Louis Borko

-
 Louis Borko
1877-
Sections G131

    Louis Borko, AKA Lajos Borko, was born in Hungary in 1877 and is among the many immigrants that swarmed into this area from Eastern Europe at the turn of the last century – passing thru the famous Ellis Island immigration depot in New York City. Louis and his wife Julianna arrived here about 1902 but Julianna died a few years later in 1908.
    Louis ran a saloon / hotel at 221 Fillmore Ave in Gastown – Gastown being the area many of our Hungarian immigrants settled. In 1915 Louis fell ill and was taken to the Ernest Wende Hospital in Buffalo where he died shortly after.
    One last tragedy is connected with Louis. When funeral director Wattengel was transporting Louis’ body back to Tonawanda in his ambulance / hearse, he accidentally hit and killed a young bicyclist.
As with many gravestones in the Twin City’s cemeteries, the inscription is written in the language still spoken by our residents – in this case Hungarian. There are also gravestones here carrying inscriptions in Polish, Russian, German and Italian.





Julianna Szeles Borko



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Barron Brothers

-
Image
William Barron 1895-1918 Section: D12 Edward Barron 1899-1954 Section: D12      William and Edward Barron of Tonawanda were among the local men who joined the United States Marine Corps shortly after the United States entered World War I in 1917. They became part of the rapid military buildup that sent thousands of American troops overseas to France as part of the American Expeditionary Forces. The brothers were attached to the famous 5th Marine Regiment of the 2nd Division, one of the most heavily engaged American units of the war. They were among the early Marines sent into combat against German forces in France and spent months serving together in trenches, reserve positions, and active combat zones      In June 1918 the Marines were thrown into the fighting near Château-Thierry during the German spring offensives. The battles around Belleau Wood and Château-Thierry became some of the most important engagements involving American forces during the war. B...
Read more

GAR Monument

-
Image
GAR Monument Dedicated: Memorial Day 1910      The GAR monument that stands before you was the product of many groups coming together in 1910. The Winfield B. Scott GAR Post of Tonawanda, The Winfield B. Scott GAR Post Women's Relief Corps, and the Ladies Auxiliary raised money, organized, and planned the erection and dedication of this twenty plus foot monument. The statue of a Union soldier at the top alone cost $450. The base would have cost about the same. It was made by the White Bronze Monument Company in Bridgeport, Connecticut. The groups raised just over two thousand dollar, which would be around seventy-thousand dollar's today.       The monument was designed to memorialize the names of over two-hundred members of the Winfield B. Scott GAR Post living and dead at the time. It also recognized the other groups who helped make the monument possible.       Miss Onelee Edmonds was supposed to dedicate the monument after a grand...
Read more

Chester Fitzgerald

-
Image
                                                              Chester Fitzgerald 1896-1918 Section G115      The death of a child can change the course of a parent's life forever. This is the case when it comes to Chester Fitzgerald and his mother. Chester entered the military during WWI at the age of 22. He was assigned to  Co I of the 125 Infantry. He was sent to France to fight in the first World War. Chester was killed at the Meuse-Argonne Offensive. The war ended a month after his death, but Chester's story didn't.       Soldiers returning home from war told Chester's parents that he had not died. They claimed to have seen him in a hospital in France.  His parents contacted the Red Cross to find out if Chester was in fact alive. It wasn't long before word ...
Read more