Servants' Hall - History of Appleton and America
However, the residence is not just divided from the family to the servants side in terms of architecture. It is also divided in terms of ethnicity, language, and religion.
The Rogers are rich, English-speakers, and Protestant. The servants in this house are working class, German-speakers, and Catholic.
The workers came from the neighborhood across the street which was filled with Irish-Catholic and German-Catholic families. They prayed at churches only three blocks away: Saint Mary’s for the Irish and Saint Joseph’s for the Germans.
A perfect example of the servants is the Rogers’ cook, Mary Deimer. Her photo hangs on the wall. She is 14 years old in the photo. That was the age she started as the Rogers' cook and the head of this household in charge of a staff of four. Mary had begun working as a scullery maid at the age of six. Her father died when she was only four, and to help her mother feed her family, Mary had to go to work as soon as she was able.
Mary's parents were from Thuringen, Germany, arriving in Appleton in 1864. Mary was born here in 1868. Mary spoke German as her first language, speaking it everywhere in Appleton. She only spoke English in this home.
Appleton was a boom town from 1860-1890, growing 500%. Most of the new citizens were immigrants and most of those were from Germany. Even through 1917, more than half the people living in Wisconsin were born outside the US.
Unsurprisngly then, as many if not more people living in Appleton in the 1880s spoke German than English. In fact, Appleton had two daily English-language newspapers at the time, but it had three daily German-language newspapers. Two of the German papers were published until World War One and the third, the Appleton Volksfreund (People's Friend), was published until the 1930s.
The 1885 census shows two unnamed German-born women servants living with the family at Hearthstone. One was Mary Deimer and the other was likely Theresa Moder. Theresa was born in Prussia and served as the lady's maid for both Cremora and Kitty. We will hear more about these remarkable women later in our tour.
