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George Carl
Tagtow family
Submitted
by Rita Tagtow-Ellsworth Aug.
2007
My grandfather was Carl John Tagtow, my father was
George Carl Tagtow. My mother, Katherine Viola Tagtow,
died May 24, 1940, and is buried in the plot (in the
Iona Cemetery) that was Grandpa Tagtow's ... he was
buried there and then Grandma had him moved to the
cemetery in Chamberlain. Lila Rose Tagtow was born
in 1915, and she lived just a short time. She is
buried on one side of Mom. Carl George was born in
1917, and died shortly after birth. He is buried
on one side of Mom. Carmen Viola was born in 1922,
she developed pneumonia, was taken to the Gregory
hospital and died three days later. She is buried
on one side of Mom. After Grandpa was moved to
Chamberlain, the three young children were buried in the
same grave ... one on top of the other and then when Mom
died, she was buried where Grandpa had been. I
believe this came about because of lack of money to buy
a plot.
This is information that my
oldest sister Phyllis wrote: Phyllis was born on
March 12, 1916, at the old Hickey place at Iona, (North)
where George and Katherine lived. Phyllis died on
October 13, 2003. Another older sister, Lorraine
Eleanor Ellerton, born October 24, 1918, at Sophie
(Tagtow) and Frank McGhee's home in Dixon. I, Rita
Joyce, was born at the ME Hospital in Mitchell on Jan.
30, 1934. Lorraine and her husband, Everett, my
husband, Aaron, and I try to get to the Iona cemetery at
least once a year before Memorial Day and sister
Phyllis used to accompany us before she moved back to
VA.
We have really appreciated
the care the Friendly Neighbor Club has taken of that
cemetery. This past May we noticed that the
crosses were there with the incorrect names and were not
in the correct place as we had been told
anyway. It was several years before we
three "girls" bought a headstone for our mother's
grave. Walter Moore bought it in Omaha and
brought it up to the cemetery. We think the
cemetery association has done a great job.
One of our family stories about
my mother, Katherine Kropenske Tagtow, was that she was
the first SD woman to be a licensed ferry boat pilot.
She and my father ran a ferry boat between Lower Brule
and Ft. Thompson on a government contract around 1930-38
----those aren't exact dates ---- I know they were
running it when I was born in 1934, and they ran
it when I was four years old. The boat's name was
The Phyllis-Lorraine after my two sisters. We lived
on the boat and in the winter we lived in (and later) on
a farm down by the river north of Iona and my father
trapped fish and hunted for a living along with my
mother, sister Phyllis and her husband, Walter
Moore.
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