Charles W. Stehr

Charles W. Stehr (Southeast Missourian archive)

Last week's blog reviewed the brief history of the Chero-Cola bottling works in Cape Girardeau. Prompting the write-up was a photo of an advertisement that once graced the west wall of the C.W. Stehr Mercantile in the 600 block of Good Hope.

Carl "Charles" William Stehr was a native of Cape Girardeau. He was born Dec. 17, 1862, the son of Conrad and Mary Martinowsky Stehr. (In doing genealogical research on this line, I had problems locating kin to Mary. I discovered why when, by chance, I located an obituary for her brother, Mathias. At some point, he had changed his name from Martinowsky to Nowski. I've always wondered why he didn't take the name "Martin" instead.)

Charles Stehr was an institution in the Haarig business district. He began his career there in partnership with Henry Nussbaum. He also married his partner's daughter, Pauline, in 1890 at Trinity Lutheran Church. They had one son, Charles Nussbaum Stehr.

Along with stories about numerous other community movers and shakers, Stehr's biography was included in The Missourian's New Building Edition.

Interestingly, the 1918 obituary of Henry Nussbaum has this to say about his association with his son-in-law:

"Following Mr. Nussbaum's marriage (in 1864) he engaged in the furniture business, which he followed for three years, then opening a general merchandise store. He remained in this business for many years, later taking his son in the business.

"In 1899 he retired from the business leaving it in the hands of his son and went to Switzerland, where he spent about six months at his old home (Aauru, Switzerland). Upon returning to America he again entered business this time with his son-in-law, C.W. Stehr. When his age began telling on him he retired from active business for good and went to his daughter's home to reside."

Here is Stehr's obituary, published June 2, 1944:

You may note a couple discrepancies between these two clippings. Other documents shows that Stehr was born in 1862 and married Pauline Nussbaum in 1890 at Trinity Lutheran Church in Cape Girardeau.

C.W. Stehr was my first cousin, three times removed.

The Stehr Mercantile store was in the 600 block of Good Hope Street. (Southeast Missourian archive)