
Person Info
Rhea Pauline HONSBERGER: Birth: 26 FEB 1893 in Norfolk County, Ontario, Canada. Death: 15 JUL 1895 in Delhi, Windham Township, Norfolk County, Ontario, Canada
Robert Gordon McK HONSBERGER: Birth: 17 DEC 1896 in Berlin, Waterloo Township, Waterloo County, Ontario, Canada. Death: 17 AUG 1973 in Waterloo County, Ontario, Canada
Nina Stoddart HONSBERGER: Birth: 21 JUL 1900 in Berlin, Waterloo Township, Waterloo County, Ontario, Canada. Death: 15 JUL 1988 in Kitchener, Waterloo Region, Ontario, Canada
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Note: CC143 Doctor Honsberger received his early education in the district schools, going to school during the winter months and during the summer assisted on his fathers farm. But his ambitious young mind soon made him dissatisfied with his limited education, and the small opportunities that a farm life afforded for advancement. Accordingly at the age of 17, he with his brother began to prepare himself for the 3rd class teachers examination and with the help of the lady teacher who boarded in their home by improving every spare moment of studying till midnight after a hard days work on the farm. they passed the examination successfully. In the fall succeeding the examination he attended the model school in Caledonia, obtaining his certificate and at the beginning of the New Year, began teaching. After teaching for three years, he spent a term at the collegiate institute, Brantford and in July of 1880 passed a second class teachers examination there carrying off a scholarship given by that institution of proficiency. He next attended the normal school in Toronto obtaining his professional second class certificate and taught for two years more. But as often the case he was only using the profession of teaching as a stepping stone to something higher. Even since his boyhood, he made up his mind to be a doctor and now he was about to enter upon the fulfillment of that dream. In the fall of 1882, he began his medical course at Trinity Medical College, Toronto passing his examinations successfully at the end of each year and graduated in March of 1886 both from Trinity Medical College and Trinity University standing at the head of his class. A few weeks after, he sailed for England where he spent six months continuing his studies in the largest hospital and under the most distinguished physicians in London. Here he passed another examination taking the degree of Licentiate of the Royal college of physicians of England. He returned in November and in the following spring Located in Delhi, a thriving little town in Norfork County, Ontario, Canada where he has worked a large part of his life. 1901 Canadian Census - had lodger John E. Biles born 9 June 1872 and domestic Mary Helgastna born 30 May 1879. DR. J.F. HONSBERGER (from Simcoe Reformer 11 Nov 1937 p. 3) Kitchener, Nov. 9: Dr. J.F. Honsberger, for 42 years a medical practitioner in Kitchener and a reeve of Kitchener when it was a town, died today at his residence, 97 Frederick St. he was born in Cayuga and for a time lived in Delhi. Dr. Honsberger was medical director for the Mutual Life Assurance Company. He was the founder of Freeport Sanatorium and a member of the Board of Directors. He was also on the Board of Directors of the Y.M.C.A. His wife and one daughter predeceased him. Surviving are one son, Gordon MacK Honsberger, a Kitchener barrister; one daughter, Mrs. Harold Wagner, of Waterloo; and two grandchildren. Two brothers, J.O. Honsberger and George H. Honsberger, both of Toronto, also survive. Dr. Honsberger’s funeral will be held from his late residence on Friday to Trinity United Church at 1:45 p.m.. Interment will be made in Delhi cemetery in the family plot. The Record 30 Mar 2012 (on-line) Flash from the Past: Kitchener corner property held home of Dr. J.F. Honsberger From Busy Berlin: 20th...Honsberger homeThe home and medical office of Dr. J. F. Honsberger still stands at Frederick and Weber streets in Kitchener. It now holds the Dental Solutions clinic of Dr. Mike Narayansingh.12 .In the summer of 1895 a 35-year-old medical doctor sold his rural practice in Delhi, Ont., and moved to Berlin (now Kitchener), where over the next 40 years he would play a key role in projects and institutions involving everything from health and education to politics and the church. Last week’s “mystery” photo shows the three-storey house at 97 Frederick St. where Dr. Jerome Fry Honsberger saw patients and resided with his wife, Alberta, and their children, Gordon and Nina. It still stands at Frederick and Weber streets, now the only