When Clara Josephine Gruny was born on March 19, 1907 in Medford, Wisconsin, her father, Joseph, was 36 and her mother, Maria Weigel Gruny, was 32. She was the youngest of three at that time with brothers Henry born two years early, and Hugo born one year earlier.
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| Clara Josephine Gruny as a young girl. |
Clara lived in Medford for the vast majority of her life. The 1910 federal census lists Clara as 3 years old and living with her father, mother, 2 brothers, sister, and grandmother Clara, likely her namesake, who was age 65 at that time. In addition to her brothers Henry (1905-1989); and Hugo (1906-1995), her sister Anna (1910-1992) was added to the fold.
In the 1920 census, Clara Gruny was listed as being 12 years old and living with her mother, 3 brothers, and 2 sisters. Since the 1910 census, her brother Joseph (1911-1999) and sister Mary (1913-2006) were added to the family. Her father, Joseph Gruny, had passed away of pneumonia in 1915 at the age of 44 and therefore was not listed in the census. Clara's mother, Maria, had to run the farm now with her kids' help. Clara would have been only 7 years old when her father passed. Her grandmother Clara no longer shows up on the 1920 census either. I have thus far not been able to determine what happened to her.
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| Clara Gruny with an unknown friend at the Hwy 64 bridge near the family farm west of Medford. The bridge is no longer there and neither is the stream. |
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| Clara Gruny as a teenager wading in the stream near the family farm west of Medford. |
Clara never graduated from high school. According to the 1940 federal census, she only completed the 8th grade. Family oral history has it that Clara worked as a cook at a lumber camp for awhile. Exactly when, where, or for how long is not known, but I assume it was before she was married. A few pictures showing Clara at the camp follow.
At the age of 19 Clara married Louis George Hirt on October 11, 1927, in her hometown. She had four children by the time she was 26: Lester, Patty, Dorothy (my mother, later just called by her middle name Joan), and Rita. She was a homemaker all of her life, initially having to wash clothes using a wash board and tub, cooking over a wood stove, and there was no indoor plumbing.
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| Marriage certificate of Louis George Hirt and Clara Josephine Gruny. |
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| Wedding picture of Louis and Clara Hirt. Clara's brother Henry and sister Anna were witnesses. |
Other than a short stint in Grand Valley, Pennsylvania sometime between 1930-32, Clara lived all of her life in Medford. Louis and Clara moved to Pennsylvania with Lester and Patty, following a relative out there to look for construction work. They only stayed for a year or two before returning to Medford. Louis took a job as a mechanic at a garage in Medford (current location of the laundromat) and later with the Handel Motor Company in Stetsonville and then Medford.
The 1940 federal census indicates he made $720 during the previous year as a mechanic, and worked an amazing 72 hours the week prior to the census being taken (that's 12 hours a day if he worked a 6-day work week). The family lived at 410 Wheelock St in Medford at that time.
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| Louis and Clara Hirt family in 1940 federal census. |
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| Clara Gruny Hirt with grandkids Julie Oehler Cullen and Jane Oehler Handel during the summer of 1960. |
Louis and Clara celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in 1977.
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| Louis (middle left) and Clara (middle right) Hirt at their 50th wedding anniversary celebration. Clara's sister Anna Fleischman is on the far left, and brother Henry Gruny is on the far right. |
Clara died of cancer on May 27, 1983, in Medford, Wisconsin, at the age of 76. She's buried, along with Louis, at the Holy Rosary Cemetery in Medford, WI - GPS Coordinates: 45.14188, -90.32154.
Click here from remembrances of Clara and Louis from a couple of their grandkids.
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