Heritage

Online journal of writer Loretta Willems

Skip to content
  • Home
  • Genealogy
  • Credo
  • Books
  • About
  • Contact
Search

1930s California

Old Photos: 1930s

October 14, 2019October 14, 2019 / lorettawillems / 2 Comments

Child Bride, my second book, begins each chapter with an old photo, or in one case a painting. I wanted it to be an album of memories, stories and photos that together tell the story of my parents' marriage that focuses on the early years, the 1930s and 1940s. I grew up hearing stories of … Continue reading Old Photos: 1930s

Jack Willems: “Truck Driving Exploits”

March 21, 2018March 25, 2018 / lorettawillems / 1 Comment

Truck driving was my father’s default occupation, the job he turned to when other projects didn’t turn out. It was a default occupation because he was good at it, and though he disliked working for other people, he did enjoy driving and took pride in his skill at handling the big diesel rigs. Below are … Continue reading Jack Willems: “Truck Driving Exploits”

Young Mother

January 7, 2018January 7, 2018 / lorettawillems / 8 Comments

Paul Buxman painting: "Winter Vineyard" Winter is the rainy season in California’s San Joaquin Valley. Some years the rain is sparse; other years it rains and rains and rains. And when it isn’t raining, and the sun tries to come out, the dreaded tule fog rises from the wet ground and turns everything a uniform, … Continue reading Young Mother

Old Photos: 1930s

May 2, 2016 / lorettawillems / 2 Comments

The photos in this week's post used to be mounted in a big photo album that sat on my parents' coffee table when I was a growing up. It had a hinged wooden cover held together by a leather shoe string threaded through holes drilled into the narrow strip of wood on the left edge. … Continue reading Old Photos: 1930s

The Canadian Twins

April 2, 2016 / lorettawillems / 3 Comments

My father left home to make his way in the world sometime in January or early February of 1933. He was eighteen years old and restless. He said he borrowed a dollar from his young uncle, Jack Zimmerman, and caught a freight train going to Los Angeles where his oldest brother, Nick, was working on … Continue reading The Canadian Twins

Old Photo: Willems Family 1930s

March 2, 2016June 7, 2016 / lorettawillems / 2 Comments

During the 1930s Depression, my grandparents, Jacob and Lena Willems, leased three different farms from the California Land Bank. The first was near the town of Reedley; the second was just a half-mile east of Dinuba; the third was near the tiny town of Orosi a few miles east of the farm in Dinuba. The … Continue reading Old Photo: Willems Family 1930s

The Gift of Laughter; The Story of a California Mennonite Family

Order the Book

“In The Gift of Laughter, you will find one family’s story of deep trauma—and the resilience born out of an ability to laugh together. . . . Laughter was their gift to each other, their story a gift to others.”

–Hope Nisly, Acquisitions Librarian for Fresno Pacific University

 

“Loretta Willems has a fascinating family history and writes of it with lovely detail, honest reflection and great beauty.”

–Dora Dueck, award-winning author of Return Stroke: Essays and Memoir, and four books of fiction

Child Bride; Remembering a Young Mother

Order the Book

Agnes Young was fourteen in 1936 when she eloped with twenty-one year old Jacob Willems and joined him on his vagabond life, traveling California’s country roads, picking up work wherever they could find it. Two years later she gave birth to her first child. Agnes was only sixteen when she became a mother; yet she managed to create a stable home for family, a home that felt secure and safe.

Former Website

A Mennonite Story: The Willems/Zimmermann Family

Recent Posts

  • Afterglow: The Book Event
  • Photos for Abbotsford Book Event
  • Abbotsford, BC Book Event
  • Bill Haney meets Frank Lloyd Wright
  • Bill Haney
  • Ukraine, pt 3: Gerhard & Katharina Rempel Willems
  • Ukraine, pt. 2: The Steppe
  • Ukraine
  • Christmas 1960: Monroe, Washington
  • The House on South Blakeley
  • How I got to the GTU
  • How I became a Mennonite
  • Agnes Young Willems: In Memorium
  • Phoenix, Arizona: March 1958-59
  • Japan: 1956

Categories

  • 1920s California
  • 1930s California
  • 1940s California
  • 1950s
  • 1950s California
  • Agnes Young Willems
  • Book 3
  • CA
  • Canada
  • Early marriages
  • Jacob "Jack" Willems
  • Japan
  • Loretta Willems
  • Mennonite History
  • Old photos
  • Paul Buxman paintings
  • Phoenix, Arizona
  • Reedley
  • Reflections
  • Richardson family
  • The Adam & Margaret Young family
  • Theology
  • Uncategorized
  • Western Washington 1957-1961
  • Willems Family History
  • WW II
  • Zimmerman Family History

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Memoir Chapters


Ch. 1: "California Mennonite"

Ch. 2: "WWII"

Ch. 3: "Going to Dinuba"

Ch. 4: "Grandma & Grandpa Willems"

Ch. 5: "How We Got to Russia"

Ch. 6: "Mountain Lake, Minnesota"

Ch. 7: "Saskatchewan"

Ch. 8: "Russia: 1866-1903"

Ch. 9: "The Zimmermans 1903-1905"

Ch. 10: "Waldheim"

Ch. 10 (cont.): "The Zimmerman Clock"

Ch.11: "Lena & Jacob 1909-1919"

Ch. 12: "Reedley"

Ch. 13: "California 1919-1922"

Ch. 14: "Madera County: 1922-1929"

Jacob C. & Helena Zimmerman Willems

Waldheim, Saskatchewan 1909

My grandparents, Jacob and Helena, were step-brother and step-sister in a marriage the family said was arranged by the Mennonite Brethren Church.

The marriage between my grandmother’s father, Heinrich H. Zimmermann—a widower with five children, and my grandmother’s mother, Elisabeth Boldt Willems—a widow with nine children, resulted in two more Willems-Zimmerman marriages: in 1909, the marriage between Jacob and Helena; and in 1912, the marriage between my grandfather’s brother George and my grandmother’s sister Anna.

Research and documents about the Willems and Zimmerman families can be accessed by clicking on the following link:

lwillemsmennostory.blogspot.com

Gallery

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Gallery of Images

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

Categories

  • 1920s California
  • 1930s California
  • 1940s California
  • 1950s
  • 1950s California
  • Agnes Young Willems
  • Book 3
  • CA
  • Canada
  • Early marriages
  • Jacob "Jack" Willems
  • Japan
  • Loretta Willems
  • Mennonite History
  • Old photos
  • Paul Buxman paintings
  • Phoenix, Arizona
  • Reedley
  • Reflections
  • Richardson family
  • The Adam & Margaret Young family
  • Theology
  • Uncategorized
  • Western Washington 1957-1961
  • Willems Family History
  • WW II
  • Zimmerman Family History
Follow Heritage on WordPress.com

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Blog at WordPress.com.
  • Follow Following
    • Heritage
    • Join 53 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • Heritage
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...