George Stoskopf

GEORGE STOSKOPF, one of the prominent citizens of Spring Valley township and the owner of a fine farm in section 18, township 35, range 24, is also one of the pioneers of Cherokee County. He was born April 16, 1836, about 15 miles from Strasburg Alsace-Lorraine, at that time a province of France, and is a son of Leonard and Salome (Voltz) Stoskopf.

The father of our subject was born in 1792, in Alsace-Lorraine, and there followed the occupations of blacksmith and farmer. He married Salome Voltz, of the same locality, a daughter of John George Voltz, a large farmer and grain dealer. The eight children of this marriage were: Valentine, a blacksmith and wagon maker of Freeport, Stephenson County, Illinois, for many years, who died there in 1892, the wealthiest man in the county at one time; Catherine, who is the wife of George Miller, a farmer in Alsace-Lorraine; Margaret, who is the wife of John Mallo, of Alsace-Lorraine; Salome, deceased, who was the wife of John Karcher, of Stephenson County, Illinois, also deceased; Andrew, who is a blacksmith of Freeport, Illinois; George, of this sketch; and Mary, who is the wife of John Bastian, of Stephenson County, Illinois.

Leonard Stoskopf died in his native land in 1848 and his widow brought her children to America, locating at Freeport, Illinois where she died in 1872, at the age of 75 years. She was a woman of great capacity and reared her family carefully and well.

Our subject attended school in his native land until the age of 14 years and then assisted his mother in the management of the home farm. In 1856 he came to America with his mother and spent four years engaged in farming in Stephenson County, Illinois, and four years in Hancock County, Iowa. He then sold his Iowa farm and returned to Stephenson County where he engaged for three years in a fire insurance business, and then came to Cherokee County, Kansas. Mr. Stoskopf has since been engaged very successfully in farming and stock-raising here and also cuts a large area of hay in the Indian Territory. His home consists of 142 acres well improved and under a fine state of cultivation and he owns another farm of 160 acres, equally well cultivated.

On May 2, 1875, Mr. Stoskopf was united in marriage to Louise Niemeier, a farmer of the Indian Territory, and they have had six children, viz: Leonard, a farmer of Cherokee County, married Hilda Anderson and has two children,—Opal and Helen; Mary Evalena, who married Alva D. Chubb, a farmer of the Indian Territory, and has one child,—James; Valentine, a farmer of the Indian Territory, who married Maud Paxon and has one child,—George; John a farmer of Cherokee County, who married Ethel Chubb and has one child,—Pros John; and William and Andrew, who live at home. The family belong to the Lutheran Church.

For the past five years, our subject has been a justice of the peace in Spring Valley township. Politically, he is a Republican of long standing. Fraternally, he is a Mason. Mr. Stoskopf is a man held in very high esteem and is a worthy representative of the men who have done so much for the agricultural and educational development of Cherokee County.

History of Cherokee County Kansas and its representative citizens, ed. & comp. by Nathaniel Thompson Allison, 1904, transcribed by Carolyn Ward, instructor from USD 508, Baxter Springs Middle School, Baxter Springs, Kansas, 1/9/97.