THE LAND — OCTOBER 15/OCTOBER 22, 2021
www.thelandonline.com — “Where Farm and Family Meet”
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If an ox yoke could talk, it would have plenty to say… If an ox yoke could talk, it and clear water from would have many stories of streams that were filled various owners and oxen — with fish. some with good temperaSure the trees and hills ments, others … well, they were beautiful, but to haul are best forgotten. a load of timber up and A yoke enabled a team of down those hills? Well, that oxen to pull together. Oxen took a pulling for the oxen were used to pull freight in my yoke (not that I am FROM MY wagons and do farm work. complaining, just saying FARMHOUSE They played an important so). KITCHEN role in settling this country. The Luxembourgers had By Renae B. Read on, as this is a story cleared the land, built their Vander Schaaf that one ox yoke might tell. homes and businesses and even a church from native limestone “For many years I sat in a corner of to replace their wood frame church a barn on Buddy Jonas’s farm. Dust covered me as for a long time tractors that had been destroyed by fire. had been doing my work. I was just an This new St. Donatus parish church old relic, forgotten except by the mice was dedicated in 1860 and still looks and spiders to whom I was a landpretty much the same as it did back mark in a way. But at least I was still then. around and inside a building. Life was good and had settled into a Then one day, the Jonas family routine. But then this man, Peter cleaned me up and brought me to Gehlen, who with his wife had come town. Alton, Iowa was celebrating from Luxembourg, got restless feet. He their centennial. Suddenly everyone was full of energy and vigor and had remembered it was a wagon train been very successful and was respectpulled by oxen that brought them to ed in the area. northwest Iowa from St. Donatus, His name is still remembered in the Iowa. St. Donatus area. A house he built stands and is used as a beautiful bed and breakfast with six lovely rooms available. The Gehlen House is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. Nearby there is a landmark that is more familiar to me. The Gehlen Barn, is also very functional, only now as a local brewery and pub. It can be reserved for weddings and other gatherings. St. Donatus Catholic Church was built by the early LuxumGehlen was prosperous, bourger pioneers. They had heard the storms in the area were so there was no reason ferocious and named the church for the patron who protects for him to endure the against lightening and storms. The church was dedicated on hardships of pioneering June 3, 1860. again. But once a man gets a notion, it seems, Many of the people who lived at St. there is no stopping him. And whew, Donatus had come from a country offidid he travel. He couldn’t stop at 150 cially called the Grand Duchy of miles, or even 200. No, he had to go Luxembourg. Now I have never been there, but in listening to their conver- clear across the state to find his perfect wilderness in Plymouth County sations, they liked this valley in which is more like a 300 mile distance. Jackson County because it reminded them of their homeland with its natuWhen he left, some said he was off ral beauties of cliffs, nuts, wild fruits his rocker and he would soon be back.
Well, he did come back after he had built a mill for grinding grain on the Floyd River — just an itsy bitsy river, not like the mighty Mississippi that the oxen and I were familiar with. Boy, was Mr. Gehlen full of talk and enthusiasm about all the opportunities out west. Photos by Renae B. Vander Schaaf He said there Jim Hentges (left) and Jerry DeWitt (right) received the yoke from veteriwas plenty of narian A.J. Neumann (center) who was given the relic by a customer. land for the taking. Others priest. Father J. Michael Flammang. soon caught his dream and made He strongly discouraged them from plans to relocate. Obviously they going, which added another element to didn’t ask me if I thought a team of consider. oxen would find the trip pleasurable. But they did talk to our parish
See FARMHOUSE KITCHEN, pg. 7
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