Laura (Nannie) Stemmerman was the daughter of a farmer named Reimer Stemmerman. When she was 16, she became pregnant by Jacob Frahm who was 10 years older and was a hired hand on Reimer’s farm. Nannie welcomed his attention, possibly seeing it as a way to get away from her stepmother, Reimer’s second wife. Nannie’s mother died when Nannie was very young--about 2 years old (she had an older sister, Margaret (Maggie) who was about 2 years older). Reimer, with the aid of the local sheriff, convinced Jacob that it was in his best interest to make an honest woman of Nannie, and told Jacob he could go to jail or marry Nannie and Reimer would set them up in farming. So they were married in 1901near Nunda, Lakek County, South Dakota.

Their daughter, Annie, was born in Aug. of that year in Fulda, Minn. A second daughter, Marthalena (Lena) was born in 1904 in Hooper, NB. And Loretta was born in 1907, in Midland, S.D. Jake was not a good farmer, however, and Reimer bailed him out twice, but Jake clung to old world ways of farming and didn’t learn from neighbors how to make the rich loam of the midwest produce for him.

So Jacob got a job with the Milwaukee Railroad and decided to homestead in western S.D. about 50 miles sw of Pierre, not too far from the Bad River. This was not a good decision--the land was not good for farming, and Jake had to be gone a lot. Nannie had to put up with living in a half dug out sod shanty with 2 small daughter and a new infant. Life was lonely and primitive---and then one day she looked up at the cheesecloth that she had stretched across the ceiling to keep the dirt from falling from the sod onto their heads. She saw a huge rattlesnake byling between the sod and her flimsy cloth. She got the kids out and smashed the snake to death with a garden hoe. In the process, she tore down her cheesecloth and a lot of dirt.

So they gave up homesteading and Jake brought his family back to Wentworth, S.D. where he worked as a farm hand. Here Hans was born, May 17, 1910 (which happens to be Norway’s national independence day). Even as a hired hand, Jake didn’t do well. He liked to do things when he felt in the mood, not necessarily then they should be done. There wasn’t much income, but the family kept chickens, so at least they had eggs to eat.

Jake got a job at Morrell packing plant in Sioux Falls and eventually, he bought an old, two story, 5 room house at 1506 N. Wayland Ave. Here Lawrenz, 6 years younger than Hans and the last of the 5 children, was born.

In 1937, Jacob died of a stroke. And on the way home from her husband’s funeral, Nannie had a severe stroke that paralyzed her left side. She spent some time in nursing homes, with Hans & Agnes, and finally with a friend. She died in Dec. 1939.

Nannie had many half siblings from her father’s 2nd marriage: Tillie, Mary, Helen, Rose, Marie, Elizabeth, Edith, George & Ernie.