She also lived on a farm, her date of birth is unknown.
On this farm was a hot spring, also a cold water spring. When it
rained a long time the water would raise and lots of trout would come out,
so there must have been a lake inside of the mountain.
When this farm was sold for
a small amount the new owner sold it for a very good profit, and they made
a big resort out of the hot water spring. The also built a hospital
there for T. B. patients.
Antonia Stopar married one
John Golob in the middle or late part of 1870. To this union was
born 13 children, 4 died in their early years, and 9 lived. Of those
that lived my dad was the oldest. His name was Anton, then came Michael,
Fred or Ferdined, Helen, John, Jerry, Leona, Anna, and Louis.
My dad, Anton Golob, lived
on at home on the farm until he went into the Austrian army (around 1900
and he served the army for 3 years). He was born in 1879. In
about 1905, he went to America. He worked in Milwaukee for 2 years
for Foster & Vogel leather factory. In 1908 he went back to Austria
and married Anna Miklovzina. Anton worked at odd jobs in the woods
for about 3 years. Antonia (Stopar) Golob died in 1934 at the age
of 74.
Michael Golob lived on the
farm at home until he finished grade school. He got a scholarship
and went away to study in high schools to become a priest. After
being ordained he was a helper or chaplin (place unknown) for several years.
He went to America and founded a parish for Slav people in Bridgeport,
Conn. where he stayed until his death in 1950 at the age of 70.
Ferdinand Golob also lived
at home on the farm until his sister Helen took the farm over, then he
worked in coal mines here and there in Old Austria, then he went to Rumania
where he got married. He later divorced his first wife and remarried.
He lived in Rumania until his death some time in the 1950s.
Helen Golob married a Joseph
Shubel and she got the home farm. To this union were born 3 girls,
Helen, Mary, and Theresa, and the fourth was to be a boy, but he died at
birth. His mother died while giving birth.
Jerry and John went to be trained
as blacksmiths where they could operate a drop hammer, they were learning
this trade for 3 years until the war broke out between Austria and Serbia.
Leona Golob went to America
to live with her brother Michael (the priest), but she stayed with him
only a short time. She went to work as a housemaid where she took
sick and died.
Anna Golob also stayed at home
with her mother, Antonia Golob, while her mother lived. Later Anna
moved to a different town, Paka, until her death. She never married.
Louis Golob lived at home on
the farm until he finished grade school, then he got a scholarship and
also studied to be a priest. He said something about his government
so he was put in jail. After being in jail for 1 year he was given
a choice, to go to the army or to stay in jail. He chose the army.
He was with the Mountain Sharp Shooters in World War I, he was a corp[o]ral
and he was later killed on [the] Italian Front. Before the war was
over, while his brother John Golob went in the Austrian army, his other
brother Jerry went into the army as a teamster to haul supplies for the
army.
After Anton Golob married,
he bought a saw mill run by water power, but he never ran it for there
was something wrong with the dam. He also bought a house where Joe,
myself (Louie), and mother lived for 9 years. Anton Golob did not
have it all paid for and in 1911 he went back to America to earn enough
money to pay for the house. He went to Milwaukee Wisconsin and again
worked at Foster & Wogel leather tannery. He went to Verden,
Ill. where he worked in a coal mine (Verden, Ill. is near St. Louis Mo.)
for some time, from there he went to Hanna, Wyoming where he also worked
in a coal mine. When World War I broke out between Austria and Serbia
he was called back to Austria because he was a trained soldier and was
in reserve, but he refused to go back to war and he could not go back any
more as long as Austria was in power. He decided to stay in America
and in 1916 he bought some land in Draper Wis. He paid for the land
and was broke so he went back to Hanna Wyoming for 2 more years and in
1918 he came back to Draper Wis. and built a house on his land. He
worked in the woods after that in the winter time as a sawyer and tie marker.
In 1919 - 1920 he worked in camp 3 (what is now Blaisdel Lake Resort),
and he made good money, he used that money to pay passage for his wife
Anna and 2 sons to come from Yugoslavia to America.
