My Genealogy Hound

Peter William Muenks, a farmer and retired merchant of Loose Creek, Osage Co., Mo., was born in Prussia, in 1816, and is a son of Jacob and Sebeli Catherine (Boomester) Muenks, who immigrated to the United States in 1841, and settled on Loose Creek, in Osage County, Mo. Jacob Muenks, who was a farmer by occupation, died December 31, 1848, at the age of sixty-one years; his widow died February 9, 1845, at the age of fifty-eight years. Peter William Muenks was the eldest of a family of six children, and attended the common schools in the country of his birth until fourteen years of age. He immigrated to Osage County with his parents, where, in 1845, he married Silvi, daughter of Augustin Maire, who came from France and located in Osage County, Mo., in 1844, where he died. Mrs. Muenks was burned to death in September, 1863; she was the mother of three children, all now deceased. In 1864 Mr. Muenks married Agnes Otto, a native of Osage County, who lived less than a year after marriage. The following year Margaret Schmitz, of Osage County, became the wife of our subject, and of the seven children born to this union seven are living, viz.: Arnold, John, Charles, Gertrude, Henry, Jacob and Elizabeth. Mr. Muenks located on his present farm in 1852, which now contains 120 acres; the house in which the family live was built in 1839, and is still well preserved. In 1854 Mr. Muenks opened a store at his house, carrying a stock of general merchandise and doing a successful business until 1886, when he removed his stock to the town of Loose Creek, a short distance from the farm, where he continued merchandising until 1888. He served as postmaster of Loose Creek from 1853 to 1864, and again in 1887-88. He is one of the pioneers of Osage County, and has been an enterprising citizen. When sixteen years of age he learned the linen weaver’s trade, which he followed in his native country several years. Mr. Muenks has in his possession on old-fashioned clock which was made in 1811, and has been in the family ever since. In religious faith he is a Catholic.