Lester George Guiff (1856-1899)

Lester George Guiff > Mabel (Guiff) Thimlar > Lester Charles Thimlar > Sharon (Thimlar) Taylor > Me 

My 2x great grandfather

Celestro "Lester" George Guiff was born March 26, 1856 in Allen County, Indiana. His parents were Jean John Claude Guiff and Matilda Brown Guiff, both originally from France. They settled in Perry, Indiana, in an alcove of French immigrants who had come from France to flee the rolling succession of revolutionary upheavals that plagued France in the mid 1800. His parents were farmers, just as he would become. 

Lester's father immigrated from France in 1847 with his brothers. They landed in New Orleans, Louisiana and then headed to Indiana to settle down. Their family was close knit, with his parents, uncle Victor and uncle Paul all living in farms next to each other. You can imagine Lester grew up in the 1860 surrounded by his cousins, playing games and doing chores in the acres of fields and vegetable gardens. An obituary for his uncle Francois in 1910 noted that he was born in Department of Saonne, France, so one can assume that Lester's father may also from this area. I have ordered additional records from Allen County to learn more about where this branch of the family was from in France. 

Modern day Saône-et-Loire (Department of Saonne)

Lester was the third of nine children born to Claude and "Tildie". It appears that all of the three girls and six boys except one made it out of the treacherous time of infancy and early childhood in the 19th century and lived well into the 20th century. 

On April 17, 1877, when he was 21 years old, he married a 19-year-old local girl, Mary Emily Pepe. Emily's parents were also from France. After their marriage, the 1880 census finds Lester and Emily living in the farm next to his parents with their first born child, John. 

Land records showing the farms of Lester Guiff, Emily Guiff and her father, Louis Pepe

You can see the land Lester farmed today, a few miles from Thimlar road outside Fort Wayne, Indiana.

 A directory in 1891 listed Lester Guiff as a farm laborer, but by 1895 he had moved onto his own 20 acre farm. By the time of his death in 1900 the land was valued at $780. His wife had an adjacent plot of 20 acres in her name as well, which sat next to 40 acres owned by her father, Louis Pepe. I suspect her father had a hand in their acquisition of the neighboring plots, although I could not find anything to support this one way or another. 

After baby John came a steady procession of children, seven in all: John, Rosa C, Florence Mary, George Andrew, Julia A, Emmett Charles and Mabel Eugene, our ancestor. The children came about two years apart, with baby sister Mabel Eugene arriving 10 years after her brother Emmett. Like Lester's siblings, all of his children lived well into their 70s. 

center front - John and Hattie Stoll Guiff, surrounding from left to right, George, 

Julia, Mable, Florence, Rose and Blanche

Rosa, Florence and John

Lester himself was not so lucky. He passed away on September 11, 1899 at the age of 43 of unknown causes, five months after the arrival of baby Mabel. His wife lived for almost 40 more years and never remarried, dying in 1938 of heart disease in the home of her daughter Mabel. She was buried with Lester in Harlan Cemetery in Indiana, along with many of their children. 

Lester's parents, like many of the French immigrants in the area, were Roman Catholics. It appears Lester may have drifted from the church in his lifetime given that he was not buried in a Catholic cemetery as his parents and many siblings were.