I can't answer Ken Eckler's question about how or when his family came to the U.S., but I think my father's mother is his grandfather Henry's sister.

My grandmother Emma Catherine Eckler Smith was born in Sandusky on May 29, 1889. She had an older brother Henry, an older sister Clara, and younger brothers Louis and Elmer.

She married Harry Smith in 1913 and moved to Marion, Ohio, where they lived during the depression. She once told me that during the worst part of the depression my grandfather and she could hardly feed the family. Uncle Henry came to visit and without fanfare laid several hundred dollars on the table. That act of generosity helped them through the most difficult financial crisis of their marriage.