In Yugoslavia from 1911 - 1920
As dad Anton Golob went to
America, his wife Anna, two sons, and her mother stayed in Austria.
Anna was a dress maker, that is how she made a living for the family and
her mother Gertie. Her mother did the cooking and other work around
the house until she died in 1917 after that Anna had to do the cooking
and all other chores. She had 1 to 2 goats for milk, also she always
raised a pig or two for butchering in the fall, so that gave her less time
to do her sewing.
When us boys got a little bigger
we helped with the chores - such as bringing in wood and water and watched
or herded the goats.
I can yet remember while we
were herding goats one day, we saw a big black snake bring a nice big fish
(trout) out of the river, so we chased the snake away and took the fish
home and grandma told us to put it in the oven to bake. After a bit
she asked if we cleaned it, no so we took it out of the oven and cleaned
it, we took the insides and eyes out and put it back in the oven to finish
baking it. That was our first fish to eat and it was good, after
that Joe would catch some, sometimes by hand where the fish would hide
under rocks or under the bank. It tried that too and did catch one
once, but when I got the fish out he gave a wiggle and I let him go.
This was a small river that flowed right near the house.
Usually I would stand on guard
or watch if some one would come on the road, for the road was right along
the river and fishing was not allowed. When we went to school we
would walk about 3 miles. Some days in the winter we would have to
shell pumpkin seeds, beach nuts, and hazel nuts which mother would then
take to the mill to make cooking oil, but we were not allowed to eat the
pumpkin seeds, for if we would, we were told that we would get lousy.
Earlier in the fall and winter we had to pick beans off the stalks and
later we had to shell the bean pods, so that kept us busy most of the time.
In the later years we would
pick dry limbs in the woods and bring them home, also the chips where someone
would chop wood, or hew timbers. Mother was sewing to earn enough
money to buy salt, coffee, sugar, and flour. In the spring of 1920
Pa wrote that we were to come to America.
We had to prepare for the trip,
there were legal papers to get at our county or state capitol Slovene Grader,
also from the capitol of Yugoslavia which was Belgrade. It took mother
4 or 5 days to go there and come back. While she was gone, Grandma
Golob (Antonia) stayed with Joe and I to cook and milk the goats.
We had an auction sale the
day before we left. We left Sostanjn on August 10th 1920. We
got to Lyublana that same day, where we stayed over night. The next
day we got on the train in the after noon for Trieste Italy. We got
there soon after it got dark and we stayed there for 4 or 5 days.
We walked to where the ship was loading and got on the ship late in the
after noon on August 15th 1920. We went to where the bunks were (two
floors under the deck) to get our bunks. The bunks were 3 deep.
When we got back on deck the ship was already out in the ocean. The
ships name was S. S. AMERICA, it was a large ship. After some days
we went by some dry land where there was a castle. The castle raised
all kinds of flags and so did the ship. We were all standing on deck
by the railing on the right side until the captain himself came to wave
us away from the railing by that time the ship was already listing about
20 degrees. We all went to the other side of the deck and the ship
straightened out again. One day we stopped at some port. It
was France where we stayed for 5 days. They were unloading dead soldiers,
4 in one big box, 2,000 soldiers. Then we went on and we stopped
again at the Rock of Gibralter for 2 days to take on coal, from there we
went out into open sea for America, about the 3rd day the water got rough.
We were all sea sick for a day or so. On the 8th of Sept. 1920 we
came to America where we could see the statue of liberty.
We stayed aboard ship that
day and the next day they took us off into a building where we went through
customs and doctors examinations. They rolled our eyes around, since
we had no money, they put us on an Island (Ellis Island) where we stayed
almost a month. Dad wrote to Frank Sakser (who was our agent) to
get us out. He came there and talked to some nuns and he gave mother
$5.00. That night they put us on a train, after 2 days on the train
we came to Chicago. They took us from one dept to another on a stage
coach driven by horses where we stayed the night and all the next day.
At night they put us on a train and we came to Rice Lake Wisconsin.
In the morning of October 9th, 1920, dad was waiting for us. Dad
bought me a cap and shirt and bib overalls there.
