Saturday Night Fun--My G-G-Grandmother Emma Amanda Sackmann

Emma Amanda Sackmann
Hillman Schmidt
(1862-1951)

Genea-Musings Blog posts prompts every Saturday encouraging followers to write in their own blogs. This week’s prompt, “Write a 100-word Life Sketch of your 2x Great-Grandparents."

I chose Emma Amanda Sackmann, my father’s maternal great-grandmother. One of the reasons I chose her is because my father knew her well and she was a beloved grandmother to my grandmother. Emma (Granny) actually lived with my father’s family for a period of time when he was young and she was the one who raised my grandmother after her parents divorced and my grandmother’s mother was committed and eventually died at Greystone Psychiatric Hospital in Morris Plains, NJ.

The Life Sketch of Emma Sackmann

We were encouraged to use AI to generate the sketches, so I am testing the waters. I gave ChatGPT three screenshots of my Ancestry Family tree timeline of my great-great-grandmother along with the prompt, “Using the following three images with text on them about Emma Amanda Sackmann, please write a 100-word life sketch about her.” This is what it came up with:

“Emma Amanda Sackmann was born on June 26, 1862, in Germania, Potter County, Pennsylvania, to John Heinrich Sackmann and Christina Dunker. She married Johannes Wilheim Hillmann in 1882, and they had two children, Herman and Louise. Emma lived primarily in New York City and Brooklyn, with occupations and residences changing over time, reflecting her role as a wife, mother, and, later, a widow. She experienced the deaths of many family members, including her husband in 1906 and her daughter in 1938. Emma eventually relocated to Brattleboro, Vermont, where she passed away on February 2, 1951, at age 88.”

Given only 100 words (well 98, in this case) there isn’t a whole lot you can say about someone, I guess this provides a very appropriate (if not bland) life sketch.

Extension of Her Life Sketch

Some of the things that were not highlighted in this brief sketch is that she was the first of her parents’ five children to be born in the United States. They emigrated from Germany in July 1856 on the ship John Herman from Hamburg as a group of 9. Her parents, Johann and Christina (Dunker) and her three older siblings Louise (4 years), Carl (2 years), and Pauline (2 months), and 4 other family members, Anna (18 year–unknown relationship), Johann (15 years–unknown relationship), and Heinrich and Catherine (possibly brother and wife). When they arrived in the US they lived in Brooklyn but then invested in the Pennsylvania (German) Land Association and moved to Germania (Abbott), Potters County, Pennsylvania to be among a small community of German immigrants. Both Emma and her younger brother were born there. 

I visited Abbott/Germania a couple of years ago and it is a beautiful country with rolling hills and in some places steeply sloping land. The immigrants were intending to farm the land but it was not going to be easy. Emma’s father died around 1870 which probably prompted the family to move back to Brooklyn. 

Emma married Johann Hillmann as a 19 year old. He was recorded being a salesman and a “liquor dealer” and owned a bar at one point. At 43 years old in 1906, she was widowed and lived alone in 1910. She married Otto Fred Schmidt between 1910 and 1915 and in the 1915 NY Census they have her granddaughters living with them. Otto died in 1924 leaving her a widow, again, but still raised her granddaughters until they were out on their own. In her later years, she resided in Vermont mostly with Ruth, her granddaughter who was not married at the time.

My perspective might be influenced by my father’s memories of her, but in researching her life I have come across several facts/observations which suggest to me that she was a very welcoming and nurturing person. Beside taking in her granddaughters and raising them into adulthood, I found in 1892 in addition to her two children, her niece Lulu Steinem is living with them and in 1900 a different niece Vera Henno is living with them and you can see in this photo Vera is reclining back and draping her arm over Emma’s knee. I’m guessing she was a beloved aunt as well as grandmother!

When I think about all she endured and experienced in her 88 years from 1862 to 1951, I am inspired by the fortitude she must have had. Maybe it was the model she saw in her own mother who was widowed at the same age with 5 children? Regardless, reflecting on Emma's life helps put my own challenges in perspective and allows me to appreciate what I do have to make my life easier…like, this computer and internet, for example!