THE 20TH CENTURY WEGMANS
On June 25, 1895, Walter Wegman was born to his mother, Hettie (Moyer) Wegman and Father Levi, in a building built by his father, presently at 5855 Oley Turnpike Road. Levi (Born 8/8/1866) had married Hettie Moyer, daughter of Henry and Sarah Moyer on February 19, 1887. At first they lived in a whitewashed stone home along Oley Turnpike Road, at the top of the hill, across the street from what was recently Judge Mays property, and which has had some recent construction to enlarge the principal house. In 1890, Zachariah Wiest purchased a one acre parcel of land at (the present) 5855 Oley Turnpike Road site, for $2850.00. It is believed that Levi, a wheelwright, a blacksmith, a carpenter, and a builder, built a Brick home on this site sometime thereafter, and then purchased the property in 1895 from Zachariah Wiest for only $1600.00, according to public record documents. Levi and Hettie eventually sold this property in 1907 for the sum of $1725.00!! Walter’s sister , Sallie, was born at the stone home on Oley Turnpike Road, however this author is uncertain as to where her older brother Will (William) and younger brother Henry (older than Walter) were born. (Henry did, however, live in this same stone home years after Hettie and Levi had moved on.) While living in their Brick Limekiln home, Hettie would take her children in a horse drawn wagon, and venture daily to help her mother with the work at the family’s homestead along what is now Wegman Road, and to look after her when she took ill. It is surmised that Levi and Hettie moved into the Moyer Homestead in 1907, after the sale of the brick home.
Harold C. Wegman farm: 2008 / Levi Wegman barn: 1895
Around 1916, Levi Wegman built another beautiful brick home, allegedly for his oldest son, Will, who had married into the Knabb family, and decided to live on a Knabb relative’s farm at the base of Wegman and Limekiln Road. For this project, the brick was purchased in Reading, and was loaded on a flat rail car, and towed on the back of the trolley car to the Limekiln stop, where it was disconnected and moved to a side rail. It was then offloaded and carted by horse and wagon to the job site. Years later, Will’s wife passed away, and Will had no desire to continue farming at this property. Walter and Carrie would subsequently purchase this 167 acre farm for $9000.00 in 1943!
Carrie Mertz, daughter of Sylvanus and Amanda Mertz, was born in 1893 in Rockland Township, near Dryville. She attended the Keller School up until 4th grade! She subsequently moved with her family to Limekiln Road, on a property which is presently a horse farm called the “Glendel Farm.” Carrie and Walter married on February 26, 1916, and originally lived in Reading on Locust Street, where Walter worked at a needle factory for the Nolde family. He didn’t like this type of work, and left a short time later, to move to a farmhouse on Moyer Road which they rented from Oliver Eidle. Their first child, Myron, was born at this property on October 3, 1916. According to Lawrence Houp Sr., who at present possesses the wisdom of the ages, “the first child can come at any time! All the rest take about nine months!!” Others who knew him have always agreed with Myron, that he “grew very fast”!! Around 1919-1920, Walter and Carrie borrowed $5000.00 from Carrie’s father, Sylvanus, who was living on West Neversink Road in Reiffton with his daughter Helen, and purchased the Levi Wegman Farm (the former Henry Moyer farm) on Wegman Road. Years after they moved away from the Eidle property, Carrie’s daughters Mae and Ruth both remember their mother lamenting how much she enjoyed living at the Eidle Farm on Moyer Road, and how wonderful their crops were that they grew at this property.
Carrie Wegman lost her father (Sylvanus) around 1937, and Walter's father, Levi passed away in 1943. (In 1943, Walter and Carrie also purchased at auction the Limekiln Road Brick Home and Farm that had been his older brother Will's.) When Walter came to the auction, a neighbor and a friend of the Wegman Family, Mr. Howard Snyder, (an uncle to Ellen’ Snyder’s husband, and thus a great uncle to Grover, Harold, and Judy Snyder, volunteered to “help” Walter (monetarily) to purchase this farm if he needed it. At first, Walter’s children Myron (married to Arlene), and Robert (married to Helen), moved into this house. (Myron and Arlene also rented a farm near the Oley Dairy, which is presently owned by the Randy Shirey Family.) Walter and Carrie’s daughter Ruth and her husband, Lawrence Houp Sr. had been living with Lawrence Houp's family, but they eventually moved into the old house across the street from this Brick Home. When Myron and Arlene subsequently moved out, Levi and Bettye Wegman moved in. Myron and Arlene’s daughter Elaine, and Robert and Helen’s son Robert Jr. were born before these couples moved to Limekiln Road, however Helen and Robert’s sons Barry, and Bruce, and Levi and Bettye’s son G. Martin were born while these couples lived in this property.
Around 1949-50, Walter Wegman had a new brick home constructed on a parcel of land located downhill from the original Moyer/Levi Wegman Homestead. He chose this site because he could bring the water via gravity from the spring above the farmhouse at the Homestead, without the need of a pump!. When Carrie and Walter moved into their new home, Robert and Helen moved with their boys to the farmhouse above, and Ruth and Lawrence Houp moved into their apartment on Limekiln Road. It was during this period, when she came over summer to visit her grandfather Peter (“Pit”) Bieber at another Moyer farm down the lane on Wegman Road, that Leona (Bieber) Wegman met and eventually captured the heart of young Robert Wegman Jr.!! Romance in Wegmanville, who would have thought that could happen!!!
