Lake County IN Archives Biographies.....Gerlach, Adam J. 1848 - 
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Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com December 17, 2006, 6:49 pm

Author: T. H. Ball (1904)

ADAM J. GERLACH.

    Adam J. Gerlach, with residence and farm on section 30, Center township, has
been identified with the most important interests of Lake county for over forty
years. He passed part of his boyhood in this county, after which he was one of
the popular and leading workers along educational lines for many years, and the
latter part of his career has been devoted most successfully to the life
insurance business and to farming, so that his years have been both varied in
their activity and prosperous in their fruits.

    Mr. Gerlach was born at Harper's Ferry, Virginia, March 8, 1848, being a son
of Michael and Catherine (Wirtheim) Gerlach, both natives of Bavaria, Germany.
His father, on coming to America, located at Harper's Ferry, and in 1857 brought
his family to Lake county, Indiana, settling in St. John township. He improved
his first farm and also was the owner of two other farms, being during his
lifetime one of the leading citizens. He taught school for some time and for
many years was assessor of his township. He died at the age of seventy-five, and
his wife in her seventy-sixth year. They were the parents of seven children,
four sons and three daughters, and all but one are living and married at the
present time.

    Mr. Adam J. Gerlach, who is the third child and third son, was about nine
years old when he came to Lake county, where he continued the education he had
begun in Virginia. He graduated from the Crown Point high school, and from that
time has made his own way in the world. He began by clerking in a store, but at
the age of seventeen entered upon his career as school teacher, which he
continued, altogether, for twenty-one years. One term was in Cook county,
Illinois, but all the rest was in Lake county. He taught different branches,
English and German being favorites, and he also made a specialty of musical
instruction, both vocal and instrumental. He is an accomplished musician, and at
the present time is organist in St. Mary's Catholic church at Crown Point.

    He now resides on his farm of two hundred and forty-five acres situated
three and a half miles south of Crown Point., where he owns one of the fine
farmsteads of this part of the county. But he devotes most of his time to
soliciting life insurance for the Aetna Life of Hartford, having been agent in
this business for twenty-one years. He has written many thousands of dollars in
this time, and his work has extended to all parts of the county. One of his
chief industries on the farm is a large dairy, and in this connection he has
become one of the directors of the Chicago Milk Shippers' Union, which comprises
many thousand dairies of Indiana, Illinois and Wisconsin. He is also interested
in a company organizing, at Crown Point, a jelly manufacturing business. About
eighteen farmers of the surrounding country will raise currents for this
enterprise.

    Mr. Gerlach is one of the well known Democrats of Lake county, and for some
years served as justice of the peace. He is a member and a trustee of the
Catholic church at Crown Point. He was married, August 10, 1874, to Miss
Margaret Scherer, the daughter of Nicholas and Frances Scherer, who were among
the early settlers of Lake county, where Mrs. Gerlach was born. Mr. and Mrs.
Gerlach have had thirteen children, and all are living but one, who died in
1903, the others being as follows: Adam M.: Amelia, wife of Theodore Stech;
George F.; Frances; Agnes: Michael; Joseph; Richard; Philip; Susan; Josephine:
and Lillie. Adam and Agnes graduated in the Crown Point public schools, and the
former and George F. are members of the Crown Point brass band. Mr. Gerlach,
being so proficient in music, has given his children fine instruction in music,
and at gatherings, assemblies and farm institutes they take a prominent part.


Additional Comments:
Extracted from:

ENCYCLOPEDIA
OF
Genealogy and Biography
OF
LAKE COUNTY, INDIANA,
WITH A COMPENDIUM OF HISTORY 
1834—1904

A Record of the Achievements of Its People in the Making of a Commonwealth and
the Founding of a Nation.

REV. T. H. BALL
OF CROWN POINT, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
ILLUSTRATED
CHICAGO   NEW YORK
THE LEWIS PUBLISHING COMPANY
1904


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