This file portion of www.watertownhistory.org website

 

David Blumenfeld

1828 - 1905

1879
The History of Jefferson County, Wisconsin”, published: Chicago:  Western Historical Company, 1879.
 

David Blumenfeld was born in the ancient city of Creglingen, Kingdom of Wurtemberg, Feb. 13, 1828; received a common-school education and in 1841, entered a printing office at Stuttgart, the capital city of Wurtemberg; left that city in February, 1848, and worked at the case as a journeyman type-setter, in the cities of Neuwied, Dusseldorf and Schwerin.

 

Emigrated to America in June, 1850, via Hamburg, and landed in New York Aug. 15, 1850; stayed there and in Philadelphia a few weeks and came to Wisconsin in the month of September of that year; entered, a few days after his arrival in this State, the service of Messrs. Kohlmann Bros, who intended to publish a German paper in Racine, and in October, set the first stickful of German type that ever was set in that place.  (See Racine History.)  The Messrs. Kohlmann are now citizens of Oshkosh and publish a well-known German paper there – the Telegraph. 

 

In April, 1851, he left Racine and accepted a position as foreman in the office of the Daily Banner and Volksfreund, at Milwaukee, published by Morritz Schoeffler, who was well known among all the printers in Germany, having been, for a number of years, first foreman and manager of the world-renowned printing establishment of Baron von Cotta, in Stuttgart.

 

In September, 1852, went to New York to get married to Nancy Lewensen, of Schwerin, Germany, and in August, the following year, removed from Milwaukee to Watertown, in company with John Kopp, from Augsburg, a pressman who worked in the same office with him in Schwerin, and afterward in Milwaukee.  They commenced the publication of a Democratic German weekly paper, called the Watertown Anzeiger, and issued their first number Aug. 27, 1853. 

 

Weltburger

 

D. Blumenfeld has since that time continued in the printing business, since 1859, as sole proprietor of the Watertown Weltburger. 

 

His family consists of his wife (with whom he celebrated his silver wedding on Sept. 11, 1877) and seven children, of whom two are married; has been a member of the School Board and Common Council from 1868 to 1872.

 
1905
Watertown Daily Times, 09 29 1905
 

Monday morning the older residents of this city were pained to learn that David Blumenfeld, editor of the Weltbuerger, had passed away as the previous night and although the end was not unexpected, his old friends and associates for half a century, felt keenly the separation that his departure occasioned.

 

The deceased was born in Creglinger, Germany, Feb. 19, 1828. After learning the printer's trade in his native town he emigrated to America, landing at Racine, Wis., where he set up the first German type composed in the state.

 

The following year he went to Milwaukee where he was employed as foreman on the Daily Banner. In 1853 he went to New York, where he was married to Nancy Lewensen and the couple removed to Watertown, Wis., where in company with a Mr. John he established a German newspaper, The Auxeiter, in 1853. The paper was later changed to the Weltbuerger and he had been its editor since that time and sole owner since 1853.

 

In politics he was a democrat . . . He was a close friend of Carl Schurz in the early days when Mr. Schurz was a resident of Watertown.

 

Cross-References:

Father of Ralph Blumenfeld

Father of Moritz Blumenfeld

Buried in Oak Hill Cemetery