When Robert Sr. passed away in 1955, Helen and the boys continued to live in the Homestead. Helen subsequently remarried George Arnold, and they lived at this property until 1965, when it was bought by Sylvanus and LaRue Wegman. Sylvanus’s middle son, Ronald (and wife Blanche) moved in around this time, and have been living there ever since. Meanwhile, back on Limekiln Road, Levi and Bettye purchased 3 acres of the (original Knabb) farm from Walter and Carrie, and also several acres from the Reiniger Farm to the west, and built his present family home around the time of the birth of his second son, Douglas. When Levi and Bettye moved out, younger brother Daniel and his wife, Geraldine, moved into the Limekiln property. Daniel subsequently built a home on Oley Line Road, where the Robert Wegman Jr. family presently lives, and he and wife Geraldine moved there. Lawrence and Ruth then took over their entire house, and subsequently bought the farm from Walter and Carrie. Their sons Lawrence Jr. and Gerald were born and raised at this property, (but were both delivered at a hospital). Daughters Anita and Lynne, however, were born at home! (Knowing that these two were always going to be such "good" kids, Ruth chose to deliver them on Limekiln Road. Of course we all know who the "Black sheep" of this family was...)! (To the best of my knowledge, Lynne (Houp) Cover was the last child conceived at this property!! However Barry Lee Wegman spent a considerable portion of his youth haunting this property, so you never know!!!!)
Walter and Carrie’s son, Harold, who married Joan (Bohner) Wegman in 1952 while attending the University of Pennsylvania School of Dental Medicine in Philadelphia, borrowed $15,000.00 from his older brother, Sylvanus, and purchased his apartment/office building at 3518 St. Lawrence Ave., across the street from the Brick Home his Grandfather Levi had built. This author can still remember seeing his great aunt, Clara, an angel by all people’s accounts, working for his father by cleaning the office, using the old style "ringer bucket! Clara passed away suddenly due to a stroke at the age of 70 in 1970. Her widower, Ernest, subsequently remarried to Aunt Charlotte (Wanner) Wegman, who was the second wife and widow of Clara’s oldest brother Will, who had married her after his young wife’s death in the early 1940’s.
Daughter Mae (Wegman) Hoffman, married Earl Hoffman in 1951, and bought the Labe farm on Oley Turnpike Road, where they continue to live today, although they have since added a new home on the farmsite. Mae and Earl ran a successful catering business for many years, in addition to operating a stand at their father (and then brother Levi’s) Market on Penn St. in Reading. Walter and Carrie divided their Market businesses among three of their sons, Robert, Sylvanus, and Levi. Robert’s boys Robert Jr., Barry, and Bruce eventually bought their Uncle Dan’s catering business, and some of their children (Robert III, Shelley, Stephanie, and Barry’s Daughter Tracy continue this tradition as the next generations of their families to work this business today). (Bruce’s son Todd, a Math teacher at the Exeter Township School District, has been known to help also on busy catering weekends too!) Sylvanus left the poultry business, and bought into the Reeser Restaurant on Route 61. Sylvanus’s youngest son, Kenneth, his wife Alice, and their daughter Jenny presently continue the fine tradition of this established business.
Many a fun 4th of July holiday was spent at the Walter and Carrie Wegman Homestead. (Walter and Carrie usually would spend a month every winter in Florida in their later years, so Walter would stop in South Carolina and Georgia and purchase fireworks that quite impressive to say the least!) They also had an annual picnic at the Skytop Retreat, which is the present site of the Bradley and Carol Wegman Home. Carrie unfortunately suffered a stroke around 1971, and then had a more severe second stroke in 1973. She passed away just before her 80th Birthday.
Walter moved in with his daughter Mae, and was treated to daily feasts of food fit for a king!! (Mae never understood, and still doesn’t understand what a “small” portion of food is!!!) This author remembers seeing Walter drive his Cadillac up Moyer Road to visit his homestead and garden, as he had done so many times in his life. Unfortunately, his eyesight began to fail him, and PennDot denied him the privilege of having a drivers license in 1982. Without the ability to see and/or attend to his flowers, asparagus, and raspberries, Walter passed on in 1983, and was buried with his wife Carrie and son, Robert, at the Spangsville Cemetery. His energy, good humor, industrious nature, and Christian ethic lives on today in the hearts and bodies of his many offspring and descendants. Fortunately for the family, his daughter Mae, unlike her father, but more like her mother before her, and a few other enlightened souls within the family, have been able to see the wisdom of the Democratic Party in America, and have not bought into the spend and not tax policies of the "other party" that is not worthy of mention in 2008!
Synopsis of Facts
1) Walter Wegman was born in a home built by his father, Levi Wegman, located presently on Oley Turnpike Road, on June 25, 1895.