building on the block - apart from the huge seven-storey Waterloo Region courthouse that’s under construction and to open in 2013. The home’s front balcony and two verandas have been gone for years and the building - it now holds a dental clinic - is so close to the street it’s hard to believe that it once had a front lawn, way back when Frederick and Weber were both two-lane streets. “It is amazing that this house still survives,” Margaret Rowell emailed from Wilmot Township, correctly identifying the building, which in recent decades has held medical and law offices. “I worked there for 33 years andI miss it,” emailed Anna Steffler, a real estate law clerk. “The interior retains all of the old charm of buildings from that era.” The house was likely built about the same time the Honsbergers arrived in Berlin, but exactly when isn’t clear. In 1935, two years before his death, the doctor published an interesting memoir (a copy of The Life of Dr. J.F. Honsberger is in the Grace Schmidt Room of Local History at the Kitchener Public Library) but it barely mentions his residence. The Honsberger house wasn’t the first building on the corner lot. Reminiscences of Berlin by Jacob Stroh, an article published by the Waterloo Historical Society in its 1930 volume, says this: “On the corner, now occupied by Dr. Honsberger’s residence, (there was) a two story brick building, for some time the residence of Sheriff (George) Davidson. Before that, 1840 -1860, Jacob Kramer occupied the building as a tavern.” Honsberger was born Oct. 6, 1959, near Fry’s Corners in the Township of South Cayuga, south of Hamilton near Lake Erie. He was a school teacher for about five years before enrolling at Trinity Medical School in Toronto in 1882. In his memoir he described the horror of an initiation rite he endured there when classmates tossed dissected animals parts at him. For several days, he wrote, he was unable to eat. In 1886 Honsberger continued his studies at the Royal College of Physicians in London, England, then returned to Canada to set up a medical practice in Delhi. Once in Kitchener, his work was focused on obstetrics and medical exams for life insurance firms. He was also a Waterloo County coroner for 33 years. Near the end of his career, in 1921, he joined the Mutual Life Assurance Co. in Waterloo as medical director and held that post until 1929. In the community, Honsberger was a co-founder of the Freeport Sanatorium for tuberculosis patients, served as a school trustee and municipal councillor, became a Liberal Party candidate, served on the YMCA board of directors for 40 years, founded a local branch of the League of Nations Society, helped raise funds to build today’s Trinity United Church . . . the list goes on and on. Following Honsberger’s death (he and his wife Alberta, who died in 1936, are buried in a Delhi cemetery) the building at 97 Frederick became the residence and law office of his son, Gordon. The Honsbergers’ daughter, Nina, married Harold Wagner, a Mutual Life administrator who for many years was a Waterloo school trustee and municipal councillor. They had two sons, Bob and Paul. In an interview this week, Bob Wagner, a former Kitchener councillor, said he was born in 1930 and has only a very few memories of his grandparents. “I can remember being babysat by them in that house. And I have a memory of sitting in the front room there, waiting for my parents to get back from a trip they had taken to Detroit,” he said. In an emailed message, Wagner noted: “On the left behind the house was a carriage house which would have held (Honsberger’s) horse and buggy in early days and auto thereafter.” Wagner said that his mother, Nina, used to say the Frederick Street house sometimes “made her a little nervous” as a girl because she could look out and see prisoners being escorted to and from the county courthouse on the other side of Weber Street. Paul Wagner, who was born in 1935, said he remembers little about his grandparents but is very interested in their former home. “It’s wonderful that it’s still there,” he said. Mary Lou (Wagner) Thompson of Kitchener, Bob Wagner’s daughter, wrote by email to say she immediately recognized her great-grandfather’s home in the photo. “Dr. Honsberger was the city coroner for many years and kept a wooden coffin in the attic of this house to be used to transport bodies,” she wrote. “Two years ago when my family heard that the owners had sold the house, I paid a visit to have a good look around and found this same coffin still in the attic.” [email protected] |
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