Jakob Von Lausser grew up in Stuttgart, Germany. He married Wilhelmins Stein,from Berlin, and came to the U.S. where Von Lausser was changed to Lawser, probably by the clerks at Ellis Island. The Lawser's first home in America was Leroy, NY.
Anna, Charles, Rudolph, Louise, ("Babe"), and Katherine were born in New York between 1855 and 1865. Anna and Charles died in childhood of scarlet fever. "Babe" told of how Annie's body was kept in her coffin, in the parlor, all winter because the ground was too frozen to dig a grave. Katherine survived the scarlet fever epidemic, but it left her deaf in one ear.
Jacob and Wilhelmina moved to Philadelphia where Jacob worked for Bergner's Brewery. He was eventually promoted to Secretary-Treasurer of Bergner's. Wilhelmina, Frederick and Emily were born in Philadelphia. When Emily was just a baby, Jacob's first wife died of heart trouble - she was in her 40's.
Jacob remarried to Emma Fuss, and they had three children: Gertrude, Edwin, and Gerald (born 10/5/1894).
Frederick enlisted in the U. S. Calvary when he was seventeen. He contracted malaria during his tour in the Spanish-American War, and charged San Juan Hill with his compatriots.
Wilhelmina ("Min") caught typhoid fever when she was in her twenties, but lived to her fifties, when she developed cancer.
Emily flew in World War I, married twice, and had one daughter. Emily died in her fifties when she developed cancer.
Katherine never married, but had a career as a nurse. She too died of heart diseasein her fifties. There is an amusing story about when Katherine was caring for Gerald's wife, who was quite ill with pneumonia, right around 1920. Katherine believed Louise to be in a wekened condition due to delivering four babies in five years. She admonished her younger brother, suggesting that she should "hang it out the window and lower the sash"!
Louise ("Babe") married and was widowed after ten years. She died at the age of 74, in 1937 or 1938, of heart trouble.
Rudolph married twice, and had one child with each wife. Elizabeth, born in 1910, married Frank Dudley Haines, twelve years her senior. Frank was a buyer of antiques, and had traveled all over the world for his employer. After the Great Depression, with no market for luxuries, Frank and Elizabeth went into children's theater. They devoted their lives to hand carving marionettes and presenting classic stories to children. They did advertising for such clients as the Dairy Council, visited schools with their productions, and worked in films, television, and radio. When they grew tired of trouping with the marionettes, Frank and Elizabeth began researching a project in the history of marriage customs. They carved, dressed, and biographed representative brides through the centuries. =The Haines' brides have traveled all over the country, and the Early American Brides have been recorded in a book of the same title, published in 1982. (Hobby House Press, Inc. Cumberland, MD). Frank and Elizabeth have given with the brides, a piece of history and a piece of their special love for each other.
Gertrude married Frederick Anne and they had three children: Freferick, Gertrude, and Richard. Gertrude, like her father Jacob, suffered from ti-de-la-rue. Frederick, Jr. became a doctor. One of his daughters died of encephalitis in 1960 - she was one of the first documented cases of the dread infection transmitted by mosquitos.
Jacob died of "a complication of diseases". His second wife Emma, died of sarcoma of the leg.
In 1914 Gerald married Louise Marie Schmitt. They lived in Philadelphia during the years their children were born: North Colorado St., North Twentieth St., and South Alden St. Herbert Jacob was born 3/19/1915 and married Elizabeth Davis on 6/24/1939. They had three children. Richard, born on 1/30/1916, died at the age of 24 of sarcoma of the mediastinum. Ruth was born 1/19/1918 and married Albert Krivulka on 6/11/49. Their name was changed to Kirk after their three children were born. Robert James was born 9/2/19 and married Barbara Claire Allen on 1/1/43. He served in the U.s. Air Force during World War II and worked for the Pennsylvania Railroad. He is also an accomplished artist. Rober and Barbara had two children, and were divorced in 1983.
Gerald died at the age of 79 of a cerebrovascular accident.