Minden, Iowa

Today would have been my dad's birthday; James Leverett Jr. would have been 95, but died a few years ago. He was a prolific photographer and I will try to get some of his photographs up here as there are many of the family.

He grew up in Council Bluffs, Iowa, where his dad met his mom, Verna Mauer, whom I never met. Verna Mauer was born "near Minden, Iowa" according to their marriage records, and I'm pretty sure the Mauer family actually lived in Minden for a while. Minden was over half destroyed by an April 26 tornado, and I'd love to know if their house survived; it could have been long gone even before the tornado of course.

Her family was German as was most of the town of Minden. German immigrants had come by the thousands through New York and Chicago and many of them ended up in towns like Minden where their friends had settled and where they thought they could make a living. Charles Mauer met Catherine Singelman in Minden and had Verna and her older brother Roy.

According to a family story a feud developed between mother and Roy (because he talked her into investing the family fortune into the railroads, and they crashed?) - I don't know the reason. But though Uncle Roy was a doctor, my father wasn't able to get to know him, because the grandmother lived in the house and wouldn't allow it.

This house would have been in Council Bluffs. My grandmother died before I was born, and it's unlikely Uncle Roy could have prevented it. To my father, though, that was the definition of a dysfunctional family - where siblings have skills that could really help each other, but don't, because for family reasons they aren't allowed to share them.

I have an old photo of the extended Mauer family in some house in Minden which I'll try to find; it has Verna and Roy in it. I'll get back to you. This will be in the next book, after Prairie Leveretts - Bluffs Leveretts.