We got on the local train again
and we came to Stouts Spur (Stouts Spur was just south of Slanovich's)
at about 11 o'clock in the morning we walked on a path towards Joe Fabians
house where Joe Fabian came out to greet us.
We walked west on Hwy 70 and
we stopped at Meglich's house where we had lunch. When we got home
from there, Pa changed clothes and went to Draper to get some groceries
on his bicycle. On October 9th 1920 we were at last in America.
The house was built but there was still brush all around it.
The weather was still nice
and warm and there were still potatoes to dig yet. Pa went to work
some place and me and Ma and Joe dug the potatoes, took in cabbage and
other crops. We went to school, what a school it was, we could not
speak American! It was a good thing there were the Meglich and Slanovich
boys who could speak Slovanian with us. I wen to school until 1924.
We entertained ourselves by hunting, trapping, and fishing.
In the summer time dad would
clear land and us boys would help. In the winter time dad would go
to work in some logging camp to work and we at home would take care of
the horse and 2 cows and cut wood. The first winter we had to carry
water from the spring down in the swamp in 1922 dad dug a well near the
house so then it was easier to get water.
So that's how it went year
after year, clearing land and picking stones every year we would pick all
the stones (size of walnuts or bigger) off the field that was to be plowed.
(I say we that means dad, mother and us kids according to size and age).
We would always raise a big garden for our home use and lots of cabbage
which we would make into sourkraut. We would make it in a large 50
gal. barrel and someone would wash his feet nice and clean and tramp the
sourkraut with bare feet.
Mother would always raise one
or two pigs which we would butcher in the fall, the meat was all put in
salt brine and later smoked, some was made into sausage too, and the fat
was all cut in strips and ground in a meat grinder. Mother would
render it all into lard, cracklings and all, which she would then put the
lard on the potatoes, sourkraut, and so on. Home made lard was much
better than store lard.
In 1925 Joe left to work in
Chicago and in 1926 or 1927 Louie went to Madison to have an operation
on his leg which he had had trouble with in Europe, and he still has a
stiff knee. In 1929 we started to build a new barn, we made the basement
in 1929 and the upper part in 1930. In the fall of 1935 I was pulling
rutabaggies and one day was cold and misty and I didn't have any good winter
clothes and only $1.00 in money so I decided then and there to look for
a job in some logging camp. I finished pulling baggies that week
and on Monday after breakfast I took off. I walked on Rail Road tracks
going west, to Clover Road, then south on Clover Road. I went towards
a camp when I met a man coming out, he said there was nobody in the camp
so I went further south until I came to George Sawwords camp. It
was all filled up and was not hiring any more men, by then it was too late
to go on so I was walking back home when I met 2 men stuck with their car
in a frost boil hole. I helped them out and they asked me where Ed
LeMays camp was, I told them that I knew where the old camp was which was
on Kennedy Road on the north side near Log Creek so they gave me a ride
and I showed them where the camp was.
When we got there only
the cook was there, and he said we should wait, for the men would soon
be in. I waited until the crew came in and I asked for a job and
I was told that I could come on Friday to their new camp, which was about
3 miles south of Big Bear Inn near Flambeau River.
On Friday I got up early to
catch the train at 6 o'clock in the morning at Loretta and I got off at
camp 41 or where the bee man was living.
I walked 3 miles north on that
road and got to LeMay's camp. Now the cook was there in the office
which was the only building finished, they were just laying the floor for
the bunk house so Ed was not there. I was told to wait and that Ed
LeMay would be there before dinner. I waited until he came, but there
was no room for me in the office to sleep so they asked me if I wanted
to sleep in the kitchen by myself. The kitchen was up but there were
no windows in yet or doors so I agreed to sleep there. After dinner
they put me to work digging a hole for the out house (about 4 feet wide
10 feet long and 4 feet deep) I dug that hole that day and earned
50¢. After that I was helping with buildings, one day I had
to dig a well. I got down until I could not throw dirt out anymore
(all in the forenoon). I told them if they want me to dig deeper
I have to have a helper so I went back ton the buildings. We made
the bunk house, for the few nights that I slept in the kitchen, the coyoties
were howling right near the camp, I just covered myself over the head so
I could sleep.
