| Parents: Education: Occupation: |
Joseph Peter Anthony Stimmler Anna Hennessy High school graduate [Source: 1940 U.S. Census] Clerk for the City of Philadelphia Administrator, Trust Department for Land Title Bank and Trust Company Philadelphia, Pennsylvania Bank clerk [Source: 1940 U.S. Census] |
| Notes: | As of the April 22, 1910 federal census, Val was 4 years old and living with his parents, five siblings and a 17-year-old |
| servant, Maggie Krafenbury, in Philadelphia Ward 21,
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
At the time of the Jan. 28, 1920 U.S. federal census, Valentine was 14 years old and living with his parents and six siblings at 323 Roxborough Avenue in Philadelphia City, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He was attending school at the time. His father was working as a house plumber as was his brother James. Eldest brother Joseph was working as an inspector for the telephone company. In the April 4, 1930 federal census, Val was 24 years old and living with his parents and four of his siblings (with the exception of second eldest brother John) at 323 Roxborough Avenue in Roxborough, a suburb of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. Val was working as a clerk for the city. The family owned their home which was valued at $10,000 (or $100,000 in current 2001 dollars) and they had a radio. At the time of the Apr. 17, 1940 U.S. federal census, Valentine was 34 years old and living with his parents, 27-year-old sister Anita and her husband Richard Baffa (age 35), and their two young sons, Richard (age 7) and Robert (age 3), at 323 Roxborough Ave. in the 21st Ward of Philadelphia City. They had been living in the same house on Apr. 1, 1935. He was working 40 hours a week, 52 weeks a year as a bank clerk, earning $1,100 in 1939. He was a high school graduate. Leo Stimmler reminisces on his Uncle Val to his brothers: "On this date in 1951, Paul, Frank and I (Did Joe go with us? Mark was only about 18 months old.) had just come in from the movies. We were in the front bedroom of 105 Rochelle Ave. getting ready to go to bed. Mom walked into the room and quietly said Uncle Val had passed away. Born September 8, 1905, he was only 45 yrs old. "He was our father's twin brother and caught polio when he was an infant. That was 58 yrs ago today. A kind and gracious man--unlike some of his brothers--I used to love to watch sporting events with him on the small television set in Uncle Dick and Aunt Anita's living room above the beauty parlor on Roxborough Ave. "Uncle Val and our father must have thought and wondered why one twin baby and not the other had contracted this very contagious disease. How strange and mysterious life can be. Uncle Val never seemed bitter to me; in fact, he seemed just the opposite. I was 8 years old at the time of his death. Why did mom tell us Uncle Val died? Was our father too upset? "Not too long after his death, Dr Jonas Salk discovered a vaccine for polio. I still remember how excited mom was about his discovery. At the time I thought she was over-reacting because she went on and on about how important this discovery was. I am sure I didn't realize how Uncle Val's death had impacted her and how terrifying polio was to the general population. "I may be reaching too far on this one but our father loved President Roosevelt who, like his twin brother Val, contracted polio. I heard him say many, many times how he felt Roosevelt single-handedly brought the country out of the economic depression. I wonder if part of his affection for Roosevelt was an extension of his love for someone who--like his twin brother--was fighting this disease." -- from a July 31st, 2009 e-mail Mark Stimmler reminisces on his Uncle Val to his brothers: "Uncle Dick told me Val was stellar. Worked for a mortgage company…brilliant with numbers. Finessed Uncle Dick’s mortgage when he (Uncle Dick) had nothing….telling Uncle Dick '…now say this and that on the application…and take it to this specific person….'. Needless to say he got the loan. "I can’t remember what caused his death (coronary? aneurism?). He said Val’s death was negligence by the doc at the hospital. He (Dick) told me he told the doc and the nurses…'something isn’t right here…doc, you’ve got to come to the hospital…you’ve got to come'…... Doc said: 'oh it’s nothing' and wouldn’t come.” -- from a July 31st, 2009 e-mail Paul Stimmler reminisces on his Uncle Val to his brothers: "Leo, how good of you to remember our Uncle Val. He was a sweet man. Uncle Val didn't die from polio, or complictions therefrom, but a ruptured/infected gall bladder, which may actually have been misdiagnosed as a ruptured aortic aneurism, one of those two, as I recall. I actually heard it earlier in the day from both of our parents because I was late getting home from somewhere possibly the movies, and mom and dad weren't able to get to the hospital to see Uncle Val off, because I wasn't home yet. Dad was greatly distressed with me. "Our father was a Democrat and our mother was a staunch Republican. I recall telling our mother in 1960 that I assumed that being the child of Irish Catholic immigrants that she was so happy that someone of Irish Catholic heritage John F. Kennedy was running for President. Her response: 'Actually to the contrary, I'm planning to vote for Richard Nixon because I admired the patriotic way he went after Alger Hiss [the commie spy in the state department] and persisted in the Congressional investigation with Whittaker Chambers.' "Our father liked Franklin Roosevelt less because of polio, but rather because he made heroic measures to try to help spring the nation out of the economic Depression which scared the begeezus out of folks our parent's age. Our father lost his very lucrative salesman's job with Oil Station Engineering Co., a Texas-based firm, in late 1929/early 1930 and all he could initially get he told me was whitewashing basements, and then household repairs which his father,our grandfather, scared up for his sons from long standing IOUs from his own plumbing customers. The latter verified by our Aunt Anita shortly before she died. He went with Metropolitan Life Insurance Co. in early 1931 after a neighbor who worked there and lived in what later became our Uncle Gerald and Aunt Ruth's house at 109 Rochelle Ave. told him about the company. Stayed there for 27 years... 3 years after his first heart attack. "Our uncle Val was a 'lifer' with Land Title Bank and Trust Co. at Broad and Chestnut Sts in Philly and worked as an administrator in the Trust dept as I recall. I can recall our father dropping him off at work one rainy April day." -- from a July 31st, 2009 e-mail |
| Ancestry: | The Hennessy Line |
| The Stimmler/Stimler Line | |
Stimmler/Stimler-Kampa Family Album
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