Chester County PA Archives Obituaries.....Kempf, Christoph W. May 6, 1957 ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/pa/pafiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Dan Lindley danoh19344@hotmail.com November 21, 2005, 3:17 pm Daily Local News, May 7, 1957 Daily Local News, May 7, 1957 A 70-year-old retired farm manager suffered a heart attack and died yesterday while working to prevent spread of a grass and brush fire on the 200-acre farm of Mrs. Louise Hayden, near Marshallton, where he had been employed and lived for the past 25 years. The deceased, Christoph W. Kempf, was a native of the state of Michigan. He left a farm there, which he operated along with his brother, to enlist in World War I. After the war, he did not return to the Midwest and was living in the Philadelphia area when he was employed by Mrs. Hayden’s father. Mrs. Hayden, a widow, continued operation of the farm, after the deaths of her father and husband. About three years ago, however, she sold her dairy and Kempf was retired. At about 10:30 yesterday morning a fire started in grass and honeysuckle near the edge of a woods. Kempf, who had been doing only light work since his retirement, fought the fire alone until about 3:00 in the afternoon when the West Bradford Fire Company was called. Firemen worked for nearly an hour to bring the fire under control and left Kempf at the scene, still beating out smouldering (sic) patches of fire with a shovel. When the aged man failed to return to the Hayden home at 5:00 o’clock, Mrs. Hayden called Marshallton firemen to determine if they knew anything of his whereabouts. When they told her they had left him at the scene she investigated and found Kempf lying dead along a little used cart road. Mrs. Hayden again called the West Bradford firemen and they, in turn, called Thorndale State Police barracks. Sgt. Thomas Dooner and Trooper Frederick Urban made a preliminary investigation and then called Deputy Coroner Cooper T. Bishop, of Phoenixville. The deputy coroner found that the man’s death was due to natural causes. This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/pafiles/ File size: 2.4 Kb