Researching the bad news
Wilhelm Karl Homeyer/ Hohmeier age 11 Husum Weser
Here are some facts about my dad you decide, which are bad
1. His family was loyal to freedom and the local crown for centuries but the
fight for power among those they protected would split the family 3 times
with brother against brother.
2. He had an uncle in Germany who abused him (se he was happy to leave at
age 11)
3. But, he had to leave much-loved relatives behind knowing their fait
between wars.
4. Shortly after he came to the US and went to High School he had to leave
school because of the dust bowl struggles to survive (this bothered him all
his life)
5. He was never in an active war, yet people beat him terribly when they
recognized his Homeyer name- assuming that he was on either the Kaiser side
or the Nazi.
6. He ran away from the Iowa home early because his uncle kept beating him
with a horsewhip to get him to work the farm harder during the dust bowl.
7. He spent many years riding the rails or working as a ranch hand and
signing up for the military 2 times between the wars just to eat.
8. By the time of the depression and war he was an expert welder and soon a
supervisor for major steel industries. He would sneak home to see his
sister Alma Homeyer Menching in Iowa whenever he could.
9. The uncle who abused him moved to Canada and lived to be in his 90s.
10. His legs were so scared from the beatings that he never wore short
pants.
11. He could never bear to speak or see his German cousins after WW2,
although he loved them and loved being German- he hated all wars and could
not face what the 2 great wars had done to his beautiful family.
12. He has a half sister still living in Germany that I did not know about,
and my research has caused a great stir in the US. As his sister Alma is
now 96 blind, hard of hearing, and low on memory.
13. My father was unusually kind and giving, and was well admired all his
life. He died a long and tortured death from Alzheimer's. Yet we believe
that once he may have killed a man is self-defense. He never forgave
himself.
14. We know he was married before my mother, yet that was kept a secrete for
many years and we have no reason to believe that they had children. She
left him when he lived in Iowa and she knew my aunt Alma and Uncle Elmer for
decades afterwards.
15. We know that he was left lands in Germany, but he would not leave the
US.
My mind is full of wonderful stories told from time to time by my father
about his cousins and Grandfather M�ller in Germany. I would have loved to
have had Grandparents and still long to see a photo of the M�ller's,
Homeyer's, and Hohmeier's some day.
Pam Homeyer Sullivan
PS It is not hard to figure who the uncles were, one shot himself, his
family, and over 200 starving cows in Texas. The other moved to Canada, and
Homeyer men would die in both wars on all sides imaginable. His grandmother
and mother would die during the dust bowl era. His best years were during
High School where he played football, had a horse named 2-bits and lucky,
and fell in love with a girl named Marie Rose- who died in an auto accident.
Her father was the one who shot everything he had and then himself just
shortly after Marie died. I would love to know more about that family. My
father found this distressed man just before he shot himself.