A New World . . .

This is a story of the Mashek family who came to the United States in 1867. Joseph Mashek was one of my great-great-great grandfathers on the Robley side. The information was provided by Mrs William (Carol) Mashek . . . I am not sure how we are related.

"Long ago, in the country of Bohemia, on the continent of Europe, a boy child was born on March 17, 1837 and named Josef Masvek. He was baptised into the Catholic faith in, or near, the city of Prague (Pra'ha) Bohemia on the Vltava River. His parents were John Josef and Anna (Vodzezka) Masvek who were probably a farm family since he came to the United States with considerable farming skill which he practiced successfully throughout his long life.

After coming to the United States, all branches of the Masvek family Americanized the name. Josef Masvek changed the "ha check" which has the "sh" sound so the name became Mashek. Some cousins changed the name to Maschek, some to Mashak, and others to Mascheck. But it is possible that all persons in the United States bearing one of the derivations of this name are related seven to nine generations distant.

Joseph B. Mashek was married to Anna Skoda (born 1841) at Prague, Bohemia in 1857; Anna was 16 years old. A son Joseph B. was born to them in 1860; a daughter Katherina in 1862; and a son John J. in 1863. According to family legend a daughter Mollei was born in 1867 on the ship as they were sailing to America.

We do not know why Joseph Mashek was inspired to come to this country. We do know that during that period of time the continent of Europe was torn by wars. Four armies had crossed and recrossed Bohemia from 1850 to 1865. It was the custom for the peasant class to be pressed into military service for as long as seven years, for whichever country was currently victorious. Perhaps Joseph Mashek had seen such military service and did not want to serve again or was fearful that his sons would face such service in the future. Having the desire to own his land, he may have been inspired by the attractive advertising of American railroad companies, who after the Civil War lured tens of thousands of European peasants to American shores. Whatever the reason, the Mashek family came to the United States in 1867.

They traveled by way of Canada to Cleveland, Ohio. It is believed that Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Mashek and children Joseph B., Katherina, and John J. were all that left Bohemia from the immediate family. Later Joseph's brother John, a nephew John, and a Mathias Mashek left Bohemia. Many Bohemian peasants left from Hamburg, Germany that year.

Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Mashek and family settled in Cleveland, Ohio for a couple of years where they gained citizenship status. It is assumed that prior to 1870, Joseph and his family had begun their journey west. The trip using Cleveland, Ohio as a departure point, took a period of four to six months traveling by horse and wagon, or by waterways and wagon. Part of the trip may have been taken by train. They may have visited with their friends the Viktora family in Muscada, Wisconsin where there was a Bohemian settlement. For "wherever the Masheks went, the Viktoras followed---our family settled their way across Iowa and Dakota right behind them." Frank Viktora was half-cousin by marriage and was born in Muscada, Wisconsin.

In 1871 Joseph Mashek bought land in Spillville, Iowa from a gentleman who had already moved to California. It was also known that other Masheks had preceded him, buying land in 1868-1870. The move to Spillville was probably a family reunion. [Note: Spillville is in the northeast corner of Iowa and was primarily a Czech (Bohemian) settlement. For more on Spillville, including a neat picture of a water mill that was built before Joseph settled there go to http://www.spillville.org/Spillville/OldMill.html ]

At Spillville, the Joseph and Anna Mashek family was enlarged by the births of James 1871, Frances Bertha 1873, Frank 1874, and twins born August 12, 1875 with a girl Anna Belle being the only survivor. Not only did Joseph lose a child of this birth, but he also lost his beloved Anna four and one-half months later as a result of what must have been a traumatic birth. Anna Skoda Mashek died early in January 1876. She was buried in the church cemetery at Fort Atkinson, Iowa where the family had begun attending church. Fort Atkinson, Iowa was a military town two and one-half miles southwest of Spillville. [Note: Anna Belle Mashek, the surviving twin, is my great-great grandmother]

After the first farm was purchased at Spillville, Iowa, he bought several more farms to add to his first few acres of land. He had sons who were maturing and would soon need farms of their own. The area where he concentrated his land purchases in Sumner Township, is just south of the area called "Bohemian Creek" in Winneshiek County. One of the farms still has a small mill wheel attached to the side of the barn and a picturesque little creek which must have been used to grind flour for the Mashek family still flows there.

With the loss of their mother, 14 year old Katherina took care of the family, including baby Anna, with the aid of aunts and a hired girl.

In 1878, two years after the death of his wife Anna, a trip to town changed Joseph's life. He was driving a young team, which he had newly broken to pull a wagon. As he entered the tiny village the team ran away, taking out the front fence from the home of a young widow. It was difficult to get the team stopped, but harder still was the tongue lashing Joseph received from the widow who assumed he was drunk at 11 o'clock in the morning! Assuring the young woman he was not drunk did not pacify her. He finally agreed that he would rebuild her fence. [Note: I should hope so!] As the fence repair began, and continued through the summer, it was obvious to the family that a romance blossomed in that yard that summer. Joseph began serious courting through the winter of 1878-1879. Joseph Mashek and Anna Stepan Riha were united in marriage in her family church at Spillville on May12, 1879.

Anna Stepan (Stef'on) Riha, born in 1845, had come to the United States in 1867 as a young wife and mother with her husband James Michael Riha and their daughters Mary and Anna, Anna's parents the Frank Stepans, and her brother Michael Stepan and his family. While she and Joseph were courting they found that they had both been born in Prague and had both come to the States in the same year. Anna's husband James M. Riha was a carpenter-farmer who came to Fort Atkinson to do carpentry for the government fort there and died March 1878 in a construction accident. Anna and James Riha had four children - Mary 1865; Anna 1867-1871; James 1873, and Albert 1876.

After their marriage, Joseph and Anna's combined families were a total of 13 living children. Their combined farmland was enough to support this large family but their farmhouse south of Bohemian Creek must have been crowded. The family size did not decrease with this marriage as Joseph and Anna had their first child Rosa, born on May 1, 1880.

Earlier in March of 1880, Joseph Mashek and his sons loaded a wagon and started on an adventure west to see the land which had just been opened up in what had been Indian land. The 1870's had been a decade of depression, drought, and hard times. The opportunity for free virgin land seemed too good to be true. When he arrived in Brule County, Dakota Territory Joseph could not believe what he saw - level land which had not a tree or a tree root needing to be grubbed out - free land, which Uncle Sam would give you just for living on it. The reader can envision how good this offer seemed to a man with six sons and the possibility of more to come! He filed a claim, built a claim shanty to establish residence, and returned home in time for the birth of his daughter Rosa. He had new land, a new family, and bright prospects for the future!"

To be continued . . .