Peter Edlef (Alfred) Petersen, Omaha, Nebraska
Peter Edlef Petersen, seated at right in a photo with his brother Louis in Omaha, was christened on March 12, 1857 in the village of Tinningstedtmark, northern Schleswig-Holstein, the sixth son of Peter Hansen Petersen and Elise Momsen Petersen.
Altogether Peter had nine siblings. His father Peter was a glazier in the region, and in 1878 Peter, his younger four brothers, sister, as well as his parents, made the journey to the United States.
Peter was just twenty-one at the time of the voyage. The reason for their emigration may have been twofold. Conscription into the Prussian army was required after 1864 when Prussia annexed Schleswig, and his parents may have wanted their sons out of reach of that regulation.
Perhaps there was a more joyful reason: Peter's sister Catharina was betrothed to their cousin Hans Petersen, who was at that time farming successfully in Belle Prairie, Nebraska.
After arriving in the U.S. Peter Edlef became known as Alfred and remained a life-long resident of Nebraska. Catherine, after spending the first years of her marriage in Nebraska, eventually resettled in 1889 to Chicago, Illinois with Hans and their children. When her middle son was born, Catharina paid her brother the honor of naming her middle son Alfred.
Alfred had a prosperous dairy farm in Hebron, Thayer County, Nebraska with 115 acres of tilled land and 2,200 head of livestock, providing work for hired help for 52 weeks out of the year, according to the agricultural productions worksheet from the 1885 Nebraska state census. Click the link at right to see the details.
Alfred's wife was Mariea Thomsen, daughter of Andreas Thomsen, originally from Schleswig. Alfred and Mariea were married about 1883 and had four children: Henry, Anne, Elizabeth, and Hulda or Helga (as she's variously listed in the census records). Alfred and his children relocated to Omaha after his wife's death in the late 1893.
Even after his retirement to Omaha, Alfred worked as a laborer and a carpenter in Omaha.
In the 1930 census Alfred lived with his daughter's family in Omaha. Elizabeth was married to Charles J. Hoffmann, and Alfred, still working as a land surveyor, shares their home with his three grandsons Charles, John and Albert.
In the photo above are (from left) Alfred, his sister Catherine from Chicago, John Hoffmann, his mother Elizabeth, Catherine's granddaughter Cathie, Elizabeth's sister Anne standing behind young Albert Hoffmann (another son of Elizabeth), housekeeper Hannah Petersen, and Walter Breetzke, Cathie's stepfather.
Thanks to our Nebraska cousin, Donald A. Leu, for providing new details about our Petersens in Nebraska.
