The connection of the Seulings in Alten-Buseck with some other American families of that name as yet is not fully clear. Waiting for further information that can shed a light on their German ancestry, we therefore will limit ourselves to the data that are available and the speculations that require confirmation.
The American branch started by Nicholas Seuling (1875-1932)[1]
This second among the American branches stems from Bavaria[2] where Nicholas Seuling was born in 1875[3]. The names of his parents currently are not known; his father was born on May 30, 1836 and died in 1908. Nicholas left for America in 18–, at a time when many of his countrymen did the same as Bismarck set out to unify Germany and the neighboring principalities. There was a John Seuling in Hamburg. A brother, Kaspar Seuling, lived in Eltmann (Unterfranken) No.123, Bayern. Anna, an older sister of Nicholas’s, born on November 19, 1869, did not leave Germany. Her son, John Pflaum, later came to Ridgewood, Queens, New York. Lorenz Seuling, Nicholas’s cousin, known as Larry, was born May 11, 1883, and came to New York. His parents stayed in Germany. He died on May 19, 1909 in New York. Grete Woefel was Nicholas’s sister; she lived in Ridgewood.
(Ill. 96: Family tree of the American Seuling branch, started by Nicholas Seuling (1875-1932).)
(Ill.: Sad story in the New York Times of May 20, 1909.)
Nicholas lived at 797 1st Avenue in Manhattan. When in America, he married Barbara Sebald (Seabold? Siebold?) – it was an arranged marriage. They later lived at 349 E. 48th Street in Manhattan, where two children were born: Nicholas Kaspar, on November 5, 1904, and John Steven, on March 12, 1908. Nicholas worked for Swift’s meat packing plant on the East River and was injured in an accident. He received a settlement for the injury and with that money, Nicholas, Barbara and the two boys moved to Ridgewood, Queens, which had now been settled by German immigrants. They bought a house at 385 Onderdonk Avenue, and on the ground floor opened a tobacco & candy store. Another child was born, in November 1909, who died a month later. On October 28, 1910, a daughter, Teresa, was born. A year later, on August 11, 1911, there was an accident and Teresa died. Nicholas Frederick was the last child born to the couple, in their attempt to have another daughter. He was born in Queens, on June 3, 1912.
Nicholas died on February 6, 1932, in New York. Barbara returned to Bayern, Germany[4] where she died on February 1, 1936.
Nicholas Kaspar
Nicholas Kaspar married Helen Gaudio (also: Gadie) and had three children: Philip Nicholas (born January 20, 1934 in Brooklyn, NY); Barbara Maryann (born July 22, 1937 in Brooklyn, NY); and Dennis Kaye (born November 7, 1946 in Brooklyn, NY). Nicholas Kaspar died in 1971 in Brooklyn, NY. Judging from the number of Internet entries, Phil (Philip Nicholas) and Barbara put the Seuling family name on the map. In 1967, when he was a high school teacher, Phil sponsored the first major comic book convention in New York. Called the Comic Art Convention, there were tables and tables full of golden age and silver age comics, big little books, newspaper strips, pin-ups, movie posters and original artwork. People came to sell their comics collection, “trying to raise money for dental bills not covered by insurance”, as one of the early participants remembered. “I was stationed in the huckster room with a few boxes of fairly ordinary comics on the table in front of me and a box of the truly valuable ‘stock’ by my feet. This included the very first comic with a Spiderman story, Amazing Fantasy # 15, which is worth over a thousand dollars today.” Phil’s conventions became a virtual brand name; he is mentioned in almost all historical reviews of American comic book art as well as in a publication Fifty Who Made DC Great (DC Comics, New York; 1985). When he passed away in August 1984, the headline in the Comics Journal read “Phil Seuling, father of the direct-sales market, dies at age of 50”. Phil had two daughters, Gwenn (born October 25, 1960) and Heather (born November 9, 1962).
“I have traveled to many places and seen wondrous things — the ruins of Pompeii, the Parthenon in Athens, Hamlet’s castle in Denmark, the Tower of London, a cloud forest in Costa Rica…but I always write about what I know best. I always come back to life as I knew it in Brooklyn, as a child.” This is how daughter Barbara on her website[5] tells about herself: where she gets many of the ideas for her books and what she has accomplished as yet. “I was born in Brooklyn, New York, which seemed like the most exciting place in the world. In the summertime, the whole family would go up on the roof of our building to see the fireworks on Coney Island. It was a short walk to Gravesend Bay, where we saw great freighters coming in and out of New York harbor . There were new movies every Saturday at one of the neighborhood movie theaters, a library a few blocks away, and always armies of kids to play with, so I can’t say I thought much about writing. I did draw, though, from the time I could hold a pencil.
When, one day, the writing bug bit, all those great times back in Brooklyn came back to me in floods of stories and pictures. My freaky fact books were a direct offshoot of my early fascination with Ripley’s Believe-It-Or-Not series in the Sunday funnies. The Teeny Tiny Woman is a kind of tribute to my love for folk and fairy tales, which consumed me until I was eleven or twelve. The Triplets sprang from the irritating way adults compared me to my older brother.
After college I spent several years as an editorial assistant, then as a children’s book editor, first at Dell Publishing Company, and later at J. B. Lippincott Co. My experiences became the basis for my book How to Write A Children’s Book and Get It Published. I taught writing for children at the Bank Street College of Education and the Writer’s Voice in New York City, and created The Manuscript Workshop to work privately with children’s writers. My long association with the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators is one of which I am most proud, and I now serve on the board of advisors of that organization.
