by Barbara Leiger Granato
My previous two blogs on this site were about discovering the true story of my 2nd great-grandfather, Sylvester Spare. During our trip to the area northeast of Pennsylvania in 1992, I not only discovered the story of Sylvester’s life and demise, but I also discovered a little more about another branch of my family from that area.
My mother’s father was named Amos Milton Spare. His father was John Spare, and John was married to a woman named Sarah Neiffer. Nobody in my family seemed to know too much about Sarah’s family history, but my mother and her sisters did tell me a lot of stories about her. She and John had a farm in a tiny town named Royersford, Pennsylvania, and together they had four children – my grandfather Amos being the third child born to them.
Sarah was remembered as being a very strict, stern woman who loved to instill fear into others. Quite by contrast, she also was a mid-wife and delivered several of the babies in that small town. She had to do something to raise money; her husband John had a silo fall on him when the children were young, and he had to be institutionalized after that for the rest of his life.
But this blog is not supposed to be about John – it is supposed to be about Sarah. Nobody in my mother’s family seemed to agree on the spelling of her maiden name. Everyone knew how to pronounce it, but was it “Knifer?” Or was it “Nifer?” Or was it “Neiffer?”
When I was studying a map (yes – in 1992 they did not have GPS systems!), I focused in on an enlarged detailed image of the area in which the Spare family lived. And then, I did a double-take! I suddenly knew how to spell Sarah’s maiden name. There was a little dot on the map that said “Neiffer.” OH MY GOSH!!!! Well, Sarah’s family must have been important if there was a town named after her family! Upon closer examination of the map, there was not only a “dot” named Neiffer, but there was also a “Neiffer Road!”
And so, after we had learned all we did about Sarah’s father-in-law, Sylvester, we decided to pursue learning more about Sarah Neiffer. My 10 & 12 year-old children were suddenly interested again. It was almost like exploring a map to find buried treasure (no pun intended!).
We drove down the “main” road until we saw a street sign that said “Neiffer Road.” “Take a left,” I told my husband, and then I told him to stop so I could get out of the car and take a picture of the road sign. After that we drove up the road until we reached the end, and we were in town called “Obelisk.” Somehow, we missed the little dot on the map that said there was a town named “Neiffer.”
But, at the end of that road when we got into Obelisk, there was a church on the right-hand corner with a large cemetery next to it. And right there, very visible to passersby on the road, stood some very large tombstones with NEIFFER on them. I took photos and tried to make notes about the writing on the tombstones, but it was difficult because they were written in German.
We not only found several tombstones with the name of Neiffer on them, but we also found Sarah (Neiffer) Spare buried next to her husband, John Spare. Thankfully, their tombstones were written in English. After making note of exactly where their graves were located and photographing them, we returned to the car. We drove back down Neiffer Road again, but this time we were a bit more cautious. We came to a small intersection, but there really wasn’t anything of significance there. We were so confused.
There just HAD to be a town somewhere. After discovering Neiffer on the map, I also learned that Neiffer even had its own zip code – 19468! We had apparently gone right through that zip-coded area without realizing it!
It was such a hot, humid day that we decided to return to the hotel so that the kids could go swimming in the pool. I had to contemplate this puzzle a bit more to find out if my great grandmother Sarah was connected somehow to the 19468 area and Neiffer Road. It was 1992 – we did not have the Internet.
So, I did the next best thing – I consulted the telephone directory in the hotel room. I looked for the name “Neiffer” and sure enough, there were about eight families listed with that name. I wrote down every name, address, and phone number, and when we returned home, I wrote a letter to every single one of them, explaining who I was and that my great-grandmother was Sarah Neiffer. Did they know anything about this woman? I also included a self-addressed stamped envelope in each letter that I mailed.
And then my wait for a response began….
To be continued…..
Lessons Learned:
©2015 Barbara Leiger Granato
After retiring from her job as a secretary at Mohawk Valley Community College, Barbara Granato had more time to pursue her love of genealogy. She is a member of the Oneida Chapter Daughters of the American Revolution, currently serving as the chapter Registrar and Vice-Chair of NYS Lineage Research for DAR. In addition to teaching Beginning Genealogy classes, she is a Board member of the Central New York Genealogical Society, as well as a Board Member for the Oneida County Historical Society. She also is a member of the Landmarks Society of Greater Utica and serves as a tour docent to the mansions on Rutger Street in Utica, and writes murder mysteries which are performed at one of the historic mansions once a year. She is a member of the Association of Professional Genealogists as well as the New York Genealogical and Biographical Society.
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