On April 3, 1950, a federal census enumerator recorded a household in Cuba City that joined three generations of the family. Elizabeth Loeffelholz, sixty-five and widowed, was the head. George Brownell was her son-in-law, and Florette was her daughter. William C. and infant Barbara appeared as grandchildren. Elizabeth's adult son Wilbur and a lodger completed the household. The relationships on the original sheet give a direct view of George and Florette living with her mother. 2
George was twenty-eight. Florette was twenty-six, just short of her April birthday. Their lives were already shared with the older Loeffelholz generation and with small children of their own. The census does not say why they lived together, whether Elizabeth owned the house, or how expenses and work were divided. What it does show is an extended household, rather than a family confined to a single couple and their children. 2
The same record supplies a small but revealing postwar episode. George reported that he had lived in Illinois a year earlier and had worked fifty-two weeks in 1949. At the time of enumeration he was looking for work, with eight weeks recorded. His occupation and industry were left blank. This describes a particular period of transition; it does not establish a long-term occupation or explain the move back to Wisconsin. His supplemental answers also record completion of twelfth grade and service during World War II. 2
The family remembers Florette as a homemaker and preserves the familiar name Freda. Those recollections add a personal identity to the formal Florette of the census and vital index. 1
George and Florette raised four children: William, Betsy, Barb, and Becky. Their family was complete by 1955, when the youngest was born. 1
The two family lines
George was born on January 5, 1922, in the Platteville area, according to vital and burial indexing. His parents were William Henry Brownell and Lelia McNear Dickson Price. Her name appears as Leila in contemporary records and property histories. The 1950 Galena census records William H. and Leila M. together at a named nursing home, providing a second household through which to understand George's family background. 1371213
Florette was born in Cuba City in April 1923 to Charles Loeffelholz and Elizabeth Gubbles or Gubbels. The Social Security-derived entry gives April 18; the family remembers April 19. Her father's death is dated May 24, 1923 in the family gravestone record. On either birth date, she was about five weeks old when he died. 1438
These family lines connect Cuba City and Platteville with Galena, Illinois, through work, marriage, and the extended household.