Snyder Community
Hale County, Texas
Snyder
Community Families
John S. (1889-1958) and Bertha A. (Kreider)
(1890-1922)
Snyder
John Samuel Snyder,
born September 24, 1889, near Cullom (Livingston County), Illinois, was the
third of Peter B. Snyder and Ida Grabill's nine children. When his family moved
to Hale County, Texas, in 1907, John was 17. The family took with them a number
of animals for their new farm. Family stories say that Peter and "the older
boys," probably Orville and John, traveled in the railroad boxcar to tend to the
animals. I don't know if John attended school in the Snyder Community, but I'm
sure he was busy helping his father establish the farm. One family member says
that Peter and his sons built their Texas house from a Sears kit.
Born near Wadsworth, Medina County, Ohio,
on November 13, 1890, Bertha Amanda Kreider was
the daughter of Jonas and Kate Kreider. At the
age of thirteen, she was received by baptism into the Bethel Mennonite Church,
where her father was preacher. When she
moved to Texas with her parents and her younger sister Ida, Bertha was
nineteen.
Family stories say that one of Peter Snyder's motivations for moving to Texas
and recruiting other Mennonite colonists to join him was to find spouses for his
children. In 1910, there were three weddings in the Snyder family! The first one
didn't happen in the Snyder Community. On April 9, 1910, John and Bertha were
married by Mennonite minister A. I. Yoder in his living room at another
Mennonite colony, Happy, TX, about 40 miles north of Plainview in Swisher
County. John's brother Orville and Ellen Hartzler were witnesses at the wedding.
Less than a month later, Maude Snyder married Bertha's brother Milo
Kreider, but I don't know the location. In September,
Orville and Ellen were married at the Snyder Community home of Ellen's
parents, Joseph and Mary Hartzler.
I
don't know when the "buggy picture" at left was taken,
but there are similar photos of
Milo
and Maude as well as
Orville
and Ellen. I think they were taken in the Snyder Community on the same day!
Newlyweds John and Bertha lived in a small house built for them on
Peter Snyder's farm. Later, Orville and Ellen Snyder lived in a similar house, both of
which can be seen in
this photo of
the
Snyder farm. (Photo from the Grace
Snyder Swartzendruber Collection.) John and Bertha were listed in the 1910
census as a separate family in Peter's household.
Shortly before the birth of the third child, Hazel Irene, in July 1917, John
and Bertha left Texas for Bertha's childhood home of Medina County, Ohio. The
1920 census shows them on a farm on Seville Road, near Wadsworth, renting the
property. Daughter Mildred had joined the family in 1918; Lois was born later in
1920.
In 1922, the family experienced great joy, followed by great sorrow. On
June 21, Bertha gave birth to a son, John Samuel Snyder, Jr. Just four days
later, Bertha quite unexpectedly died. According to her obituary,
"She
gave birth to a baby boy on June 21 and was apparently on the road to recovery.
On the morning of June 25 she had a fainting spell and in just a few minutes she
passed away, without any pain and scarcely any distress."
Bertha's
obituary
- Gospel Herald
- Vol. XV, No. 18 - August 3, 1922 - page 351 or 352
At Bertha's death, John had five daughters and a newborn son.
The family photo at left is from the Grace Snyder
Swartzendruber Collection. In 1924, John married Bessie Stauffer; the couple
had five children. John died at age 68 in 1958, the first of Peter B. and Ida
Grabill's children to pass away.
John's
obituary - Gospel Herald - Vol. LI, No. 27 - July 8, 1958 - page 649
or 650
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2007 Bonnie Snyder Smith
