As I mentioned in an earlier post about my 3rd great-grandfather John Frost, his wife Catherine’s surname was unknown. Recently Ancestry.com added records from the New York, New York Marriage Indexes 1866-1937 and I found the entry for John and Catherine’s son Frederick, who married Augusta Kiem in 1886 at the German Evangelical Church in Brooklyn [where Augusta’s family lived]. I ordered the original from the NYC Department of Records and 6 weeks later the photocopy arrived in the mail. It’s not always the case, but this one included quite a bit of information, including his mother’s maiden name!
The name could be spelled Dixheimer, but based on some preliminary searching I think Dexheimer is the proper spelling. Her first name is also spelled with a K on this record, but C is used on every other record I have for her, I’m pretty sure K is the more traditional German spelling.
Because John and Katherine lived in Newark, NJ, I checked Ancestry.com for records of other Dexheimer’s in the area and found one that is particularly interesting. Frederick Dexheimer was born around 1829 in Hesse Darmstadt and is a barber in the 1861 Jersey City directory. Katherine was also from Hesse Darmstadt and was born around 1818, so they could be siblings, but what’s really interesting is that he’s a barber.
Katherine’s sons Julius [my 2nd great-grandfather] and Frederick [possibly named after his uncle?] were in the barber supply business for many years. I’ve often wondered how they got involved in that business, perhaps it was Uncle Fred?
Interesting how answering one question leads to so many more, the investigation continues…
This post is 23rd in the 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks challenge series.
References: Ancestry.com. New York, New York, Marriage Indexes 1866-1937 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2014.
Original data: Index to New York City Marriages, 1866-1937. Indices prepared by the Italian Genealogical Group and the German Genealogy Group, and used with permission of the New York City Department of Records/Municipal Archives.
Ancestry.com. U.S. City Directories, 1821-1989 [database on-line]. Provo, UT, USA: Ancestry.com Operations, Inc., 2011.
The eLuceydator 
3 replies on “New Discovery – Dexheimer Surname”
My great-grandmother was Mary Catharine on official documents but informally signed her name as Mary Katherine or Mary K. Perhaps the K-spelling was also the more fashionable of the time?
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That’s a great point, the other element here is that I don’t have any documents where she wrote her name, only where it was written by others, so that persons preference could come through too. Luckily, most search engines will consider both. Thanks for reading and commenting!
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