Surnames: Helmke, Zimmerman

----Source: Marshfield News Herald (Marshfield, Wood County, Wis.) 13 Feb. 1930

Sexton of the City Cemetery

Otto Christ Louis Helmke is a native of South Kaukauna, Outagamie County, Wisconsin, where he was born on October 22, 1889. At age 11, his parents moved to the town of Eau Pleine, Marathon County, where his father passed away several months later. In 1904 his mother and family located near Unity, Clark County. He received his education in public schools in South Kaukauna and Eau Pleine, and helped at farmwork at home until 18. He then worked on the farm of his brother, William, in the town of Eau Pleine, for six months. Leaving his brother, he went to Maple, Wisconsin, between Ashland and Superior, to labor in a sawmill. A few days after starting work he sustained injuries that incapacitated him for months. In the accident, his clothing caught on the shaft of the machine, which whirled him around.

After his recovery from the injuries, he followed various lines of work, principally as a helper in the harvest fields at Clark City, South Dakota; Valley City, North Dakota; and Fairfax and Campbell, Minnesota; on the Soo Line with a section crew and gravel train at and near Riplinger, in the paper mill at Rothschild; and on farms in central Wisconsin. His woods work included three winters of logging on his own account, on an eighty of his own, in the town of Eau Pleine, which he still owns. His timber consisted principally of hardwood and hemlock. The logs were sold to the Doud Sons and Company of March Rapids, and the R. Connor Company and the Roddis Company, both of Marshfield.

In 1917 he embarked in farming on the eighty which he had cleared in the logging operations. He continued at farming there for seven years, after which he leased the place, which he had improved to a large extent, to his brother, William, and accepted a position as assistant sexton of the local city cemetery, where he has been employed since.

He was married to Miss Emma Zimmerman, by a Lutheran minister, at the home of her parents in Little Falls, Minnesota, April 19, 1917. Their children are Marion, 12 and Otto Jr., 6.

He is a former constable and school district clerk for Eau Pleine Township. Politically, he is Independent. His hobbies are reading and motoring.