Monday, December 12, 2011

Amanuensis Monday - The death of Fred H. Wandrey

According to Genabloggers, "An Amanuensis is a person employed to write what another dictates or to copy what has been written by another. Amanuensis Monday is a daily blogging theme which encourages the family historian to transcribe family letters, journals, audiotapes, and other historical artifacts."

Fred H. Wandrey was my first cousin, twice removed, meaning he was my grandfather's first cousin. He was the son of Fred G. Wandrey and Lucy Viola (or Viola Lucile) Parker. Viola would be my great grand aunt, on my mother's side. I don't have a lot of details, except birth records indicate he was born in Wautoma, Waushara, Wisconsin May 22, 1906.

I found this article via the newspaper archive of the Appleton Post-Crescent. I was looking for information about the Wandrey's after my grandfather told me that he remembered a cousin that was a school superintendent in Green Bay. What I found was the troubling story of his death. Unfortunately, the story contains only the bare facts and doesn't answer any other questions.

Appleton Post-Crescent
Wed. June 18, 1958
Superintendent of Green Bay Schools Takes His Own Life
GREEN BAY — (AP) — Fred H. Wandrey, about 51, superintendent of Green Bay public
schools since 1952, was found dead in the basement of his home Tuesday afternoon with a shotgun wound in his chest.

Dr. Cletus Belisle, Brown County coroner, said death was a suicide.

He said the shotgun was found near Wandrey's body and that there were powder burns on the hands and chest. The body was found by Wandrey's wife when she returned home.

Wandrey came here from Beaver Dam where he had been superintendent since 1949. He
was superintendent at Richland Center from 1943 to 1949 and also had been head of schools at Black River Falls.

He was a graduate of Cumberland High school.

Other survivors include two daughters.