The Genealogy Search

Clara Emma Miottel

Cir 1928, South Dakota unknown men with two female passengers Clara Miottel from SD and Clara Miottel from Chicago, Illinois (My  Grandmother)

Clara Miottel (grandmother's cousin) and Clara Miottel (my grandmother is the one on the right)

Clara Miottel Skibbe 

Helen (nee Blank) Conour and Clara  (nee Miottel) Skibbe, stepsisters.

Clara Miottel cir 1920

Clara Miottel Skibbe and Lorraine Skibbe 1938 Chicago, Illinois

Clara Miottel and Rose Blank - Stepsisters dressed as  men.

My mother is in town visiting Tucson so I sat her down and went over some of her family information.  I asked her when her parents were married, where, and who married them.  Her answer - I have no idea.  They never celebrated an anniversary.  I knew (or hoped) that their marriage was prior to their son William's birth in 1923. I wrote to the counties my grandfather had lived in Indiana, no records.  I wrote to Cook County in Illinois and had a record search performed - no record. I had been running searches for their marriage month after month and put it a side for awhile.  After talking to Mom I ran a search on Ancestry.com today and guess what!  A marriage record for Clara Miottel and William Skibbe in the Cook County Illinois Marriage Indexes, 1914-1942.  The index lists a marriage date of September 14, 1921.  According to Ancestry they posted the marriage records 17 October 2011.  The lesson learned today - run those sea...

  Clara E. Skibbe, nee Miottel was my maternal grandmother.  My mother was Clara's surprise, born when Clara was forty years old.  Clara's first born was William born in 1923 when Clara was 29.  Clara and her husband William Skibbe also adopted a niece  Violet that was born in 1914.  Needless to say a child at forty was not in the plan for my grandmother, she thought she was just about done raising her children when mom arrived.  

I found this photo among the pictures my Mother had removed from my Grandmother's photo album.  My mother believes that it is her mother on the far left and her step sister Helen Conour's children, along with her mother's step mother Emilie Blank Miottel.. I have doubts about the lady on the right being Emily.  I wonder if the family often had coffee in the backyard or is this is just for fun.  That is not a tea pot - could those children be drinking coffee?

Clara Miottel cir 1910 and her bible she received at her confirmation.  I believe she attended the German Ev. Lutheran St. Matthews Church with Pastor H. Engelbrecht.  I know that her father married twice, each time at the St. Matthews. Now I need to locate the church's records and see what family information can be gleaned from them.  Birth information and death information indicate Clara spelled her name with a C.  I don't know why the bible is monogrammed with Klara with a "K".