St. Martin's Church

In Springfield, Wisconsin there is a Catholic church called St. Martin’s that is both a part of our family history and one of those small pieces in the puzzle of American history as well.  Johann Adam Sitzmann, my great-great grandfather, was a stone mason who had recently arrived in the United States from Germany when the building of St. Martin’s began to be built in 1850.  According to local history, it was only in 1841 that the first white settlers had come permanently to this area.  Most of the land still belonged to Native Americans, and that included the land that he thought he had a deed to, as he later found out.   

In history context is everything.  Sitzmann was working on St. Martin’s prior to the Civil War.  It interests me that the church he was helping to build was a Roman Catholic church at a time when there was still a deep prejudice in this country against Catholicism.  No doubt, our tobacco-farming Northen ancestors would have driven them out of town, had they shown up in rural Virginia.  St. Martin’s went on to have a school.  While today we simply assume every child’s right to public education, in the mid-1800’s education was still basically a private affair.  Those parents who had money might send their children, but even then, Catholics were often not allowed, so no doubt St. Martin’s school played an important role in the community.

Because of the dubious claim to his property, Johann Adam Sitzman ended up moving on to western Iowa becoming part of the mass mid-century expansion westward.  St. Martin’s, of course, remained behind.  In one of my imaginary drives across the country to visit all those places that played a part in our family becoming what it is today, Springfield is definitely one of my stops.  It is amazing that today, though expanded and updated, the original church of 160 years ago is still standing.  It was built of stone and meant to last. I’m intrigued with the idea that if somehow Sitzmann left his own fingerprints, his own mark on it.   I doubt many buildings we put up today will be standing 160 years from now, when our descendents look back at us.