Catherine "Katie" Kristufek (1857-1929)

Catherine "Katie" Kristufek was born in Chicago, Illinois on Nov 24, 1857, the fifth of seven known children of Jan Kristufek and Anna Jelinek. Katie grew up at 171 Dekoven, near the corner of Desplaines, where her father owned a grocery store and later a saloon. On the night of the Great Fire in 1871, she told her descendants that she had buried her jewelry in the yard before her family fled into the night.

The house was undamaged by the fire which started on their street at 137 Dekoven but burned north and away from their address. But by 1875, she was living at 487 S. Canal Street a few blocks away in an apartment house her father had built in 1868 and had been the home of Vaclav and Catherine Donat, the in-laws of her older sister Anna Kristufek (1855-1931). An 1875 City Directory lists her at that address and working as a milliner. On October 26, 1875, she married a butcher six years her senior named Frank Gross, who had been born in Hodina, Bohemia on Nov 28, 1851.

Frank and Katie Gross 1875 Wedding Portrait

By the 1880 Census, Katie and her husband Frank were living at 487 S. Canal Street, along with her married brother John Kristufek Jr. and his family and their parents and youngest brother Joseph (1863-1932). Sometime around 1884, Katie and Frank, along with her brother Joseph joined their sister Antoinette "Jennie" Kristufek (1861-1939) and Jennie's husband Frank Lepsa and brother-in-law Thomas Lepsa who had relocated to Wahoo, Nebraska and engaged in a brewery scheme.

The brewery business, for whatever reason, did not last long. Joseph Kristufek went quickly back to Chicago, married and moved with his new wife to New York City. Frank Lepsa turned to local politics and banking, while his brother continued on in the area as a boilermaker and amateur boxer.

Frank Gross went back to being a butcher, opening a successful meat market in Wahoo, which remained his occupation until he retired in 1904 and a business he passed down to his oldest son, John Frank Gross (1878-1967) who had joined him in it in 1896.

Frank and Katie Gross with three of their children: Sylvia, John Frank and Georgiana

Katie remained very close to her sister Jennie for the rest of her life. Contemporary newspaper reports of the time include several visits between the two while Jennie was living in Denver, Colorado and Katie and Frank spent summers in Manitou enjoying the mineral springs there. The Aug 13, 1911 edition of the Denver Post reports that Katie's son John Frank Gross was married to Elizabeth Woodward at her sister Jennie's house in Denver the previous Monday.

In addition to John Frank Gross who married Elizabeth Woodward on Aug 7, 1911 in Denver, Katie and Frank also had a daughter Sylvia Gross (1876-1938) who married Albert Oscar Zerrenner, two sons who died as infants Frankie (1883-1886) and Eddie (1885-1888) and a daughter Georgiana Gross (1892-1943) who never married.

John Frank Gross, wife Elizabeth Woodward, and their three children around 1922

John Frank Gross and his wife Elizabeth had three children Pictured above): Jack Edward Gross (1913-1999) who married Hilvie Mae Olson, Frank Gross Jr. (1914-1998) who married Hazel Fraley and Marjorie Elizabeth Gross (1917-1995) who married Thor Pearson.

Frank and Katie Gross later in life.

Katie Kristufek Gross died of pneumonia on Apr 17, 1929. Frank Gross Sr. died on March 16, 1937.