After the bunk house was made
they were hiring more men right along. When all the buildings were
built we started to cut roads. To cut roads they gave each man an
old axe and a grub hoe and we had to grub the trees and brush out by the
roots. One morning two guys were told to stay in camp and they were
fired. A few days later I was told to stay in that morning so I surely
thought I was fired, but then the camp boss came in and told me to go with
him. He gave me a shovel and told me to dig a well by the barn I
dug down about 5 feet and hit water sand and water. I could not dig
anymore so I got out of the well and there was some wood cut by the kitchen
so I split about ½ cord of wood for the cook (all in the forenoon
and all for 50¢). We were getting $1.00 a day or $26.00 a month
so in the after noon I went back to cutting roads again, that lasted about
a month.
They started sawing and the
boss asked me if I wanted to go sawing, which paid about 14¢ more
a day or $30.00 a month but I asked for an axe and I was put swamping,
which is to cut limbs off the trees after they were felled. Sawing
lasted about a month to cut 3 forties. First they would cut all the
Hemlock and then they would cut the hardwood, that was about the last part
of January. They started to haul logs to the Rail Road spur known
as camp 41. The haul was about 3 miles long. They hauled the
logs on a sled with 4 horses and I was given a job to keep the roads clear
of horse apples (about one mile long) and it was very cold so I had to
walk back and forth to keep warm. In about 3 weeks my leg started
to hurt so I quit and went home (some time in February).
Next winter I worked for Charlie
Cicel at Loretta in the kitchen as a cookie until I got sick. The
winter after that I worked for John Weyers and Sons at camp 44 doing odd
jobs around the camp. Then they moved me to camp 45 to work in the
kitchen as a cookie. I also worked for Weyers one winter as a cookie
in Jackson camp (about 1 mile north of Big Bear Lodge). By that time
I was getting about $45.00 a month. I worked one winter at Bailey
Blowers in Milwaukee for about 3 months and I came home to help make hay.
In the fall I went back to
Milwaukee and got a job at Hiels, at the time they were making or welding
hulls for army tanks which they called Honey the 16th. At Hiels I
worked the 3rd shift which was from 11 at night to 7 in the morning, that
was a really hard shift to work. I worked there for 7 months.
I asked for a raise, but did not get it so I quit. In 1943 I got
a job at Kearney and Traker where they were making milling machines.
I also worked the 3rd shift for about 2½ years. I was working
on external grinders, we were grinding all kinds of parts for the milling
machines (they gave me all easy jobs to start with until I learned how
to do the grinding), after that I was getting all kinds of jobs.
After World War II was over
they laid off lots of help so in 1947 I got laid off too. I went
to work for Briggs and Straton, there I was grinding on crank shafts on
external grinders. I also worked there on centerless grinders off
and on, and I got laid off there in April of 1949. I came back home
that year and we built the house I am living in now.
In the fall of 1949 I went
back to Milwaukee and after some time of job hunting I got a job at Stalper
Steel Co.
I worked at Stolper Steel Co
for about 3 months and dad was sick. I was called to help take care
of him some time in the winter of 1949. I and Mother took care of
dad. In the spring I took him to Madison Wis. to the University Hospital,
he stayed there a short time and brother Tony brought him home. I
and Ma took care of him for over a year after that and he died in May 1951
at the age of 72.
After that I did not go to
work in Milwaukee any more, for I had to stay at home to look after mother
for she was 71 years old at that time. I got a job to take care of
the Draper cemetery there I earned my credits so I am now able to get Social
Security payments. In the winter of 1955-56 I borrowed my sister's
spinning wheel. I learned to spin wool into yarn and Mother would
knit socks and mittens for me. I liked that so well so I wanted to
buy her spinning wheel but she would not sell it to me - so I made some
drawings of it and make my own and when people saw that they wanted one
too. So I made some for other people and that's how it went and I
am still at it for over 23 years at that hobby making spinning wheels in
my spare time. In the winter time I have made 46 wheels. So
for January 1981 it sure makes my time go fast.
