Death of Joseph Haitz

The Ripley Bee

Joseph, or Joe as he referred to himself, died on Valentine's Day in 1960.  He was 82 years old while I was three and half months shy of being just 3 years old.  I have no memory of him.  At the time of his death, his sixteen children had given him 37 grandchildren, and I was just one of his 10 great grandchildren!  He was the patriarch of a very large family and, in fact, they had been photographed and featured in local newspapers as one of the largest in the area.    

Joe was no stranger to large families.  He was one of ten children born to Frank Haitz and his wife, Elizabeth Germann.  A devout Catholic family, they attended St. Michael Catholic Church in Ripley, Ohio where Joe would later become a member of the Holy Name Society and the Ripley Council of the Knights of Columbus.  Of his siblings, there remained only one sister, Anna Serwna, to mourn his passing.  She would live three more years reaching the grand age of 100!

A requiem high mass was intoned on February 17 in St, Michael's by the Reverend Father Charles Moore.  Joseph was  buried in Maplewood Cemetery, Ripley, Ohio.  He lays to rest with his wife who followed him just three years later.

Maplewood Cemetery, Ripley, Ohio

2015 - copyright Lynn Ann Wayson Koehler.  All rights reserved.