Today I have had more than fifty books published and write a regular column for the magazine, Once Upon a Time…. Writing is a tough game. You have to keep proving yourself and you can never take the next success for granted. In spite of that, I continue to love my work. It’s almost as exciting as Brooklyn was to me all those years ago.”
Others have grown to admire her work, making her the best known of the worldwide Seuling tribes. “You’ll also want to see what author, editor, and writing teacher Barbara Seuling has to say about an often-overlooked strategy for finding publication. Her perspective in Success Through Magazines may surprise – and inspire – you. But then, that’s really not surprising. She’s long been an inspiration for many.” The text once again is taken from the Internet and provides advice for depressed would-be authors. Barbara[6] indeed developed into an expert on the subject; her books include texts on How to Write a Children’s Book and Get It Published and To Be a Writer: A Guide for Young People Who Want to Write and Publish. Over a long period of time she published a great many books herself, however, with some of the wildest and funniest titles on record: Bugs That Go Blam & Other Creepy Crawler Trivia, Elephants Can’t Jump and Other Freaky Facts About Animals, You Can’t Sneeze With Your Eyes Open and Other Freaky Facts About the Human Body, The Last Cow on the White House Lawn and Other Little-Known Facts About the Presidency, The Last Legal Spitball and Other Little-Known Facts About Sports, The Loudest Screen Kiss and Other Little-Known Facts About the Movies, You Can’t Show Kids in Underwear and Other Little-Known Facts About Television, You Can’t Eat Peanuts in Church and Other Little-Known Laws, Who’s the Boss Here?: A Book About Parental Authority, and the Teeny Tiny Woman: An Old English Ghost Tale.
Dennis Kaye had two daughters, Elizabeth (born in 1975) and Pamela (born in 1978).
John Steven
John Steven never married. He died in June 1960 in New York.
Nicholas Frederick
Nicholas Frederick married Elizabeth Bernard Stelter on February 6, 1932. They had one child, Marilyn Ruth, born March 1, 1933. A second marriage to Barbara Oehl produced Barbara Ann, in 1947.
Marilyn Ruth married Richard Norris and they had eight children: Richard Frederick (1953), Robert Francis Stephen (1954), William James (1955), Lawrence Andrew (1958), Barbara Bernadette (1960), John Tracy (1962), Maureen Bridget (1968) and Laurel Anne (1970).
Barbara Ann married Michael Gerrard and they had two sons, David and William.
The American branch started by John J. Seuling
As yet we know little about a third American Seuling branch that, according to our current, limited insight is headed by John J. Seuling and his spouse Anna Cushing. Living in and possibly around Olean, New York, they were the proud parents of five children. No further details are known regarding John J. Jr. and his sister Mary M. except their deaths before 1999. Their brother Edward W. – according to his November 1999 obituary – was a veteran of World War II, even a Pearl Harbor survivor, who retired from the U.S. Navy as a chief boatsman after twenty years of service. After his retirement he returned to Olean. According to our correspondent Barbara Seuling, his two sisters Catherine and Dorothy Seuling (4201 Massachusetts Avenue NW, Washington, D.C. 20016) share our interest in genealogy and hopefully can help us in completing the overview of the American branches and the roots that connect them to Germany[7].[8] Although further confirmation is needed, first telephone information suggests their father John was one of six children, probably three boys and three girls. He grew up in or around Buffalo, New York. As his father died young, much of the oral family history is lost; the last name of the grandmother of Catherine and Dorothy possibly was Volk.
[1] A Johann Andreas Seuling emigrated in 1767 with the ship “Sally” from Rotterdam by way of Cowes to Philadelphia. A Johann Andreas Seuling is also found on a Passenger Immigration Index (CD 354) and a Census index Colonial America, 1607-1689 (CD 310) in Pennsylvania. A Horace Seuling is registered in the New York Marriage Index 1630-1639 (CD 401).
[2] The name Zettmannsdorf appears in the family records.
[3] The information on the American branch of Nicholas Seuling was kindly provided by Ms. Barbara Seuling, 320 Central Park West, Apt. 6I, New York, NY 10025.
[4] (Zettmannsdorf? An Internet search showed that a very large group of more than 70 Seulings still lives near Zettmannsdorf, at least three of which – Lorenz, Siegfried, and Georg – live in the village itself.)
[5] Barbaraseuling.com.
[6] (Or is this niece Barbara Ann, the daughter of uncle Nicholas Frederick?)
[7] (Internet provides names and addresses of further American Seulings that as yet can not be retraced to the branches discussed above: Barbara (Londonderry, VT), Else E. and Rudolf K. (Peoria, AZ), H. (Esperance, NY), H. (Delanson, NY), Jean M. (Albany, NY; no reply to letter of April 1999), John H. (Farmingdale, NY), and Lorenz H. (Mukwonago, WI; no reply to letter of April 1999). Moreover, Carol Seuling is mentioned in a book “Women and the Comics” by Trina Robbins and Catherine Yronwode (Eclipse Books, 1985; p. 106). Ms. Janet Seuling is a graduate assistant at CIT. Finally, Michael Seuling lives in Duncan, BC, Canada.)
[8] (Internet search through Alta Vista – search for “Ancestry.com” – yielded some Social Security Death Index Results that we as yet could not place in the family tree of the American Seuling branches. These are: Anna (1895-1990), Christine (1907-1993 Suffolk, NY), Clara (1904-1993 Buffalo, NY), Henry (1911-1973 River Edge, NJ), Kaspar (1904-1971 Brooklyn Kings, NY), Lisa (1972-1994 probably Wisconsin), Louise (1902-1981 Flushing, NY), and Mary (1912-1974). Note: married women apparently are registered by their husband’s name.)