Friedrich Wilhelm Stock

GEDCOM Note

Born in Exten 35 (today means street 10).Friedrich Wilhelm also last name as Cane. Frederick Charles Buckingham reminisces about the death of William Stock in the 1890s, then owner of the 96 Ranch. In Fritz Buckingham's reminiscence, William Stock took the hooting of an owl as a portent of death, a widespread belief in Europe and America. A more scientific portent may have been the medical problems that plagued Stock's final years. His grandson John Grotsch portrays the man as a strong, hard-working, six-footer who weighed over two hundred pounds. He suffered a severe back injury in 1883, a stroke that left him partially paralyzed in 1886, and a heart attack in 1893. Grotsch described Stock's death in the following passage: In order to afford his family and himself a more comfortable living Mr. Stock had constructed a large, two-story house. Fate, however, was to step in and deprive him of this pleasure, for on November 25, 1898, just one night before he was to move into his new home, he passed away in his sleep at the age of sixty-one. Thus came to an end the life of a man who came to America as an immigrant boy, determined to avail himself of the opportunities his adopted country had to offer those with courage and foresight.