The Matt Kuka farm was 80 acres. Peter Kuka and Anna Sonsalla had the barn built and then later the house. Part of the old house was used as the chicken coop. Grandpa (Peter Simon Kuka) called the oldest grandchild (Martha Agnes Murphy) Martushka (google search says this means lady). Every time mom (Helen Kuka) expected and delivered another baby, Martha was sent to live with grandparents (Peter and Anna Kuka).
Blanche Kuka went to take Clara's place to work for Mrs. Markham when she married Adolph. Mom (Helen Kuka) worked for Mrs. Markham before she married. Grandma asked Mrs. Markham to teach the girls how to be ladies. Aunt Lizzie Kuka didn't last long. She would stay out too late at night and Mrs. Markham didn't want to be responsible. Grandma (Anna) Kuka was very ambitious for her children and worked very hard. Imagine being able to give a dowery of $1000 to each daughter. This money was applied to a farm - she felt like her daughters would be co-owners. Clara Kuka lent her money to St. Peter & Pauls so she could afford to buy the farm from Helen Kuka after she married Ed Grutzik. Blanche claimed the house that she lived in as her dowery. Martha Skroch sometimes felt that grandma (Anna Kuka) had a right to get angry. Grandpa was such a gentle person and equally hard working but the rheumatic fever/heart held him down as well as Alphonse. Grandpa Peter Kuka loved to try something new every year. One year tobacco, another peanuts. Once he wrote a farmer's magazine for a pattern to make a boomerang. Allie (Alphonse Kuka) would take it into the pasture to throw it (it didn't always come back)... Martha Skroch trotted behind her grandpa in the furrow, barefoot, in the spring when he did the plowing. The Matt Skroch and Helen Kuka children named the cows, Daisy, Katie, Flora, Wishbone, Billie, Nellie and Rose. - written by Martha (my grandmother) to her brother Peter M. Skroch
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MeNewly self-appointed family historian for the Baggetts and Murphys of Kansas City. ArchivesCategories |