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The Reinheimers of Sandusky, Ohio, and the Rheinheimers of Holmes County, Ohio, and then LaGrange County, Indiana, both came from the same set of villages in Germany. However, I can't quite tie them together as a family.

One key is the Jacobs born in the 1750s and 1720s. We have:

Johann Jacob R(h)einheimer

Father: Jacob

Wife: Elisabetha Catherina Lang, daughter of Georg Lang, married 12 Mar 1776 in Hinzweiler.

and

Johann Jacob R(h)einheimer

Father: Jacob

Wife: Anna Margaretha Lang, daughter of Georg Lang, married 28 Jan 1777 in Hinzweiler.

Why aren't those the same Jacob? Maybe Elisabetha Catherina died tragically early, and Jacob married her sister. Elisabetha Catherina, however, has several children in the ensuing years with husband Jacob.

If there are two Johann Jacobs born around the 1750s whose father is Jacob, then there are two Jacobs born around the 1720s. One has a son, Johann Peter, born to wife Maria Elisabetha in Hinzweiler on 27 Sep 1746, and one has a son, Johann Friedrich, who dies 25 Dec 1781, at age 21, so born around 1760 and buried at Hinzweiler. These may well be the same Jacob, but then there still has to be another one.

If anyone has better access to the records at Hinzweiler and/or better information, please let us know.

According to her obituary, Eva Catharina Benz, wife of Wilhelm Reinheimer, was born in Weingarten, Germany in 1828 and died in 1905 in Sandusky, Ohio. Fine. This being a genealogy site, though, the question to ask is "Who are her parents?".

There is an Eva Catharina Benz born 17 April, 1828, in Weingarten to Jacob Heinrich Benz and Eva Catharina Koch. Here's the catch: The family Eva emigrates with from Germany to Ohio is that of Jacob Friedrich Benz and wife Barbara Mayer, and the ship's log lists her as age 10 in 1834, the same age as Jacob Benz, Junior. We find no birth record for that Eva, though there is one for Jacob.

That ship's log also lists son Christian as a daughter, Christine, at age 14, so maybe it's not to be trusted. My best guess is that Eva is an orphan who comes along to America with a relative's family, but I don't find death records for either of the parents of Eva born in 1828. Does anyone have any better information?

We have spent much more time five or six generations back than on recent ancestors. Please help improve the site by sharing corrections, photos, or stories.

This symbol, which might look a little like a capital cursive M to you, or a capital S and C in the script of the day, is found between the words wo meinen (where my) and Grosvadter (Grandfather) in this snippet of a letter written in 1810 by Johannes Eckell. It appears several times, usually before a family title, and by context might mean deceased or maternal or paternal or something else. Does anyone know?

Rachel Suntheimer is in the lower left of this photo, but we don't know who the others are. Rachel had two sisters and three brothers, but the oldest her youngest brother could be in 1894, the year Rachel died, is thirteen, and her eldest sister would have been 33 in that year--the ages don't seem to match up. If these are three couples, the man with his hand on Rachel's shoulder doesn't appear to be her future husband, Jacob Rheinheimer. Though she doesn't look thrilled. . . . Any ideas?