JOSEPH VORBECK IN THE BRICK YARDS

Note from Bill Vorbeck, December 2007

JOSEPH VORBECK
ABOUT 1883

Joseph Vorbeck my grandfather Joseph Vorbeck sitting on cornices's prior to their being glazed - while he wait's for the men in the brick yard to load his train. The picture was taken about 1883.

Joseph and his train crew. Joseph is the one in the baseball hat. The man in the derby hat is the yard boss the one in the suit is the station master, and the one with the dog on the leash is the bull - Railroad Detective.

Joseph and his train crew. Joseph is the one in the baseball hat. The man in the derby hat is the yard boss the one in the suit is the station master, and the one with the dog on the is the bull - Railroad Detective.

The second photo was taken just a few days before Joseph was killed in a head-on collision with another train in Coffey-ton, Missouri, [that's between Sullivan and Bourbon Missouri - see page 126 in Vorbeck Book. the accident occurred April 1898.

Joseph's brother Henry Vorbeck also worked in the brick yards on Manchester. He lived with his daughter Maud Elizabeth Vorbeck-Riegel who married Louis Henry Riegel: they lived in the 6400 block of West Park four houses west of Tamm Avenue on the north side of the street. He walked from their to the brick yard where he worked. Henry worked there as a mold maker. He was a skilled craftman and made castings for architect's for their building. He died in 1934.

Maud and Louis had 4 daughters all went to St. James School. Agnes Maud, Celeste Marie, Jane Margaret, and Mary Catherine Aka Babe Riegel. She would have graduated from St. James in about 1949/50.

Bob Corbett adds: Given the cornices Joseph Vorbeck is sitting on, I would suspect it was the Winkle Terra Cotta Company was where he was working.