2) Carrie (Mertz) Wegman grew up on Limekiln Road, in what is now the present Glendel Farm, with her parents Sylvanus and Amanda Mertz.
3) When they first were married, they rented a farm from Oliver Eidle, located on Moyer Road. Presently this property is inhabited by Joe and Joan Lubas. Carrie and Walter, throughout their lives, always recalled fondly how well they did with their truck farming crops at this location.
4) Sometime prior to 1916 (before the birth of their first child, Myron), Walter and Carrie borrowed $5000.00 from Sylvanus Mertz to purchase the Levi Wegman farm (which he had inherited from his father-in-law, Henry Moyer). Walter would periodically visit his father-in-law, Sylvanus, in Reiffton, where he lived with his daughter Helen, to make payments on his loan. Never one for keeping accurate records, this would come back to haunt Walter upon his father-in-law’s death, since he could not produce all the receipts for the payments he had made on his note, and ended up paying some of this money twice!
5) Sometime during the end of the 1940’s, Walter and Carrie built their own home on their farm along Wegman Road, and their son Robert moved into the family homestead. After his death, Helen and George Arnold rented this homestead for sometime, before the farm was bought by Walter and Carrie’s son, Sylvanus. Presently, Sylvanus and LaRue’s son Ronald (and his wife Blanche) have been living in this property since approximately 1965.
6) In the late 1940’s, Walter chose the site of his new home because he could use the Spring (water source) from the original homestead, and pipe the water from the spring via gravity to his new home.
7) Walter’s Father Levi was a builder, a carpenter, and blacksmith, and a wheelwright. Presently, (4) structures that were built by Levi Wegman are still standing. They are:
a) The Home Walter was born in at 5855 Oley Turnpike Road
b) The Barn located presently on the Harold Wegman Farm at 5451 Oley Turnpike Road, built for Snyder Family around 1895
c) The Brick Home on Limekiln Road , built in 1916, which was constructed for Levi’s oldest son, William (Will), who had married into the Knabb family at this location. Presently this Home and Farm are owned and occupied by Lawrence and Ruth (Wegman) Houp, Walter and Carrie’s Daughter. Myron and Arlene Wegman, Robert and Helen Wegman, Levi and Bettye Wegman, and Daniel and Geraldine Wegman also lived at this property at one time or another! Rumor has it the Barry Wegman, Robert and Helen’s second son, also haunted this property for many a day during the 1950’s!!
d) 3517 St. Lawrence Ave. This brick home was the last house that Levi built, which he built with his son-in law, Charles Bieber. Levi built this property to live with his daughters Ella, Clara, and Emma, along with his son, Daniel. Unfortunately, Levi’s wife Hettie (Moyer) Wegman passed away, and Levi remarried to Emma Fisher, and moved to Wernersville. He never moved into or lived in this St. Lawrence Ave. property. His children, however, lived there for many years, and a photo exists that is owned by Ruth Houp which shows the three sisters posing in their front yard, sometime in their early twenties and all dressed up! The St. Lawrence grade school, built in 1911, can be seen in the backround. Talk about “flappers”!!! (Note: Elmer Adams, born in 1907 across the street next to the grade school, told Gary Wegman a story of many a day sitting on his front porch and watching a farmer herd his sheep down St. Lawrence Ave and turn down Brumbach St. to take them to a pasture for grazing near the former St. Lawrence Mill along Antietam Creek. 100 years ago sheep were herded down St. Lawrence Ave! In the 1950’s, Clyde Rhoads’ butcher truck would stop on St. Lawrence Ave and cut up meats and cheeses as per your personal request. Mail men brought your mail to your doorstep, as did a daily Milkman making your personal delivery! A bakery operated along St. Lawrence Ave., and the Borough had a MD Doctor, a DDS Dentist, a Furniture Factory, a linen mill, a Dairy, a Woodworking Door and Plywood Business, and an Automobile Mechanic! In 2008, of all these enterprises, only the Dentist office still remains in business in St. Lawrence. The younger generation likes to call this pathway into our future, progress!!
Respectfully submitted,
Gary S. Wegman
Grandchildren Dateline
Name Year Graduated
1) Elaine Wegman 1958
2) William Wegman 1959
3) Robert Wegman Jr. 1959
4) Ronald “Butch” Wegman 1960
5) Nancy (Wegman) Fies 1961
6) Barry Wegman 1962
7) Bruce Wegman 1964
8) Lawrence “Skeeter” Houp Jr. 1965
9) Kenneth Wegman 1965
10) G. Martin Wegman 1966
11) Gerald Houp 1967
12) Loreen “Reenie” (Wegman) Duff 1968
13) Anita (Houp) Heydt 1969
14) Douglas Wegman 1970
15) Sue (Wegman) Reifsnyder 1970
16) Bradley Wegman 1971
17) Lynne (Houp) Cover 1971
18) Richard Wegman 1972
19) Sharon (Wegman) Brizek 1973
20) Randal Wegman 1974
21) Gary Wegman 1975
22) Linda (Wegman) Kohl 1977
23) Dwight Wegman 1978
24) Janet (Wegman) Kratz 1978
25) Brenda (Wegman) Haag 1984
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