Saturday, June 23, 2007

He Certainly Deserves An Eternal Reward

Chris over at The Genealogue frequently spots and highlights unusual names. Recently, he had these (1, 2, 3). I don't know if he's seen the 1880 census for Clinton County, Iowa.

On that census, there's a nineteen year old grocery clerk, the son of German immigrants. Fredrick and Lisette Lindloff apparently named their son "Through." That by itself would be strange, but it gets better. Professor Murray Heller explains in his 1975 introduction to N.N. Puckett's work, Black Names in America, that the young man's full name was Through Much Trial and Tribulation We Enter the Kingdom of Heaven Lindloff.

Born in 1881, "Through" died on March 11, 1947, and presumably fulfilled his eponymous admonition.

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