AOL

In 1998 Matt and I visited the Czech Republic and Slovakia a second time.  In addition to visiting Drahovce again, I wanted to research the roots of my mother’s family, the Jondles.   I knew that they had come from Bohemia, which is now part of the Czech Republic, but I had no idea from which village or city.   Betty told me that her grandfather Michael had come to Iowa when he was a little boy, but that was all she knew.

A few weeks before we left for the trip I sent an email to all email addresses on AOL that had "Jondle" in the address.  That was back in the days when if you had an AOL account you could search all of their email addresses by name.  I sent out a request asking if anyone knew the history of the Jondle Family.  Before we left on the trip, I got a few replies from Jondles across the country.  However, none of them knew where the family had come from.

So we left on our two-week long trip with little hope of finding the origins of the Jondles. Then on our second to last day in Prague before our return flight to Iowa, I was checking my email at an internet café.  I had received a reply from a John Jondle who lived in Texas.  He had traced the family roots back to Netolice and Hrbov, which are a couple of hours drive south of Prague. He had been there himself a year or so earlier. He gave me the name and phone number of the Town Clerk in Netolice, where the Jondle family, (Čondl in Czech) had lived before coming to Iowa in 1869.   We had just enough time to rent a car and drive there. Vojtech Svec, the Town Clerk, showed us around the town and took us to the church where Michael Jondle (Betty’s grandfather) had been baptized. It was very gratifying to see the home villages of my mother's grandfather.

When we returned to Iowa I corresponded for a while with John Jondle’s father, who grew up in Fort Dodge, but was then living near Buffalo, New York.  He told me that there was a photo of the Jondle family in the possession of Marvin Stanik, whose deceased wife was a Jondle.  He had asked Stanik for a copy of the photo once but was not successful in getting one.  I wrote Mr. Stanik and told him that I would pay him if he took the photo to a photographer to have a copy made.  When visiting Clare I drove to the Stanik house, which was just down the road from Bohemian Hall to pick up the copy. I have been sharing the photo and the story of how the family came to American whenever I run into a Jondle.  You can see the photo in the April 29 post.

Here is a picture of Michael Jondle and his family. Michael came to Iowa From Southern Bohemia when he was one year old (click on the photo for a larger view). Michael and his wife Christina (maiden name Blaha) are seated. The small girl is Julia (Betty said that she had red hair and was deaf - she lost her hearing because of polio). Edward is the tall young man in the middle.  He was Betty’s father.  His brothers are Henry and William.  This photo was likely taken in a photographer's studio in Fort Dodge (there are several photos in the history book of St. Matthews Church in Clare that have the same fake church windows as a background).   I estimate that this photo was taken about 1910. It was given to Betty by her father or her grandparents.

When Pauline and Irvin Ball were first married, they shared a duplex with Michael and Christina Jondle. Pauline wrote that Christina was a sharp lady.  She knew that Pauline was pregnant with Doreen, before Pauline knew herself.